Heavy Color scores Mark Ruffalo produced documentary on Rights of Nature Movement | Premieres 9.4.20
Earthwork Music's Heavy Color (Ben Cohen and Sam Woldenberg) have composed the score for the forthcoming Invisible Hand, a Mark Ruffalo-produced documentary on the Rights of Nature Movement which premieres this Friday, September 4, 2020 at 6PM EST.
When the quarantine was announced in Ohio, my wife had just given birth to our first son, Isaiah, a little over a month before. He was healthy, happy, fragile and impossible to comprehend. Like so many people around the world, our first few weeks of the lockdown were defined by a frantic listing between extremes. Oscillating between the purity and joy of watching our child smile for the first time and the darkness and grief brought on by the ongoing pandemic and deeply rooted injustice from which our society was born and is struggling to break free. Balancing on one foot and jumping to the other.
I approached the directors of the documentary Invisible Hand not just as a part of Heavy Color but as a member of Earthwork Music, representing the ongoing environmental activism that is a core principle of the collective.
Invisible Hand tells the stories of those who are protecting their communities by challenging unsustainable and dangerous policies through uphill legal battles, peaceful occupation and deep resilience. The Rights of Nature Movement is slowly but surely gaining momentum across the world. This is the first documentary that focuses on the effects that Rights of Nature legislation can can have in protecting our air, water and earth.
I reached out because I am impossibly saddened by the destruction of our eco-systems in the name of profit. I am impossibly angry by the corporate power to determine what is safe and what isn’t for our watersheds, our rivers and our lakes.
When they asked us to compose music for the film it felt like the perfect project to focus our energies. It was an honor for Heavy Color to have composed the score for this powerful film.
As artists we are always striving to find a balance between the abstract and the representative. It is a truly special moment for us as musicians and composers to be able to make meaningful work that speaks to our ideals as much as this project has.
When composing the movements for the film, we approached the different themes by assigning them elemental properties.
Each of the musicians we worked with embodied these themes so fully that the music would not breathe in the same way without their voices. They are: Patrick Booth (Winds, Horns) Estar Cohen (Voice) Mike Savina (Electric Guitars) Jeffrey Niemeier (Electric and Acoustic Violin) and Wesley Hornpetrie (Cello). The soundtrack itself is being released by Curious Music on Vinyl and Compact Disc and pre-orders are up at their site www.curiousmusic.us
Invisible Hand is produced and narrated by actor and activist Mark Ruffalo, directed by Joshua Pribanic and Melissa Troutman for Public Herald and researched, filmed, edited and made possible by so many more dedicated people than I can name here.
The world premiere is Friday, September 4th at 6:00 PM EST, and will feature a live Q+A with the directors Joshua and Melissa, producer Mark Ruffalo, Markie Miller (from Toledo!) representing the Lake Erie Bill of Rights and Degawena:Da's of the Wolf Clan Seneca Nation of Indians speaking and answering questions about how this movement can create the systematic cultural change we need.
Ticket info and Trailer for the film at www.invisiblehandfilm.com
Album info at www.curiousmusic.us
In joy and uncertainty.
Ben Cohen of Heavy Color
