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Tours

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Saved by Paul Baker
on January 18, 2012 at 12:00:40 pm
 

ECHOES OF SILENCE

US TOUR: FEBRUARY 16 - MARCH 12, 2012

UK TOUR: AUTUMN 2011

 

Peace. Justice. Beauty. One People. One Planet. Workers, not 'Stars'.

____________________________________________________________________________

 

PRESENTATION 2012

 

Another World is Possible – Join us in Building It!

 

Echoes' co-ordinator Paul Baker Hernandez, is part of the Latin American renaissance movement currently building a sustainable society and future via fair trade, solidarity and caring for the Earth. A passionate environmentalist (as a hermit monk he made the guitar he still plays from an old table and toilet seat), he lives in a Nicaraguan shanty town digging waste water ditches and building houses with recycled plastic bottles. On tour he celebrates a host of wonderful workers from the global peace, justice and ecological movements encountered along the road via songs, stories and their practical projects. Paul offers examples of daily, personal experience of the positive impact of the Bolivarian Alliance of the Peoples of the Americas (ALBA) on the lives of ordinary people impoverished by savage consumerism, working within the burgeoning Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) to forge a genuinely new world order based on justice, solidarity and eco-balance instead of greed, waste and dog-eat-dog.

 

   Paul has decades of experience working with hands-on projects, and, through his regular music/speaking tours, of moving people to believe in themselves and in what we can accomplish working together. He's as at home meeting with faith communities and labor unions as he is with solidarity groups and folk clubs, exiles', women's, peace, ecological organizations, schools, colleges and house concerts, radio and tv; and he and the guitar have played to houses as small as two and as large as 300,000. Paul has worked in Chile with Joan Turner Jara, Víctor Jara's widow, to help take back the stadia used as death camps during the 1973 Nixon/Kissinger/Pinochet coup; he has also served as human shield for Salvadoran exiles under death squad attack in Los Angeles CA, and invaded Queen Elizabeth's private castle with a bevy of bishops to protest Britain's nuclear weapons. He is married to former teenage Sandinista revolutionary fighter, Fatima Hernández Chavarria, who now dedicates herself full-time to voluntary education and health projects in their local marginalized neighborhood, La Primavera, Managua. They have 3 children. Paul's tours help support these projects and keep the kids in beans.

 

 

All presentations in English and/or Spanish.

 

 

Accommodation: sofa/floor/food for one aged but still agile person and small undemanding guitar.

Transport: cheapest. Assistance with fares appreciated.

Equipment needed: where necessaary two mikes with pedestals, one stool, a glass of red

Fee. Whatever local group can manage plus assistance with travel expenses

 

 

More information on Echoes of Silence projects: http://www.echoesofsilence-ecosdelsilencio.pbworks.com

 

 

Bookings: echoespaul@tortillaconsal.com



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That Expletives-Deleted Cellphone!” and other Inspirational Ditties

 

Once a silent monk, Echoes of Silence coordinator Paul Baker Hernandez was thrown out of his Trappist monastery for secretly making a guitar from a toilet seat and other recycled oddments. 40 years on, the reincarnated toilet has led him to invade queen's castles over nuclear weapons (heading up a posse of bishops), confront popes with protest songs, join Jackson Browne and Martin Sheen on Central American picket lines, and help fight off death squads attacking Salvadoran exiles in Los Angeles.    He now lives in Nicaragua where he has founded Echoes of Silence (artists with broken nails) to work in fair trade, community and eco-projects - and to make up irreverent songs about cellphones, dictators, and even Starbucks.  With his unusual blend of humor, practical experience and beautifully powerful music, Paul is currently preparing a renewed tour of Scotland, England and Wales for October/November, 2011.

 

Fuller Information (and please see Articles):

Bookings: please contact Echoes of Silence directly at: echoespaul@tortillaconsal.com - Thank you.

 

Songs of Loveliness and Courage

Paul Baker Hernández – Eco-Minstrel

 

  While a silent Trappist monk, Paul secretly concocted a guitar from a toilet seat and other scraps. The resulting lovely instrument inspired him to ‘become another Bob Dylan. Only quieter’. 40 years on, still together, they continue to celebrate beauty, peace and creative recycling(!), offering hope-filled action where planetary and financial meltdown threaten paralysis.  Paul's ‘Ode to Starbucks’ and ‘That Expletives-deleted Cellphone!’ inspire laughter and listeners’ own creativity, while the passionate beauty of flamenco guitar, US/Latin American songs of struggle, and even Scottish traditional music moves people to take action for justice.  'I Thought I Heard Sweet Víctor, Singing in the Night', written by Paul in the house of Victor Jara, Chile’s martyred singer-songwriter, is for many their finest song ever.

  

   After living with Salvadoran exiles in Los Angeles to help ward off death squads attacking them even in Hollywood, Paul moved to a shanty town in Managua, Nicaragua, one of the world’s most-impoverished countries. There he works with grassroots projects to roll back global warming, and coordinates Echoes of Silence and Women, Water, War, a hope-filled response to the global economic/ecological crisis. Signatories to WWW require governments to commit 1% of all military budgets - and personnel - to provide every person on earth with fresh water, so beginning to roll back global warming and the build-down of weapons and war, while providing a fitting memorial to all those who suffered and died in the belief that their sacrifice would finally bring peace to the world. (http://waternotwar.pbwiki.com)

   

    The Autumn tour will raise awareness, money and other support for these vital programs, plus help maintain the full-time but unpaid health, education and community work of Fátima, Paul's Nicaraguan wife. Last, but not least, it will also help ‘keep the family in beans’.

 

    Over the years, Paul has sung with Inti Illimani and Joan Jara, Carlos Mejia Godoy, Jackson Browne and Martin Sheen; and for Britain's largest-ever crowd, 300,001 (the one was the Pope). He's led a posse of bishops on an anti-nuclear invasion of Queen Elizabeth’s private castle at Balmoral, taken part in peace and justice festivals from Chile to Canada, driven in solidarity caravans to Cuba and El Salvador, worked as in-country staff-person for the US Nicaragua Network and the UK Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign, published a couple of books, translated and recorded Victor Jara's songs, and generally had a high old time. He shares all this via concerts, lectures, homilies, workshops, conferences, classes, etc. shaping his presentations to the interests of his listeners as nuch as possible.  

    Neither he nor the guitar eats a lot, they ride the (cheapest) dog and much prefer homestays to hotels. So expenses are really low. Fees depend on the capacity of the inviting group. Although fund-raising is important to keep the work going, helping build a truly global community is primary. So just 'the door' and/or 'passing the hat' are fine. 

 

Echoes of Silence and Tour information: http://echoesofsilence-ecosdelsilencio.pbwiki.com

Bookings: paulbaker2004@yahoo.com or echoespaul@tortillaconsal.com – (505) 22 49 0979

 

 

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