Is it strange that whenever someone mentions awards one of the things I think of is the “Montgomery Burns Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Excellence” from the Simpsons? Anyone else remember that episode?

The League of Young Voters is teaming up with The Bollard to give a little love to Portland’s unnoticed worker bees.

The Step Up to the Plate awards, will be a first-of its kind – an award show where the people getting the trophies won’t be musicians, actors, athletes or other people who could be identified without the need for a Google search.

At least that is the theory. Since the nominations, and eventual voting will be up to the public, anyone could be nominated for fields such as:

Urban Ecologist
Healthy Lifestyle Educator
Technology Maven

And the list goes on. It’s a good idea in theory and hopefully it will work out in practice. (Also, feel free to nominate your favorite youth/bacon/pop culture blogger. There is a signed photo in it for you.)

Should be a solid event no matter who gets the hardware. As anyone who has been to The League’s last few parties can attest to, they realize that raising awareness and community involvement works just fine when you do it to music and beer.

I never really took to an instrument as a kid. There was a brief stint with the violin, which ended badly after I abandoned practices but still showed up for the recital. Then there was the drums, an idea I was behind but my mother never really seemed to back.

My point is, how cool is it that kids can go to Rock Camp now?
The Portland Conservatory of Music has been putting on the camp series for a couple of years now and has produced great results. Not only do kids have a better alternative than trips to the lake with the family, but they’re able to get music careers off the ground early.
I was really sad to hear the first hip-hop summer camp had been postponed, but it sounds like they are pushing things off to create a better camp. The idea was simple in some ways, but not in others – duplicate rock camp for the kids who are into rap.
Imagine getting to learn about how to get into the business, make demos, talk to the press in the morning, and then in the afternoon getting your hands on the mics and turntables. Sounds pretty sweet to me.
Keep an eye out for the camp as they tell me they’ll start holding sessions over the next several months.

It’s not the Battle for Shaker Heights* How tempting is the idea to take part in the 48 Hour Film project? The challenge of trying to put together something that is not just passable as a film, but also original is very alluring. Sure everyone has some sort of movie making dreams, maybe it was seeing “Bad Boys II” and thinking “THAT ROCKED” or “The Shipping News” and thinking “I could have done better than that.”

Of course potential drawbacks include sleeplessness, anxiety, and fear of failure (or, of course, real failure).

I know there’s more than a few amateur and real filmmakers out there – why not have some fun with it. I will issue a challenge right here, right now – if you’ve putting together an “A-Team” to work on the 48 Film Project, I will feature you in my weekly column. (read: FREE ADVERTISING)
Maybe we could even get some live blogging going on something like that?

And of course, I am available for any acting gigs. An 8x10 glossy headshot is available for interested parties.

* See, Project Green Light, also Shia LeBeouf

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