First Speakers

A language is lost every fourteen days. One of those endangered tongues is Minnesota’s own Ojibwe language. Now a new generation of Ojibwe scholars and educators are racing against time to save the language. Working with the remaining fluent-speaking Ojibwe elders, they hope to pass the language on to the next generation. But can this language be saved? Told by Ojibwe elders, scholars, writers, historians and teachers, this tpt original production is filled with hope for the future. (http://www.tpt.org/?a=productions&id=3)

Film Composer Brent Michael Davids is the country's top award-winning American Indian composer, and a citizen of the Mohican Nation. In 1996, Davids composed his first feature film score, commissioned by the Santa Fe International Film Festival, for "Silent Enemy" (1929: Paramount) that was performed live-to-picture at the Grand Illusion Theater. Considered the senior fellow of American Indian composers, the world's most celebrated ensembles have commissioned him, including the Kronos Quartet, Joffrey Ballet, Chanticleer and the National Symphony.

His original music scores, for films like "Dreamkeeper," "The World of American Indian Dance," "The Business of Fancy Dancing," and "Raccoon & Crawfish," have appeared on ABC, NBC, Hallmark, PBS, and on radio broadcasts for NPR, NAPT and AIROS, including "A Prairie Home Companion" show. With two university degrees, Davids trained at Redford's Sundance Institute with Shirley Walker (A League Of Their Own), and apprenticed in London with Stephen Warbeck (Shakespeare In Love). A Great Film Needs A Great Composer! www.filmcomposer.us