Today we’d like to introduce you to Hello Noon: Stephen Spies, Danielle Castrence, Kyle Dombroski, Rory Shively, Kate Bacich, and Rebecca Bacich.
Hello Noon came together sharing music with each other while music students at UCLA. With six members, the band has an anthemic, orchestral rock sound with the instrumentation of viola, piano, electric guitar, bass, drums, uke, and lots of group singing.
They immediately realized their shared passion for serving others through musical performance. Since then, they have performed for the Special Olympics 50th Anniversary–“Pier Del Sol”–at the Santa Monica Pier, the Healthy Campus Initiative celebration at Pauley Pavilion (UCLA), the LA Cancer Challenge run to end pancreatic cancer and Angel City Games for Paralympic athletes at Drake Stadium (UCLA). They also made a music video with the UCLA Mattel Children’s Hospital and just released a video today, July 9th, with the Special Olympics!
Hello Noon’s creative process tends to revolve around lyrics, and how to emotionally communicate the story behind them.
Stephen Spies, singer, and guitarist in the band wrote the song “Help You” about his experience working with homeless youth. He is a songwriting, recording, and music producing instructor with the organization My Friend’s Place, which provides numerous resources for homeless youth (13-25 yrs old) in Hollywood. He’s always amazed by the incredible singers, songwriters, and performing musicians who attend his workshop, and wrote this song out of hope that their talent will one day be discovered and they won’t need to live on the street anymore.
Danielle Castrence, singer and ukulele player in the band, wrote the song Into Place about being in a dark place and finding friends to help you out of it.
Once the song is written, each member of the band comes up with their own part to the song, and that’s basically it! There is no criticism towards anyone’s parts, no producer involved, no arranger involved. We all trust each other to simply add to the song as we feel and guide the songwriting process based on instinct.
Have things improved for artists? What should cities do to empower artists?
We feel that the biggest challenge for artists today is to stay true and genuine to your art. There are so many opportunities now to write very specific types of music, cater to specific trends, and get certain sponsorships that the business opportunities in the industry can overshadow the pure, unadulterated creative side of the process. Our goal as a band is to always make music that we would want to listen to, and always release videos and content that we deeply and truly believe in!
Do you have any events or exhibitions coming up? Where would one go to see more of your work? How can people support you and your artwork?
Our music video for our song “Run Free” has just been released today, July 9th! For this project, we teamed up with Special Olympics Los Angeles to make a music video showcasing Special Olympics athletes in Los Angeles. The video features three athletes: Caley Versfelt, Cole Sibus, and Jared Cozak. We meet them through interviews, sport demonstrations, and a performance of “Run Free” with Hello Noon, focusing on their abilities as opposed to their disabilities. Hello Noon created this video to celebrate neurodiversity and highlight the intelligence, kindness, and positivity Special Olympics Athletes demonstrate that we can all learn from! You can watch this video on the Hello Noon YouTube channel!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.hellonoon.com/
- Email: hellonoonband@gmail.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hellonoonband/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/hellonoonband
- Other: Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWueNpv7aNpJTjS9kxzMhFg Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/2yhVGqgmlamDBztmgQHzaP?si=fpcqIp02QBKllN7JV1c2Lw
Image Credit:
Photographers: Marco Bacich, Andre Misyutin, Nick Lie
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