Last summer, Brad “Braddigan” Corrigan and the indie band Dispatch played in front of a roaring crowd at Madison Square Garden in New York City — one of the grandest musical venues in the world. But Braddigan is also accustomed to playing in a trash dump in Nicaragua.
For the past two years, Braddigan has been making an annual trek to this Central American nation to play in the “Dia de Luz” or “Day of Light” festival, in which the Nicaraguan community and American students come together through art to see what life and culture are like in one of the world’s poorest countries.
The day centers around Corrigan’s performance in the dump and the acknowledgment of the organizations that have helped build the community. Participants paint murals, fly kites and dance. The meshing of art happens during the festival there because it is where much of the local community is forced to live.
Stage to screen
Corrigan’s experience at the 2008 festival on March 6 is the subject of a 30-minute documentary that will be released this fall. His manager and co-director of “Love Light and Melody” James Kenly, said the “Day of Light” documentary will be finished in time for a screening in Boston in November.
“The documentary shows the day when people break down cultural, religious and racial barriers until people are face-to-face with humanity,” KC Dewey, the director of the festival, said. “The people there are choosing to be fully present in their lives, to walk with them. There are murals flying over the trash, music and the most beautiful mural on the side of the school that speaks of hope. The dump that felt vacant becomes a total festival and a celebration of life and love.”
For Corrigan, performing at the festival — meant to promote embracing new cultures — offered a personal growing experience. The first 10 times he visited the community, Corrigan stayed in the car with the windows up while he watched children play barefoot in piles of trash and fires light up the sky of the Central American slum.
Dewey said he shared a similar, fearful, first impression of the dump.
“When you enter the dump for the first time, you see the spectrum of light and darkness. It is the closest depiction of hell I’ve ever seen,” Dewey said. “There is fire, dust and vultures. Then you drive a little farther and see a shanty house built on the trash and little children who are full of life playing outside, a total visual contrast.”
Take my hand
But Braddigan is no longer the distanced celebrity. While driving through the tattered community in 2007, a 13-year-old-girl named Ileana stopped Braddigan’s taxi, he said, forcing him to take notice. When he opened the door, she tugged at his hand and pulled him out of the car. Her story was almost unbelievable. Ileana said she was HIV positive. More than that, the adolescent was infected with syphilis and addicted to sniffing glue. Life for this vibrant girl, like the lives of so many of her peers, was extremely difficult. Corrigan knew at that moment that he had to do something to make a difference.
Since he met Ileana, Braddigan has told her story, and the story of her community, through concerts, slideshows and now his documentary.
Recalling the experience while tuning his acoustic guitar and playing the opening riffs to “Ileana” backstage at the Martin Luther King Jr. Peace Concert at Boston University last semester, Corrigan said, “I felt afraid, angry and unprepared. I felt this burden like there has to be a better way, and I’m not going to pretend that these people don’t exist. A lot of our fear is intended to rob us from meeting the most precious, incredible people.”
Corrigan does not consider himself a rock star. Unlike many famous musicians, he does not go through guitars every week. He has been strumming the same axe since he started performing. He traded his tight rock-star jeans and shaggy hairdo for something more cleaned up as he matured as a performer. Before shows he blends in and mingles with the audience, standing in the back to watch the tech crew set up microphones and drums.
Being Trendy
Corrigan hopes his documentary can start a trend of trying to play for a greater value. Music, in Braddigan’s mind, should not be about selling out big venues — like MSG, which Dispatch has sold out three times — it should be about bringing people together and achieving real results.
Braddigan created “Love Light and Melody” to help achieve these goals. The organization is committed to facilitating art programs, dance camps and helping to build the educational systems in the Nicaraguan community. LLM hired a person to live in the dump to provide support for the people that are forced to call it home. Corrigan believes that music is about connecting to individuals and minded this concept when creating his charity. The documentary and the festival highlight what Corrigan’s charity can accomplish.
“Our documentary is a way of bridging the gap on a tangible level that people can understand. We want to find ways to bring this story to life. The medium we are using is to inform people,” Dewey said.
Braddigan fan Russ Silva was able to preview the rough cut of “Day of Light” in Londonderry, N.H. this summer and participated in a question-and-answer session after the showing. He walked away from it feeling conflicted by the contrasting images of children with dirt from head to toe cutting to the same children with pressed and clean uniforms for school.
“It was conflicting because it was beautiful and sad at the same time,” he said.
Silva said going to see Braddigan concerts has given him the opportunity to watch the story in Nicaragua evolve. When Corrigan talked about Ileana and the dump, Silva said it got him on the LLM website and inspired him and his wife to make a donation.
Corrigan and the band recognize Silva and his wife at the shows. At the concerts, Silva has been able to make a connection with other audience members, the band and the community in Nicaragua. Corrigan attempts to make the personal connections during his performances.
“If you stay connected to [Corrigan], you get to see the whole story line. It’s not a one-time deal, it’s someone’s life,” Silva said. “If [Corrigan] sees you at another show, he’ll recognize you. The more you see them, the more they want to see you.”
Working the crowd
“There was something special about the way Braddigan conducted himself during the show,” Silva said. “I’m older — in my 40s — and went with my family. During the show a couple times Braddigan came down and spoke to the audience and asked them to calm down and to focus on what the concert was really about. The point the band wanted to make was that this is for charity when all the crowd want to do was listen to music.”
If Corrigan can get his fans to realize there is more than just music, his vision as seeing the world as a single community will be recognized. Stories like Ileana’s can bridge the gap from a grim past to a promising future. Corrigan hopes LLM supporters will follow the story of the Nicaraguan community.
“In a couple of years, I think there is going to be a beautiful story about how that burning trash dump is now a park upon a lake and how a lot of those families will have transitioned into a new life.”