The subjects were around back then, but none of the singers, of course, were remotely close to being born in 1972 when Bill Withers penned and sang the classic tune Lean On Me.
Students from Coldstream’s Kidston Elementary sung the song to honour veterans on Remembrance Day 2020, and dedicated the song and accompanying music video to beloved kindergarten teacher Margot MacDougall, who retired earlier in 2020.
“I’ve been working on this since September,” said Kidston kindergarten to Grade 7 music, drama and dance teacher Melissa Jacobs, who is also owner/operator of Inspire Kindness Productions, a company that specializes in events and produces films that inspire kindness in the community.
Jacobs recorded the students’ voices separate from the video images.
It took her all of September to teach the students the song and film them, and Jacobs used all of October to edit the video down to four minutes and 16 seconds.
The video made its debut at a nine-minute virtual school assembly Tuesday, Nov. 10.
For the assembly, Jacobs shot video of school principal Debbie Cullum giving her annual Remembrance Day speech, followed by the singing of O Canada and playing of the Lament, Roust and Last Post, then the Lean On Me video.
The production starts with a salute to, and video cameo by, MacDougall, and ends with a thank you to veterans, with the line “they gave their tomorrow so we could have a today.”
The video has been posted to Inspire Kindness Productions’ YouTube channel.
READ MORE: Vernon teacher inspires kindness through film
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