music video: "lovely to me (immigrant mother)" by taiyo na

Check out this awesome, newly released music video for "Lovely to Me (Immigrant Mother)" by Taiyo Na, from his debut album Love Is Growth. I think it's great. Here are some thoughts from Taiyo:

A tremendous shout out must go to its director Gary San Angel. A couple filmmakers expressed interest in making a music video for this song when the album first came out, but nothing panned out, and perhaps it was meant to be. Gary put his heart into this project, and I could not have been more honored and proud to have him as my director for this music video. With a couple of incredible state-of-the-art cameras and a wonderful team, he grasped the very feeling of the song and enhanced it with the beauty of Philadelphia, a city I've come to love dearly over the years for its grit, good food and people.

The footage of the families are tender and strong. The portraits of the people in Love Park are luminous and stunning. When I watch this music video, I am reminded of why I do what I do. I hope it does the same for you. I hope these faces bring you back to the reasons why you do legal work or medical work, why you teach, write, work at that non-profit, take those classes, work the 9 to 5, make art... why you care.

If it moves you, please rate, comment and share. Gary tried to get this in around this time as a gift to folks for the holiday season. In my opinion, it is a true gift.

Thank you for your support.

Peace,
Taiyo Na

And here's a note from the video's director, Gary San Angel:

To commemorate this Thanksgiving weekend. I thought it would be appropriate to send this beautiful music video out to the world called Lovely to Me (Immigrant Mother) by New York based artist Taiyo Na from his debut album Love is Growth. I completed the final cut of the music video on Thanksgiving day and thought it would be nice to give thanks to our moms and to all the people who shared part in raising us.

I want to give a very special shout out and thank you to Taiyo Na for trusting me and for allowing me to take his song on this journey, to back up his beautiful song with visuals and stories from our community here in Philadelphia from Chinatown to Love Park and beyond.

A very big thank you to David Lin and the Asian Arts Initiative for helping to produce this project. As well as Eric Law and Wai Man Ip from Chinese Arts and Crafts, Inc. and Karen Thai from QT Vietnamese Sandwich in Chinatown.

This is not just a music video it's a community arts film project involving so many voices and volunteers. I thank you from the bottom of my heart to all who were apart of this vision. I could not have done it with out you. I was merely the conductor orchestrating all these amazing moments. I only hope that what you see is something that is unique, honest, and powerful.

Please share this with your friends, family, loved ones close and far. I hope this is a reminder to us all where we all came from.

Shout out to the all the immigrant mothers out there, my own included. To learn and hear more from Taiyo Na, visit his website here. And his album, Love Is Growth is available for download from the usual online spots like Amazon or iTunes.