Adam Sweet

This fall I set myself a simple project: write songs about the people, places and discoveries that caught my heart, then send each one to the people it was about. Scientists who untangled the cosmos, firefighters and town staff who showed up on a hard day, land trusts, teachers, historians, a trail builder in Boston, a farmer in Hadley. I didn’t know what to expect. Busy people get a lot of email. But the replies kept coming, from Seattle, Nanjing, Ottawa, Chicago, Lima, Sussex and right here in the Valley. Some were a line or two. Some were long, generous letters. A few made me cry. Here are some of my favorites. “By the time I reached the final verse of the song, I was misty-eyed and choked up in public, and I couldn’t have been happier about it.” — Miles Howard, creator of the Boston Boundless Trail on Boundless “It is really terrific: the music, the lyrics… I can almost guarantee that at some point in the near future we will be singing your song.” — Charles McCr...

When I send a song to the people who inspired it, I often add a promise: if the song ever earns anything, the proceeds go to their work. A $1.50 download won’t change the world, but it can be a small thank-you that keeps giving. Here are the organizations I’ve pledged songs to, and what they said. NEPM, New England Public Media Song: The Hadley Witch “This song is very interesting… We’ll be featuring this story on the show today.” — Monte Belmonte, The Fabulous 413 Kestrel Land Trust Song: Pelham Hills , Westhampton’s Spruce Hill and Spruce Hill Stands “I’m so touched to hear that our work inspired you to create this beautiful music! … a moving reflection of the love of the land.” — Kari Blood, Community Engagement Director Friends of Wildwood Cemetery, Amherst Song: Amherst Swing “This song is so much fun!!!! … We are always looking for donations so your offer is very much appreciated.” — Rebecca, Friends of Wildwood Cemetery City of N...

By Adam Sweet, Granby Buy & Download for $1.50: https://adamsweet.bandcamp.com/track/from-the-welsh-hills Listen on YouTube: https://youtu.be/5C_FghN1egM Long before there were orthopedic surgeons, there were the Sweets. In southern New England, if you broke a bone or threw a hip out of joint, you sent for "Doc Sweet." He had no medical degree. Most days he was a farmer, a carpenter or a blacksmith. But he could set a bone, and so could his father, and so could his grandfather. The family came from Wales. John Sweet was in Salem by about 1630 and moved on to Rhode Island with Roger Williams' people. His son James settled at Ridge Hill, now Shermantown, in North Kingstown, and the bonesetting line runs through him. The skill was passed father to son, along with liniments made from roots and bark. Our family archives say some of that knowledge came from the Narragansett. Some of the stories are hard to beat. During the Revolution, Job Sweet set the bones of French offic...

I wrote a song about it called "Lyman Road".  Buy & Download for $1.50: https://adamsweet.bandcamp.com/track/lyman-road Listen on YouTube: https://youtu.be/p7IsHfBJx-Y It began in 1926 when Smith College President William Allan Neilson established the Smith College Nursery School (alongside a Day School). It opened with about 15 students, many of them children of Smith faculty. Organized as a cooperative school by the Institute for the Coordination of Women’s Interests, it offered educational opportunities for Smith graduate students and became part of the education department in 1928. For years it operated as part of the broader Smith College Campus School (with the preschool program at Fort Hill on Lyman Road and kindergarten–sixth grade at Gill Hall). Full-day options expanded in 1992 with infant/toddler and extended-day programs primarily for Smith faculty and staff. In 2003 these elements were reorganized into the distinct Center for Early Childhood Education. The pr...

  Local stories need local outlets. Finding the door is the hard part. Notes from a Granby songwriter on getting the word out in the Pioneer Valley These days I write songs about real western Mass stories: a Hadley witch, a fire chief on a gray Percheron, a WWI sergeant from my own family, and a freylekhs for Valley Light Opera's Fiddler on the Roof . Songs like these belong in local papers and on local radio. So this fall I set out to tell the people who cover the Valley about them. It has been an education. I want to share what I've learned, with respect for the people on the other end, because I think it helps musicians, small businesses, and the outlets themselves. The newsrooms are stretched thin When I emailed my Fiddler song to local writers and arts contacts, most of the replies were automatic out-of-office notes. I don't take that personally. Western Mass has fewer reporters covering more towns than it did when I started playing out. The people who are left are ju...

  "You can't be mystified by AI. You cannot be terrified by it." Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia Celticado on Stage Nearly every musician I know is afraid of AI. I wrote about that recently, and then Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said it plainer than I could: "You can't be mystified by AI. You cannot be terrified by it. You have to find a way to activate yourself to take advantage of it." He calls this the beginning of a new industrial revolution. Not in the production of energy or food, but the production of intelligence. We've been here before I've played fiddle since 1966. I've watched musicians fear the drum machine, the synthesizer, home recording, MP3s, and streaming. Each time, the players who did best weren't the ones who hid. They learned the new tool, kept what made them human, and got back to work. What AI can't do, and what it can AI won't sit in a kitchen and hear your grandmother's story. It won't know why a tune makes you...