Budding singing star, 17-year-old Kendal Moody from Co Wicklow, has released a new song, The World is Waiting. She is in fifth year in Scoil Chonglais, Baltinglass.
Kendal was one of the winners of the Ploughing for Stars competition held by the Irish Farmers Journal and Irish Country Living at the Ploughing Championships in 2019.
Her father is a sheep farmer, and while farming may have been of big interest to her as a child, it has definitely taken a back seat to music.
The World is Waiting is a project I embarked on during transition year, alongside my singing teacher Conor O’Reilly. The writing of the song's original composition began during singing lessons, when Conor was playing this haunting melody he had recently been working on. On hearing the melody, I immediately felt a connection. It was like I had heard it before, perhaps in a different life! This was when images of travelling in a time capsule appeared in my mind.
Conor later assigned me the task of penning lyrics to accompany the melody. As the weeks unfolded, I reflected on the different factors that have made the world how it is today. The growth and diversity of technology, changes in fuel production, an increase in transport and advancing agricultural methods, have all resulted in change beyond human imagination.
On hearing the melody, I immediately felt a connection. It was like I had heard it before, perhaps in a different life
As we are all aware at this stage, our climate is rapidly changing and not for the better. Our atmosphere is soaring through the temperature scales, due to the significant increase of poisonous smog polluting the air.
Raging bushfires are breaking out, ice-caps are melting, and we, as a mass assembly, must take responsibility. However, due to the COVID-19 restrictions, air pollution has dropped to unprecedented levels across the world.
It is just a pity that it takes a global pandemic for us to be forced to respect Mother Earth. Truly, we are destroying the landscape that we were entrusted to mind. As the author Katherine Hannigan states: “We don't own the earth. We are the earth's caretakers [...] we take care of it and all the things on it. And when we're done with it, it should be left better than we found it.”
I hope through my music I can encourage further positive change and make a difference to the world we live in. To quote a line from the song: “Invisible faculties are hidden by our distant needs, clear the sky of expertise, it’s misleading.”
To celebrate the 50th anniversary of International World Earth Day, which was on 22 April, The World is Waiting was released on YouTube/Google Play, to pay tribute to all the people who have worked tirelessly, and those who continue to work, for environmental reform.
Truly, we are destroying the landscape that we were entrusted to mind
It will also be available to stream on iTunes, Spotify, Apple Music and Amazon Music in the coming weeks via The World is Waiting by Menshek ft. Kendal Moody (Menshek is Conor O’Reilly’s solo music project).
Acknowledgements
A huge thank you is owed to Bryan Jardim Fleming for recording, mixing and co-producing the song and also for his beautiful shakuhachi playing; to Oliver Fallen-Bailey and Martin Blake of Bailey & Blake Video Productions for producing the video; to Nuala Whittle for her vocal contribution and to Conor O’Reilly/ Menshek for helping me see this transition year project through. Not forgetting of course, Mother Nature for sustaining all of us.
Let’s make the difference everyone,
Kendal
Watch: 16-year-old Kendal wins Wednesday’s Ploughing for Stars