How See Through Together’s YouTube musical Playlist reduces carbon, and how you can help
Welcome to See Through Together’s sibling See Through News.
We hope you all enjoyed the show,
we’d really like you all to know,
the action we need to take for all these years…
Concert in the Key of C (CitKoC) is one of many projects designed to serve the See Through Goal of Speeding Up Carbon Drawdown by Helping the Inactive Become Active.
Here’s how it works, and how you can help (to skip straight to what you can do, jump to the bottom of this article).
What’s A ‘Concert In The Key of C’?
A ‘CitKoC’ is:
- Unusual: the concert features something unconventional (instrumentation, venue, genre-bending etc.)
- Mutually beneficial: as well as serving See Through’s overall goal of measurable carbon reduction, each artist who introduces their fanbase to their ‘CitKoC’ boosts both brands’ profile.
- Flexible: C is the chemical symbol for ‘Carbon’, but can appear in any plausible guise. CitKoCs so far are’ Copyright’, ‘COP26’, ‘China’ and ‘Crossroads’.
CitKoCs can be anything from a full one-off themed concert to one song inserted into a set, or a selfie video recorded on a bus, so long as it’s original material and provided pro bono for STT to use at its discretion.
See Through Together has various CitKoCs already edited, some original, some from recycled/reclaimed/un-broadcast material.
- CitKoC C: ©opyright: An inventive musical rebuttal to the notion that chord sequences can be copyrighted.
- CitKoC Crossroads: Lutes, mandolins, theorbos and ukuleles combine to play the music of two Robert Johnsons, born three centuries and a continent apart.
- CitKoC China: China’s first contact with the global ukulele boom.
- CitKoC COP26: Guerrilla gig featuring bagpipes, melodica and ukulele, performed to an audience of zero by an ark on a hillside overlooking the sea during COP26 at Glasgow
These initial concerts all happen to feature ukuleles. Others now in development feature other unlikely and unusual instruments, genres and interpretations. More details on the CitKoC concept in this article.
CitKoC flavours
As well as featuring a variety of venues, instruments and performers, the See Through Together team packages up CitKoCs into different types of video, from high-energy snacks to multi-course feasts.
The full feast
Concert in the Key of C: ©opyright, for example, was performed by ukulele legend, Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain founder (and See Through Brains Trustee) George Hinchliffe.
With the organisers’ permission and support, George inserted the 16-minute CitKoC segment into his headline act at the 2024 Winchester Ukulele Festival. The entire show was developed in collaboration with STT, and recorded and edited by a volunteer STT production team. The resulting musical feast appears on the See Through Together YouTube channel as:
The Short Snacks
The CitKoC YouTube Playlist also features Shorts versions of individual songs clipped from the 16-minute full concert, conforming to YouTube’s sub-60-second Shorts format.
These CitKoC Shorts are edited to form appetising taster nibbles, designed to tempt doom-scrolling, side-swiping short format viewers to click on the longer versions.
They’re re-edited to suit the Shorts portrait format, like this:
Shorts are another entertaining step along the path See Through has designed to end up with actions that measurably reduce CO2 (see below – we’re coming to that…).
The Extra Treats
Über-fans want more, not less. See Through Together offers such fans Extras. CitKoC Extras could include:
- Behind-the-scenes footage
- Making-of videos
- Uncut versions of edited performances
- Bonus performances not included in the main edit
For George’s CitKoC: ©opyright, for example, ukulele-nuts want to play along. They might not be satisfied with the basic chord symbols, synchronised with the music, to illustrate the copyright point for a general audience, used in the main version.
So STT also produced a version for a specialist ukulele-playing audience, with synchronised ukulele window graphics, showing the names and chord windows of the augmented/diminished versions George is playing.
Something for everyone, then. But that’s not the point. See Through isn’t in it for the money. If all we do is get lots of YouTube hits, all we’re doing is further enriching our Silicon Valley Overlords (and generating more carbon via their massive data centres).
Getting the usual subscribes, likes, and clicks is part of the See Through journey, but not the destination.
So What’s This About Reducing Carbon?
See Through is developing projects that, while still engaging and entertaining as per the See Through Methodology, end up with clear actions ordinary people can take to measurably reduce carbon.
These projects are more ambitious, and specific, than the usual ‘sort your recycling’/eat a bit less meat’/ride a bike to work’ individual behaviour changes. People already know all about those.
Instead, See Through actions are targeted at the big levers of carbon reduction, like accurate corporate carbon reporting and changes in government regulation.
If you’re curious how they might work, here are some currently being developed by other members of See Through’s global network of pro bono experts:
But What Can I Do Now?
Some options:
- Boost Us: the usual social media stuff – subscribe, Like, click, comment, share with your friends etc.
- Join Us: email volunteer@seethroughnews.org to see how you can help this zero-budget project. We have plenty of roles requiring varying degrees of expertise and experience.
- Follow Us: Subscribe to See Through News Newsletter. It’s free, keeps your data private, and plops into your inbox every Sunday, updating you on new content and developments See Through’s innovative mission to measurably reduce carbon. Share any See Through content with your friends
- Critique Us: Use the comment features, on YouTube or here on the website, to give your thoughts on any aspect of any See Through project. Being innovative involves making mistakes, and we benefit as much from your criticism as your praise (though feel free to praise us too, if you want…)
Thanks for your interest. We welcome your interest and support.