This week: a special announcement from Earth Eclectic co-hosts Bart Everson and Laura Dedelow.
We’re just over a month away from hitting our two-year mark here at Earth Eclectic. That’s 104 episodes of inspiring ecospiritual music. Episodes have covered the gamut of themes: from birdsong to degrowth, from the four elements (over four installments) to our most recent show, focused on tardigrades (yeah, really!).
From the beginning, one of the driving motivations for the series has been to find new songs of Gaia and share them with as many people as possible, perhaps in the process even inspiring folks to form a deeper connection with the sacred living planet to which we all belong. In fact, you could say that’s the whole point.
We devote a lot of time and energy to finding that music, but sometimes our listeners help us out. We’re always glad when that happens, so much so that we’re having a contest to encourage discovery of the best new music of recent years.
We’re looking for newer releases that lift up ecological consciousness. Specifically, with support from the Gaian Way, we plan to give an award of $1,000 to recognize outstanding ecospiritual music released in 2024, 2025, or 2026.
Re-releases, remasters, and remixes are welcome, and self-nominations are encouraged. Also, strictly speaking, it doesn’t even have to be music. We also like to play field recordings and spoken word and weird pieces that defy categorization. It’s all fair game, so long as it clearly celebrates Earth.
Nominations must be submitted by Earth Day to qualify for the 2026 prize—that’s April 22nd—and we plan to announce the award on World Environment Day—June 5th. As well as the ‘grand’ prize (yuk, yuk), we’ll invite the winning artist to present some of their favorite music on a special episode of Earth Eclectic. If you want to nominate your or other artists’ music, you’ll find the nomination form on our site, EarthEclectic.org.
Go with Gaia,
Bart Everson and Laura Dedelow
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