TOKYO CLASSIFIED MAGAZINE
	The Power of Music
	Sept 2000
	Photo courtesy of Cliff
	Tokyo Classified Magazine talks to former pop/jazz performer Cliff Woolley, who is helping bring a note of hope to the children of Southeast Asia.
	"Some may consider me an idealist, but I feel the world would be a better place if we had more music and less violence in our lives." As the man behind "Guitars for Guns," Cliff should know. "Intelligent music makes one a more tranquil person and raises aptitude," he says. And from personal experience he has discovered the power a tune can have on an individual."
	Born in the Bethesda, Maryland US Navy Hospital, he moved frequently throughout his childhood and was often forced to leave friends behind. "Music and books became my lifetime friends," Cliff says.
	Surrounded by musically gifted classmates, he started studying music from the age of 10, playing harmonica and French Horn, and joined his first band at 12. So when he headed to Vietnam for the US Department of Defense in 1971, as a 20 year-old student, it wasn't to fight the Viet Cong, but to play his guitar to ears only used to the echoes of war.
	"I toured military medical facilities and bases throughout Vietnam for the United Services Organization (USO), sitting on hospital beds, playing music, consoling wounded soldiers, boosting morale." These wounded young men were in shock and fearful of the anticipated reactions of their families and loved ones when they would see the physical and emotional damage they had sustained.
	"How will my family, my girlfriend, react when I go home like this, was deeply on their minds." He says, "I was an impressionable young man in a war zone. The therapeutic value of music stuck with me" and indeed music therapy is now recognized and taught at University level.
	He later traveled to Japan and the Philippines on similar missions before returning home to Gardena, California where he resumed music studies at El Camino College. He played and studied jazz with Tommy Gumina, president of Polytone Amplifiers, performed in the American debut of The Who's rock opera Tommy with classmates in Grammy Award winning group Ambrosia with whom he also did years of concert work. He later worked with jazz alto sax legend Art Pepper and was a member of hit pop group The Association.
	Cliff immigrated to Japan in 1980 and helped Ambrosia on their Japan tour for UDO Music, Japan's largest promoter. He became marketing and sale rep for Schecter Guitar Research, International Musician & Recording World Magazine, Gibson Guitars and later, Paramount & Universal Home Video.
	But a visit to warn-torn Cambodia in 1995 reawakened his desire to use his musical gifts for therapeutic purposes. Cliff stayed on in Phnom Penh when most foreigners left the country after the coup d'etat in 1997. "There were brutal firefights, lootings, death squads, complete chaos and Russian T-54 tanks in the streets of Phnom Penh. Tens of thousands of refugees fled across neighboring Thailand's borders."
	"I tried to provide shelter to a number of Khmer families, also provided content for a website called Cliffnotes from the Killing Fields of Cambodia, posting reports of atrocities and crimes against humanity as documented by Major Mark A. Smith, US Army Special Forces (ret), to press, military and government organizations worldwide. No one seemed to care."
	When the fighting subsided one month later, Cliff was appointed Music Director for the Cambodian Disabled People's Organization, teaching music to blind and physically impaired Khmers.
	"I taught and played jazz classics for them. My students were overwhelmed, would hug me, tears streaming down their sightless eyes. It was a humbling experience."
	In the midst of the chaos of weapons, drugs, violence and non-existent education, role models and positive influences, Cliff came up with his brainchild "Guitars for Guns."
	"Play music, you and those around you will feel better. Some may want to participate. Pick up a weapon and someone is going to die, it's a no-win situation," he reasoned.
	Cliff bought a motorcycle, loaded it with guitars and hundreds of harmonicas, and traveled the Cambodian countryside visiting villages, teaching and playing music. His objective was to take away some weapons and put musical instruments in the hands of the misguided youth.
	"Hell yes, I'm an optimist! A musical instrument traded for a weapon of destruction, which is publicly destroyed - it's a start! When I was marketing for Paramount and Universal we publicly destroyed pirated video cassettes, and it does have a positive effect." At the very least it raises public awareness and helps shame the bad guys into hiding.
	"Look at the sales figures of musical instruments compared to weapons," he says. "It's out of control." Cliff aims to focus world attention on the problem and hopes to convince global music industry manufacturers to donate low-end instruments to his projects.
	"In a few years, with hard work and God willing, these troubled regions will have healthy market economies, and instrument manufacturers will have new markets for their products."
	JINTARA PUNLARP/THAI LAOTIAN MUSIC "MORLAM"
	After leaving Cambodia in 1998, he embarked on his next musical adventure: to work with Jintara Punlarp, the superstar singer from Issarn, Northeast Thailand.
	Cliff wanted to promote Jintara globally and was introduced to her by the CEO of Grammy, Thailand's largest entertainment company. He met Jintara at one of her rare Bangkok appearances, and the following day, joined the "Jintara Convoy," a huge show consisting of about 100 performers, on what would become a two-year, musical gypsy caravan, performing outdoor concerts nightly in remote parts of Issarn, along the Mekong River.
	The Golden Triangle region is infested with methamphetamine drug labs and "tons of yabah [the drug's local street name] are smuggled across the border daily, finding their destructive way into the bodies and minds of children and adults," he said.
	"I realized that traveling with the Jintara Convoy presented an excellent vehicle for becoming role models for the youth of Issarn. I envisaged us becoming kind of like Musical Morlam Mousekateers." (Morlam is the local music of Northeast Thailand).
	And with Cliff's tenacity, this project materialized.
	Various member of the ensemble became The Morlam Doctors, visiting hospitals and schools along the concert trail and performing inspirational music.
	"Think about it, how effective is it if a cop comes to your school makes a speech saying if you get caught with drugs, you're gonna be my guest for a year? Positive messages interlaced within music and comedy are much more effective."
	Cliff is now back in Tokyo working as a recruiter for multinational firms, and continues volunteer activities in Southeast Asia.
	With a motto reading "Unsolicited, unreciprocated acts of kindness and generosity to those in need," Cliff feels compelled to help right some terrible wrongs.
	"Instead of selfishly hoarding their good fortune and resources, people of the First World should shoulder responsibility to help those with less advantages than ourselves.
	"At a tender age I witnessed the futility of war in Vietnam, recently again in Cambodia," he said. "I have found I have a natural gift for helping people become productive, and in turn, to influence them to help others."
	For more information about Cliff and his activities, check out his homepage http://www.cliffworks.net.

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