Having no idea what to write this week, I thumbed through my pictures for inspiration. I did a double take on this picture I took last year while running to catch a subway under NYC. I remember stopping for a moment to listen to the beautiful music being played by this string quartet and thinking, Wow, that is a breath of fresh air down here!

I haven’t thought about this brief encounter until today when I looked closely at the picture and saw the banner hanging behind the quartet. Mmmm…they have a name: The Terra Symphony Orchestra String Quartet.

I dug around relevant websites and discovered that this NYC-based Brazilian orchestra began as a dream of violinist/violist Eliano Braze. He funded his dream through subway donations. I thought of the donation I put into the open violin case a year ago and how it, along with the many other donations dropped in the case, keeps Eliano’s dream alive.

When Eliano was a child, he lived on Brazil’s streets. Through a special project, Eliano learned to play the violin at age 10 and played with an orchestra at age 13. By 14 he was composing. In his twenties he followed love to New York, bringing his love of music with him. Now he works with his dream orchestra and continues his work under the streets of New York bringing joy to people like me.

Where does Eliano Braz get his inspiration? According to the Terra Symphony Orchestra website he is “Inspired by earth’s original symphony found in the Amazon jungle.” So while I’m combing my iPhone pictures for inspiration, he’s mining ancient history and finding funds in the bowels of the underground.

If you want inspiration, watch this (you have to scroll down to 2nd video) 5-minute documentary about Eliano Braz. By the end, I was thunderstruck by what people can accomplish through their dreams. I realize how small my dreams are compared to Eliano’s. This was a reminder that our dreams get played out in underground tunnels of life where we inspire one another in ways we’ll never know.

So what did this subway quartet teach me about writing?

• Inspiration can be found anywhere…from the Amazon jungle to the NYC subway.
• Look behind a story for the real story.
• Don’t just dream, dream big and dream beyond the boundary of your life.

Thank you Eliano for taking your music underground on the day I happened to be catching a subway.