Wall of dreams

On January 25, the Garden of Dreams Foundation unveiled the newly constructed Garden of Dreams Recording and Video Production Studio at The Children’s Village’s Dobbs Ferry campus. MSG Networks’ Rebecca Haarlow, Knicks player Kevin Seraphin, and Garden of Dreams Board Member Darryl ‘DMC’ McDaniels were all in attendance for the ribbon cutting ceremony.

Previously an underused classroom, the studio was transformed into a fully equipped soundproof space that includes new flooring, acoustic panels, isolated doors providing ingress/egress into the recording studio, a video editing bay, lighting for video production, a music workstation as well as recording and video equipment, software and training.

“The important thing about the studio is that we don’t want the kids just to see that ‘I can be a rapper and I can get money,’ ” said Garden of Dreams Board Member and 2016 Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award recipient, Darryl McDaniels. “We want to show the kids that there are many opportunities within all of the areas of what they love to do. They will learn about a career.”

The brand new studio was made possible by a $175,000 grant from the Garden of Dreams Foundation in order to enhance The Children’s Village arts program and provide a way for the at-risk youth to positively express themselves and learn creative skills.

During the ceremony, McDaniels emphasized the importance of what Garden of Dreams is doing for youth by providing them with opportunities to learn and succeed, “The whole purpose of what the Garden of Dreams is doing and will continue to do is so that this world will be filled with greater versions of all of us in this room.”