Digidesign Donates 10 Mobile Studios to Little Kids Rock for Student Recording Projects

State-of-the-Art Technology Advances Music Education Efforts

July 23, 2004 - Nashville, TN (NAMM Summer Session – Booth 2037, Level 2) Little Kids Rock (LKR), an innovative non-profit music education program, today announced that Digidesign has contributed 10 portable recording units and accompanying software to the program. The equipment is a major advancement for Little Kids Rock's efforts to teach children to compose, perform and record their own compositions, corporate partners.

"Past efforts to compile student recordings were hampered by a lack of recording equipment and antiquated technology," said David Wish, executive director, Little Kids Rock. "This gift will revolutionize our efforts by enabling teachers to record and store songs as they develop and to archive more material than ever before. Little Kids Rock is deeply grateful to Digidesign for their tremendous contribution."

Included in this generous donation were nine "M-Boxes" and one "Digi 002" recording rack. With these units, Digidesign included current versions of their landmark Pro Tools recording studio software. The recording interfaces, which are only about 7-inches tall and a few inches wide, connect to any computer via USB connection and will be used by various LKR mentors and staff in different regions to record and produce original student songs.

Digidesign is a company on a growing list of music industry heavyweights that have supported the mission of Little Kids Rock. Sabian, Sonor, Pro Mark, SunLite Guitars and Epiphone have all donated instruments to the program. The Plant recording studio in Sausalito, California and Manhattan Center Recording Studios in New York have both donated studio time for LKR's CDs.

About Digidesign
Digidesign, a division of Avid Technology, Inc., is the world’s leading manufacturer of digital audio production systems, and the winner of the 2001 Technical Grammy Award and 2003 Academy Award of Merit (Oscar® statuette) for the design, development and implementation of the Pro Tools® digital audio workstation. The company is the exclusive distributor of the Focusrite hardware and software product lines in North and Latin America. Digidesign provides the professional music, film, video, multimedia, and radio broadcast industries with tools for digital recording, MIDI sequencing, editing, signal processing, and surround mixing. Digidesign products are marketed in over forty countries worldwide through a distribution network of value-added dealers, distributors, and OEM relationships.

About Little Kids Rock
Little Kids Rock believes that music is a critical component of first-rate education. Many elementary schools have been stripped of their music programs. These cuts have had a disproportionately large impact on children from low-income backgrounds. Little Kids Rock restores music to its rightful place in the academic lives of kids in our public schools by providing a rich music education program including instrument instruction, free instruments and trained mentors. Founded by a single elementary school teacher in 1996, Little Kids Rock is now serving 2,000 students in CA, NY, NJ and TN. Bonnie Raitt, Paul Simon, BB King and Les Paul sit on our Honorary Board of Directors and we are supported by friends Carlos Santana, Phish, Bob Weir and others. Little Kids Rock programs are scheduled to launch in the Los Angeles area in 2004.

Media Contact:
Allison Neves, PR Director
Little Kids Rock
415-948-1200
allison@littlekidsrock.org