Deborah Pardes

Founder , Executive Director

A graduate of Barnard College of Columbia University and The Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars Program, Pardes began her career in writing, music and media production over 2 decades ago. She has used art and technology in all her work, ranging from producing community events to launching multi-national music competitions. She is the founder and host of Get Smart Radio. She also created One Good Thing - a quiet movement to tag things that are good in the world. She has offered workshops around the country for teachers and tutors of low-level readers. Pardes has produced several music CDs - five under her own name. She is a prolific writer and is committed to making sure that storytelling is an art form that is accessible to all who want to read, write, speak, sing, film or dance it! For more info on Deborah, you can visit her blog.

Artists for Literacy was founded in 2000 in a musical 'ah-ha' moment.  Deborah wrote a song inspired by a book - Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt. Every time she played  "7th Step"  at her live shows, people would ask about the book that she mentioned inspired her to write it.She realized that songs inspired by literature were great vehicles to inspire reading...and The Songs Inspired By Literature Project (SIBL) was born.

Here's 7th Step - recorded in San Francisco in 2001. All the percussion you hear is made by the human mouth of Andrew "Kid Beyond" Chaikin.