May 7

May 7 Rochester students sing for peace and harmony in new music video

(THE MED CITY BEAT) - What started off as a simple melody more than 15 years ago is now a full-scale music video.

A celebration was held Thursday afternoon at the Rochester Community and Technical College for the release of "If the World." The song was written by local musician Doug Porter using a melody his daughter — who is now 26 and practicing law — sang him when she was just nine years old.

"The chorus of the song uses the same melody she sang me," said Porter, who by day is a software engineer at the Mayo Clinic. "I was able to build the rest of the song around that."

But until recently, Porter kept the song "tucked away in a drawer," not sure if he would ever doing anything with it. That was until his good friend, and local news anchor, Tom Overlie heard the song and encouraged him to bring it to life.

From there, Porter was able to find some talented young artists in the community to perform the song, including members of the Seeds of Wisdom Christian Academy's children's choir.

"Kids expect peace, love and harmony; they don't expect hate, war and poverty," said Porter. "We as adults should listen to that and try to achieve that and make that our ideal."

The four other vocalists are local high school students. Lead singer Jesnasha Jamison attends Century with backup singer Kendall Schears. The other two vocalists, Nicole Pauley and Diana Sorenson, are students at Mayo.

"[The song] just brings tears to my eyes," said Porter. "It fills me with hope."