Melanie Hammet, recorded 4/2/10 at Georgia Public Broadcasting
Performing songwriter Melanie Hammet first composed music about land-use over a decade ago. In 1997, Hammet and playwright Marjorie Bradley Kellogg were commissioned by The Alliance Theatre to create a musical about an unusual subject: an inner-city community garden. The result was Livin In The Garden, directed by Tony-nominated Kenny Leon. Several years later, Hammet returned to the subject---this time as an elected official. During her first four-year term as city councilperson in Pine Lake Georgia (she was elected to a second term in Nov. 09), Melanie was instrumental in securing a grant to hire a city planner; she then served on the steering committee for the re-write and adoption of new commercial and residential zoning. Hammet also worked to establish a year-long monthly series on aspects of community land-use and wrote legislation that created a review board to help enforce best practices. In January 2009, Melanie Hammet was accepted to The Seaside Institutes Escape To Create residency, having submitted a proposal to write songs that distilled urban planning concepts to human-sized basics: the impact of good street design; the importance of public space; the Ponzi-scheme structure of non-renewable planning. The seven songs written during E2C are now the CD Edifice Complex, scheduled for official release on April 1, 2010.
