The Story Comes
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Hi, I’m Jeni Dominelli
I’m the Founder/CEO of The Beat of Life, a Nashville based nonprofit organization that brings therapeutic songwriting programs into prisons, youth centers/schools, mental health settings, and other vulnerable communities – with the mission to use the power of music to tackle our toughest personal adversities and some of the nation’s most critical social issues… and tell healing and redemptive stories through song.
At the same time, we’re creating the power of connection in a world perhaps more than divided than ever through the universal language of music.
My vision for The Beat of Life began with a simple idea: that perhaps music is more than just an incredible form of entertainment. Perhaps it possesses such extraordinary power to transform our deepest suffering into our greatest songs. Perhaps it possesses the extraordinary power to transform the stories that wound us into the very stories that heal us.
This vision quickly gained support from scores of Nashville’s professional and hit songwriters/artists and musicians, who testified to the same sentiment: that music had been a type of saving grace for them, too… and that wanted to help The Beat of Life help those who needed that power the most. The organization quickly became perfectly positioned in the turbulent times we live in today.
For more than a decade, The Beat of Life has forged powerful community partnerships with correctional and government agencies, mental health facilities, and youth centers across the country, helping vulnerable individuals write original songs… and new life narratives.
But the story didn’t begin in Nashville...…
It began here.…
And it started with an 8-year-old little girl writing letters to Daddy Dominelli - letters stuffed with song lyrics and mailed to 808 Union Street,
at the beginning of his 12-year federal prison sentence at
Metropolitan Correctional Center San Diego
So this summer - decades later - came a moment I’d dreamed about since founding The Beat of Life:
Returning to 808 Union Street…
Bringing my team to launch The Beat of Life's first “Redemption Songs” San Diego Program at...
Metropolitan Correctional Center San Diego
And 808 Union Street, a place once symbolizing absolute devastation for my family, became a place of healing.
But this wasn’t just about my family’s redemption.
It was about all the souls in this building for whom we prayed before we rode an elevator to the rooftop of this prison skyscraper
to make all this happen…
…with the sun streaming down on us as we christened that building with anthems of hope to the sea of inmates.
It’s hard to explain how we felt leaving that place that day...but I sensed it was somehow the beginning of something big.
And the Story Didn’t End There...
A walk along the oceanfront led to a serendipitous invitation
A few days later while we were still in town, a veteran we met on the ocean boardwalk heard about what we were doing and his eyes lit up. He shared about his assisted living community filled with older adults carrying remarkable life stories.
"Ohhh, we could really use something like that! Would you come here next?" he asked, making me promise to connect with his Director the next day.
That’s right! I thought… San Diego is packed with often-forgotten senior communities and veterans with extraordinary tales so worthy of being heard. Of course we would come there, I told him!
Moments later, we met a singer-songwriter who “just happened” to be the one assisting us at a local store
Wow, how cool, what are the odds?, I thought. She too heard about what we were doing and nearly fell over with excitement. She had been praying for a way to use her music for something bigger than herself.
But there was more. She speaks fluent Spanish. Just days earlier, MCC had shared that one of their greatest hopes for future programs was bringing Spanish-speaking songwriters to better serve their diverse incarcerated population. What??! Okay this is getting crazy now.
As we talked a little longer we discovered she also already knows some of our NASHVILLE songwriters at The Beat of Life (out of, you know, millions of songwriters in Nashville). Now I feel like I’m in the twilight zone… but God’s, because I’ve come to recognize that’s how He works.
Then it dawned on me. There is also our current songwriters’ roots:
Several of our songwriters who once called San Diego their home too are now part of our Nashville Beat of Life team - and they still have incredibly strong ties in this city, traveling back monthly for gigs.
Others who were once part of The Beat of Life in Nashville now reside back in San Diego.
There is even a songwriter in San Diego who was incarcerated with my dad all those years ago who happens to be a close friend and co-writer with one of our Beat of Life songwriters (a truly mind-blowing discovery) who heard the story of his former cellmate’s daughter returning and is ready to jump in.
The ideas were formulating...…
Things only kept growing.
The University of San Diego, my alma mater -
now has a restorative justice program,
and is eager to partner with our work at The Beat of Life.
MCC San Diego is becoming
a now permanent partnership
for return visits and regular programming...
And more facilities throughout California
and within the US Federal Bureau of Prisons
are now requesting their own programs…
It was too clear to miss at this point:
This is so much bigger than just going back home or even adding in another city...
San Diego is perfectly positioned...
To become the Homebase of an entirely new West Coast Chapter
A natural West Coast home base — San Diego can become The Beat of Life’s permanent launching point for programming throughout Southern California and, ultimately, up and down the West Coast.
One of the largest and most diverse regions in California — creating opportunities to serve communities across age, culture, language and circumstance.
California offers extraordinary room for impact — as the nation’s most populous state, it is home to millions of people and communities touched by incarceration, mental health challenges, addiction, homelessness, trauma and other issues at the heart of The Beat of Life’s mission.
A major military and veteran community — making San Diego uniquely positioned for songwriting programs centered on service, transition, trauma, connection, healing and the stories of those who have served.
A significant justice-impacted population — with federal, state and local correctional systems throughout the region and Southern California, creating tremendous potential for expanding our Redemption Songs programming.
A gateway to an entire network of correctional facilities — establishing a permanent California presence gives us a practical base from which to serve facilities throughout Southern California and eventually expand farther north.
A significant recovery and behavioral-health community — San Diego County’s network of treatment, recovery and behavioral-health providers creates another natural setting for our songwriting model and Beautiful Minds programming.
A large older-adult and retirement community — San Diego’s many senior-living, retirement and assisted-living communities offer exciting possibilities for songwriting centered on storytelling, legacy, connection and reducing isolation.
A truly binational community — San Diego’s location at the U.S.–Mexico border creates extraordinary cultural diversity and an opportunity to grow bilingual and Spanish-language programming.
A thriving music and creative community — giving The Beat of Life access to the songwriters, artists, musicians and producers who are the heartbeat of our model.
A major university and education hub — creating possibilities for interns, volunteers, research, restorative-justice partnerships and the next generation of changemakers.
A strong nonprofit, philanthropic and corporate community — creating opportunities to build partnerships around mental health, veterans, youth, justice, recovery and community well-being.
One regional hub can reach many populations — incarcerated individuals, veterans, people in recovery, youth, older adults, people navigating mental-health challenges and other underserved communities can all be reached from one home base.
San Diego connects us to the larger Southern California corridor — from the border region north through Orange County and Los Angeles, a San Diego base puts The Beat of Life within reach of one of the country’s largest population centers.
And the vision can continue north — San Diego can become the anchor from which The Beat of Life builds relationships throughout California and eventually into other West Coast communities.
Not Just a San Diego Chapter. A West Coast Home.
Our vision is to establish San Diego as The Beat of Life’s permanent West Coast base — rooted deeply in this community while creating a launching point for programs throughout California and, one day, up and down the West Coast.The need is here.
The artists are here.
The partners are here.
The doors are already opening.
San Diego isn’t simply another place where The Beat of Life could work. It’s a place where everything we need to build the next chapter is already beginning to come together.
A Full Circle Moment
Welcome to the Beginning.
Welcome to The Beat of Life San Diego.
Birthed A Whole New Circle
And so we invite YOU into this story.
Introducing... …
Our Founding Campaign Goal: $100,000
What began as a two-day pilot became one of the most meaningful programs in our organization's history - and confirmed that San Diego is ready for a permanent Beat of Life chapter as our West Coast Regional Center.
Our goal is to raise $100,000 to establish the foundation for The Beat of Life San Diego during its first year. This campaign will establish the inaugural year of The Beat of Life San Diego, creating the people, partnerships, staffing, infrastructure, and overall foundation needed to serve correctional facilities, schools, veterans, seniors, mental health communities, and more throughout San Diego County and the West Coast.
No great dream and endeavor can ever be possible without the funds to support it.
And so… we ask for your help.
But as we’ve learned as we built this in Nashville, it takes more than funding to build a movement...
It takes people.
So we're Not Just Building the Financial Ground of a Chapter.
We're Building a Team.
Interested in joining
Team Beat of Life San Diego?
We need all kinds of kinds!
There’s a place for you on this team. We’re looking for musicians, songwriters, artists, producers and others from San Diego’s creative community - BUT music experience is absolutely not required.
We also need social workers, nonprofit and ministry leaders, educators, advocates, community connectors, volunteers, and people who simply have a heart for the populations we serve.
Whether your passion is justice and reentry, mental health and recovery, youth and schools, veterans, older adults, or other critical social issues, there are countless ways to bring your gifts, experience, connections and heart to The Beat of Life.
Some people will join us inside programs. Others will help coordinate, connect us with community partners, share professional expertise, open doors, join our Board of Directors or Advisory Council, volunteer at events, or simply lend a hand wherever it’s needed.
You don’t have to know exactly where you fit yet - that’s what we’re here for.
Fill out the form below, tell us a little about yourself and what you’d love to bring to the team, and we’ll connect with you as soon as possible to help get you plugged in!
Let’s build Team Beat of Life: San Diego together.
THANK YOU SO MUCH...
Whether you gave, joined the team, shared our story, or simply decided to believe in what we're building here - thank you. We are so incredibly grateful to have you with us in whatever capacity it might be, and we can't wait to see what we create together.
