“Robinson is a source of boundless enthusiasm and friendliness”
The List ★★★★
“A sentiment worth getting behind”
JUBILATION
FOUNDATION
FELLOWSHIP
AWARD
2018-19
JUBILATION FOUNDATION FELLOWSHIP
2018-19
"for individuals with exceptional talent for helping young people feel fully alive through rhythm."
“A multi-layered adventure that gets richer with each spin”
2019/2020 Recipient
Kids Open Mic "Night"
“Amelia has the inexplicable ability to bring smiles to the faces of both parents and children. Hopefully soon she can put one on yours.”
Broadway Baby ★★★★
Mil's Trills is a Brooklyn-based children's music project dedicated to creating positive inclusive music-making experiences that strive to empower and embrace young audiences and families. Through joyful collaborative live shows, engaging albums, and interactive songwriting web series, we work to find new creative ways of bringing people together towards a peaceful global community.
Mils Trills is led by Amelia Robinson (2020-21 BAC grantee) who writes and performs original lively tunes on her electric ukulele with the help of a rotating cast of musical guests. Together, they have released three award-winning albums; Everyone Together Now! (Parents' Choice 2014) celebrating community, Now That We're Friends... (Parents' Choice 2015) fostering friendship through open minds and compassionate hearts, and their most recent album, Ridiculous Nonsense, (NAPPA, Parents' Choice GOLD) emphasizing the value of play in the creative process. Their most recent release, "Put Your Mask On" ft. Uncle Jumbo is a semi-finalist in the International Songwriting Competition and was the theme song of Masks 4 America's national Mask Up Covid Down campaign.
Mil's Trills latest community project, the Kids Open Mic "Night" series provides weekly virtual workshops and performance opportunities for aspiring songwriters in Brooklyn, NY.
“Robinson yields a powerful authenticity”
KindieMusicDC
Mil's Trills' music can also be heard on the children’s album, Songs for a Healthier America, produced as part of former First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! Initiative to promote a healthy lifestyle in youth.
Mil's Trills is currently producing a new interactive songwriting series, Guide to Songwriting, inspired by Musical Playdates, and featuring her Messy Music method - a play-centered, highly responsive approach to music-making that activates creativity free of standards, judgement, and criticism.
With a focus on process over product, and through a lens of curiosity and improvisation, Amelia's Messy Music method offers accessibility to the arts, builds social emotional skills, and helps us understand how we construct our realities so we can better accept differences in others around us.
Performance Highlights
Lincoln Center, BAM, Symphony Space, Wolf Trap, Guggenheim, MASS MoCA
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Tribeca Film Festival, London's Southbank Centre, Royal Concert Hall at Nottingham, and with the Pleasance Theatre's KidZone at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Scotland.
Accolades
BAC grantee 2020-21 | 2018-19 Jubilation Foundation Fellow | 2018 NAPPA and Parents' Choice GOLD / 2014 / 2015 Parents’ Choice Awards | Top 20 best shows 2014 Edinburgh Festival Fringe by The List | Notable Mention, Primary Times Children’s Choice Award | BRIC B FREE Award
Recommended by
New York Times, Time Out NY, New York Magazine, Brooklyn Parent Magazine, Mommy Poppins | Featured on NY1, Local News 12, BBC Radio 1, BRIC's Brooklyn Free Speech
ABOUT AMELIA
Amelia Robinson is a community leader, educator, composer, and performer born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. Trained in Suzuki for piano and voice from the age of three, Amelia’s affinity for building community propels her work towards creating collaborative songwriting experiences via her Family Music project, Mil’s Trills, and pedagogy called Messy Music Method. With a play-centered, highly responsive approach to music-making, Amelia presents programs for all ages such as seasonal Kids Open Mic “Nights”, live songwriting shows, and Guide to Songwriting video tutorials with entertaining outcomes in Musical Playdates. She is currently developing an SEL curriculum to support her 4th album to be released in Fall 2021.
With 25+ years of experience in the Family Music space, Amelia has been recognized for an excellence in bringing joy to children (Jubilation Foundation Fellowship ’18-’19), has received multiple grants (Brooklyn Arts Council 2020-21), and is an award-winning recording artist (Parents’ Choice GOLD, NAPPA, International Songwriting Competition, BRIC B-Young, Jamie Oliver’s Big Feastival) She is certified in Responsive Pedagogy from Teachers College at Columbia University, has trained with Lincoln Center Education, and has worked under great composers such as Michael Nyman (The Piano) and Evan Lurie (The Lounge Lizards, The Backyardigans). As an educator, Amelia created early childhood music programs and curriculum at Stephen Gaynor School and Avenues: The World School in NYC.
Amelia’s music has appeared in partnership with Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! Initiative, Target’s Coffee and Crayons, the London Symphony Orchestra, and with the East End Film Festival where she composed and conducted a multi-media interactive orchestral piece, The Cycle Symphony, incorporating 500+ bicycle-bell playing participants (Time Out London #1 Critic’s Choice). She has performed and developed site-specific works with Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, the MET, Guggenheim, BAM, Wolf Trap, MASS MoCa, Symphony Space, The Walker Art Center, Crystal Bridges, and with Sesame Street’s Gordon and Elmo. Amelia has toured the globe extensively, spending five months performing on an artificial island in Qatar, and presenting works at London’s Southbank Centre, Royal Concert Hall Nottingham, and a twice sold out run at Scotland’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Her love for ethnomusicology has taken her to explore music in Kazakhstan, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Guatemala , Mexico, and Eastern Europe.
Amelia has released four all-age albums; Everyone Together Now! (2014), Now That We’re Friends (2015), Ridiculous Nonsense (2018), Let It Out! (2021), as well as an EP, Air Mail (2010), and a mature album The Space Between (2016). Her hit singles, Mother May I?, Put Your Pants On, and its remix, Put Your Mask On, have escalated her Spotify plays to over 5 million with 9K+ monthly listeners, and secured heavy rotation on Sirius XM’s Kids Place Live. An extensive press portfolio includes features in The New Times, New York Magazine, Brooklyn Parent, NY1, BRIC TV, and BBC 1.
In 2020, Amelia stepped into leadership in the Family Music genre, joining a diverse group of artists to co-found Family Music Forward, a racial justice collective dedicated to transforming the industry in support of Black artists, children, and communities. Along with Aya World Productions and Tuff Gong International, Amelia produced a historic album, All One Tribe, and first of its kind bringing together twenty four Black Family Musicians in celebration of the rich culture and diversity of Black voices.
Amelia continues to devise innovative ways for all ages across all races, genders, religions, abilities, and class to engage in the creative process. She is passionate about activating imaginations, navigating the unexpected, and arriving at a place of higher consciousness and radical empathy through the arts.