Landfill Harmonic film teaser from Landfill Harmonic on Vimeo.

Landfill Harmonic is an upcoming feature-length documentary about a remarkable musical orchestra in Paraguay, where young musicians play instruments made from trash.

Cateura, Paraguay is a town essentially built on top of a landfill. Garbage collectors browse the trash for items they can sell, and the children are often at risk of getting involved with drugs and gangs.

When orchestra director Szaran and music teacher Fabio set up a music program for the kids of Cateura, they soon had more students than instruments. That changed when Szaran and Fabio were shown something they had never seen before: a violin made out of garbage. Today, there’s an entire orchestra of instruments made from items found in the landfill, now called The Recycled Orchestra.

The film shows how trash and recycled materials can be transformed into beautiful sounding musical instruments, but more importantly, it brings witness to the transformation of precious human beings.