\u201cThey were like, the FEMA of the music industry,\u201d Simmons-Santa Cruz said.<\/p>\n
According to Theresa Wolters, executive director of MusiCares, the organization supports the music community through direct financial assistance for basic living, medical, mental health and substance use needs, as well as free preventive healthcare. One year after the Los Angeles wildfires, MusiCares has directed more than $15 million toward relief and recovery, reaching over 3,200 music professionals affected by the disaster.<\/p>\n
When MusiCares stepped in to provide emergency funds for Simmons-Santa Cruz and her husband, it also offered to replace an important instrument for her. Her father, who died seven years ago, helped her pick her first guitar, but the guitar was left behind when the fire broke out.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat guitar was very sentimental for me,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Nothing can ever replace the personal memory tied to the guitar, but Simmons-Santa Cruz says that MusiCares offered her hope through this deed, and the new guitar represents that.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just broke down, I just started crying, because I\u2019m like, who replaces a guitar? \u2026 The last thing that was on my mind was replacing our equipment because we\u2019re still in survival mode,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
![\"Drummer](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1767823811_361_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Drummer Darryl \u201cJMD\u201d Moore\u201d getting fitted for custom ear molds for his live performances at MusiCares Altadena Health and Wellness Clinic at Grammy Museum L.A. Live <\/p>\n
(Rebecca Sapp\/Getty Images for The Recording Academy)<\/p>\n
The couple is living in a rental and continuing to deal with the fallout of the fires, still unable to rebuild their house because of the financial costs. Since the fires, many other music professionals have faced similar hardships, like music producer and drummer Darryl \u201cJMD\u201d Moore, who still has to pay the mortgage on the home he lost while rebuilding another one \u201clike for like\u201d as mandated by the mortgage bank.<\/p>\n
\u201cI wanted to build a home for my children, and my grandchildren, my descendants, that would serve them financially and in every other way it could, because I know this property is valuable, my house doubled in value, it was worth twice what I paid for,\u201d Moore said. \u201cBut our insurance is not paying us enough money to build the same house, it\u2019s like hundreds of thousands of dollars short, so everybody like us, we\u2019re in a scramble to get the money to fill in the gaps.\u201d<\/p>\n
After years of renting in Altadena, Moore finally bought his first home there in 2011, a purchase made possible thanks to his success in the music industry. Moore is known in both the jazz and hip-hop music scenes, having produced acts like the Pharcyde and Freestyle Fellowship while also drumming for jazz greats like Horace Tapscott. Moore originally grew up in South L.A., where he started playing drums at 13, focusing on R&B and funk before eventually being mentored by the renowned jazz saxophonist and singer Elvira \u201cVi\u201d Redd.<\/p>\n
When the Eaton fire began to crawl toward Moore\u2019s house, he said he quickly packed his most important possessions. He took an archival hard drive which contained his music from 2004 to the present, but everything else burned: his recording studio, archival tapes and reels, and his favorite drum set, a vintage 1965 Rogers Holiday kit he bought in the \u201880s.<\/p>\n
\u201cI played on albums and records with that Rogers kit, when I moved to New York in \u201989, I took that Rogers kit with me, and I pushed that kit down the street every night from the East Village to the West Village to work,\u201d Moore said. \u201cI can get one that looks just like it if I was willing to spend the $4,000, but was it in the back of the subway, did I play it on Bleecker Street?\u201d the jazz drummer said.<\/p>\n
Immediately after the fire took his home, Moore needed to work, but he no longer possessed the peripherals and equipment he required to record. MusiCares donated thousands of dollars\u2019 worth of equipment he needed, including a drum set, and it also provided grants to help him pay both his mortgage and the rent where he\u2019s currently staying. Moore has a long way to go before he completely recovers financially, but he says the organization made a significant impact in his life this past year, and he\u2019s grateful.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy studio\u2019s back online, I\u2019m able to practice, I\u2019m able to work and do some gigs \u2026 it gave me my voice back, really, that was the beginning of everything,\u201d the hip-hop producer said.<\/p>\n
For Gwendolyn Sanford and Brandon Jay, a married couple raising a 16-year-old and a 9-year-old, the emotional weight has been just as significant as the financial burden that followed. The couple said they\u2019ve been proactive in prioritizing the mental well-being and happiness of their children since losing their Altadena home.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was harder for them early on, when we were moving so frequently, we didn\u2019t have any control over it, we were just trying to get somewhere stable to be, and I think they were processing the loss when they were sad that we didn\u2019t have our home,\u201d Sanford said.<\/p>\n
Sanford and her husband are singer-songwriters and have scored music for television shows like \u201cWeeds\u201d and \u201cOrange Is the New Black.\u201d The couple is also in a children\u2019s music band called Gwendolyn and the Good Time Gang, and they recently composed music for the off-Broadway show \u201cRomy and Michele the Musical.\u201d<\/p>\n
Like many others, the couple lost their personal recording studio, making work difficult. The stress has been immense for the couple, but they said MusiCares was able to ease some of the financial burden when the organization offered them grants to cover their mortgage, which they are still on the hook for.<\/p>\n
![\"Darryl](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1767823812_536_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Darryl \u201cJMD\u201d Moore in front of his home that burned down in the wildfires, taken in 2023. <\/p>\n
(Darryl \u201cJMD\u201d Moore)<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s all the red tape and hurdles and things we have to do just to rebuild our home, so that in itself is like a full-time job that we never wanted, on top of just our regular lives raising our kids and doing work,\u201d Jay said. \u201cSo, to have the support of someone like that and have them say you don\u2019t have to worry about this one aspect for a while, is invaluable.\u201d<\/p>\n
Recently, Sanford was asked to perform at a groundbreaking ceremony her former Altadena neighbor was having for a new house being built there. Sanford\u2019s daughter had not wanted to go back to the neighborhood, but she decided to accompany her mother anyway. The return was cathartic.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was able to walk around our lot and have a private moment, and I asked her how she felt, and she said, \u2018I feel safe here, this is my home,\u2019\u201d Sanford said.<\/p>\n
At the event, Sanford sang a song she penned in 2011 called, \u201cAcorn,\u201d which was inspired by the grandeur of oak trees and what they symbolize in nature. The song has taken on a different meaning for her in the wake of the fires.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe acorn is a metaphor, and I think that\u2019s kind of where we all are right now, we have to start over, we have to start small, and eventually we\u2019ll get back to where we were,\u201d Sanford said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Singer-songwriters Lisa Simmons-Santa Cruz and her husband Francisco Carroll Santa Cruz were going through a challenging time last…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":499882,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[21053,1582,276,10756,5810,25250,224353,316,17819,2961,224,5337,75557,1435,975,224351,224354,129336,224352,1628],"class_list":{"0":"post-499881","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-altadena","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-california","11":"tag-couple","12":"tag-eaton-fire","13":"tag-equipment","14":"tag-first-guitar","15":"tag-home","16":"tag-house","17":"tag-la","18":"tag-los-angeles","19":"tag-losangeles","20":"tag-moore","21":"tag-mortgage","22":"tag-music","23":"tag-musicares","24":"tag-rogers-holiday-kit","25":"tag-sanford","26":"tag-singer-songwriter-lisa-simmons-santa-cruz","27":"tag-year"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115856108954262130","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=499881"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499881\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/499882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=499881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=499881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=499881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}