An award winning children’s songwriter, Ross created the Safety Ape, Hearty and is co-creator of Eco the Butterfly. He is licensed to write, produce and distribute music for The National Crime Preventions Council’s McGruff the Crime Dog and also wrote music for Rotary International’s Four Way Test Project. Ross produced a puppet production on reading and literacy for Coca-Cola and Reading is Fundamental (RIF) for their Story Traveler Tour featuring his original music. The Go Ape Band CD won a Gold ADDY Award and the Story Traveler Tour won a silver REGGIE® Award for cause related marketing promotions. National Crime Prevention Council has licensed the use of Ross’ music for McGruff the Crime Dog video games. Ross is managing partner of Music as Message, is on the Board of Directors of the Pensacola Beach Songwriters Festival and is the administrator of theSongFest fan page on Facebook. He will be participating in the school visits during SongFest 2011.