2 Fitch grads team up for special-needs kids

The album can be bought online for $20.
By GUY D'ASTOLFO
VINDICATOR ENTERTAINMENT WRITER
AUSTINTOWN -- Two childhood friends with a love of music have collaborated on a Christmas album that will benefit children with special needs.
Jeff Tokar, who is a fire department captain in Garland, Texas, and Jack Ciarnello, who owns and operates a recording studio in Austintown, have just put the finishing touches on "Home for Christmas."
The album combines the vocal talent of Tokar's six-man group FireForce, which is made up of Garland firefighters, along with musicians that Ciarnello rounded up from the Youngstown area. Ciarnello produced the CD in his studio.
Sales of the album will benefit NOCK (National Organization Caring for Kids), which provides assistive technology devices to children who need them.
Tokar and Ciarnello, friends since the first grade, attended Austintown schools, graduating from Fitch High School in 1977, where they both played in the band.
Tokar studied music at Baptist Bible College in Springfield, Mo., and has been a singer and firefighter in Garland for 22 years.
Ciarnello, a classically trained pianist who went to Dana School of Music, plays in the Youngstown Symphony Orchestra and Warren Philharmonic. He operates TakeNote Productions, a recording studio based in his Austintown home.
Origin of idea
The idea for a benefit Christmas album came about when Tokar's FireForce was performing on a Dallas television program. The show's host challenged Tokar to put together a Christmas album.
Tokar chose NOCK as a beneficiary, because it is a newer group with a national reach.
One young woman who was helped by NOCK sings a song on "Home for Christmas." Sara Pyszka, 19, of Pittsburgh, who has cerebral palsy, sings "My Grown-Up Christmas List" with the help of an artificial voice device made by Dynavox Industries and supplied to her by NOCK.
Musicians on the album of traditional Christmas songs are LaMar Austin of Warren, drums; and Scott Hockenberry and Marc Pupino of Boardman, and Jonathan Willis of North Canton on horns.
Daniel Leahy of Galesburg, Ill., arranged the music.
"Home for Christmas" will soon be available for $20, which includes shipping and handling, at www.usafireforce.com.