About | Heart in Boston

Nothing is as unstoppable as a city whose time has come.

An ordinary voice. An extraordinary city.

Let me be the first to admit I am no recording artist. Nor do I play one on TV. I wrote “We've Got Heart in Boston” because I love Boston. But it’s every Boston lover’s song. No need for trills or soaring vocals, or the ability to wow Symphony Hall. The only thing “We've Got Heart in Boston” calls for is Boston in your heart.

I remember the sound of the “el” screeching on tracks high above Washington Street, the crowds at Downtown Crossing on Saturday afternoons, and warm blueberry muffins from Jordan Marsh. St. John’s and St. Patrick’s. La Alianza Hispana. Orchard Park Housing Project. Picnics at Houghton’s Pond. The trek with a little daughter in tow from a Dorchester three-decker to Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom.

You can take the girl out of Boston. You can’t take Boston out of the girl.

A Boston Story Told by Someone Who Lived It

“We’ve Got Heart in Boston” wasn’t written in a studio or a boardroom. It came from a writer who was born and raised in Boston and who has carried Boston with her through every chapter of her life. Seventy-six-year-old Daria MonDesire spent her formative years in Roxbury, was educated at the old Girls’ Latin in Codman Square and was shaped by the city’s tumultuous history. While raising a family in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom, MonDesire was constantly in Boston, visiting her father in the South End, and extended family members on the South Shore. Boston has never stopped being home. As MonDesire quips, “You can take the Bostonian out of Boston, but you can’t take the Boston out of the Bostonian.”

MonDesire’s mother, who, at 100 years old, remembers the days when song sheets were sold on the corner of Washington and Summer Street, is a link to a still older Boston, a Boston when City Point was a no-go zone for African Americans, and jobless men knocked on back doors for meals. MonDesire is her mother’s round-the-clock caregiver in northern California, a turn of events that make the absence of lobster rolls and bean pots a “Do I need say more?” indictment of the west coast.

A Down-to-Earth-Voice For Down-To-Earth City

MonDesire’s voice on “We’ve Got Heart in Boston” is the voice of an ordinary, everyday Bostonian. That’s intentional. The track didn’t demand vocals from the New England Conservatory, or from a Rhianna sound-alike. It needed someone who mirrored Boston: warm, direct, and real. MonDesire’s voice carries the sound of Boston. To hear her sing is to know she could be from nowhere else. To listen to her lyrics is to know only a Bostonian could have written them. “We’ve Got Heart in Boston” is for Boston lovers with a willingness to belt it out and an iced Dunks’ for added courage. Your moment has arrived.

The Sound of Boston’s Cross Currents

The track opens with Irish tin whistle and builds straight toward an exuberant bridge of West African and Celtic drumming. The arrangement is neither whim nor accident. They come straight from the influences in MonDesire’s childhood where she attended St. John’s Elementary in Roxbury, and later, St. Patrick’s, with nuns who were fond of telling the misbehaved, “Keep your wits about you, or it’s Mother Superior you’ll be sent to.” Weekends, after the workload of Girls’ Latin, included time for African dance and drumming. “We’ve Got Heart in Boston” is a fusion of these influences, with the distinctive sounds of samba and marimba in the mix. The song weaves these strands together the way Boston brags on its people, naturally, proudly, and joyfully.

Why This Song Exists

“We’ve Got Heart in Boston" is a salute to the city’s character: the resilience, the loyalty, the humor. It’s not about landmarks or cliches. It’s about the feeling of Boston, the Boston that speaks for itself, the Boston that is ‘Boston Charming.’

The song was written to give Boston a city song that feels like it came from the city. A song about the city, by a daughter of the city. A song that says wherever you are in the world, you will always be in Boston.

Artist Statement

As a writer and songwriter, my purpose is connection, bringing people together through joy, rhythm and the shared heartbeat. I write to give voice to what I feel, to what other people feel. If I can tap into those feelings, I’ve succeeded.

I’m blessed to have been born in Boston. The cadence, the humor, the no-nonsense approach, the way it will always be The Garden, it’s all part of who I am. Boston shaped my ear, my voice, and my sense of identity.

Songwriting became another way to tell stories. And those stories are another way to connect people to each other and to the places they love. I’m no mathematician, you wouldn’t want me in your calculus class, but give me a memory, or a moment, and I can turn it into something that feels alive. While “We’ve Got Heart in Boston” celebrates Boston and the joy of belonging to a world-class city, my writing also spans quieter emotional moments. My goal is the same: to create songs and narratives that help people feel connected to themselves, to each other, and to the stories that shape their lives.

Lyrics: We've Got Heart in Boston

Verse 1: Our streets are like car lots, three-deckers are king
We put chairs in the snow, we make way for ducklings
Our harbor is cold, but our ship still comes in
And we don’t waste our ‘R’s, we’ve got heart in Boston

Verse 2: Some places are warm, they have fun in the sun
The people so sweet, they don’t eat honey buns
But we know what we need, Dunkin’s almost a creed
And we don’t waste our ‘R’s, we’ve got heart in Boston

Verse 3: So, come if you want, we’ll show you a good time
We’ll go get a chowder that’s simply sublime
But you’ll pay your own tab, and put up with the din
And we don’t waste our ‘R’s, we’ve got heart in Boston

Outro:
And we don’t waste our ‘R’s, we’ve got heart in Boston