New Orleans trumpeter Shamarr Allen wanted to find a way to get guns out of kids' hands, so he turned to what he knows best: music. He recently created a gun-for-trumpet exchange program — called Trumpet Is My Weapon — and has so far collected four guns that he turned over to police.
"I had some trumpets lying around, and I know for me, the trumpet saved me," he says.
Allen, who's from the city's Lower Ninth Ward, started the program after learning about Devante Bryant, 9, was fatally shot in front of his 7th Ward home earlier this month.