The tragedy of September 11^th personally affected Cantafio. As with most stock and bond traders in Chicago, he did business with traders in New York who were lost in the World Trade Center. Joe decided he was going to do something this time and not sit around like he did during the 1^st Gulf War.

After being turned down by the Armed Forces because of his age, Cantafio decided to step-up using his musical talent.

A few days after the September 11^th attacks, Joe’s business associate Bill Reishtein, called and asked Joe what he was going to do. They talked over many different ideas for hours and came up with a concert tour idea.

Bill called some pubs and started booking Joe, for free, into those venues.

Joe started fighting terrorism a different way and wrote a three-hour solo musical show Bill and Joe named “Let Freedom Sing.”  The show was free to the public. People were asked to donate what they could into fire boots provided by Joe’s firefighter brother-in-law.

Eventually he toured with the firefighters of New York’s Engine Company 55. Joe pulled the name of one of the lost firefighters from that Engine Company out of a hat, which contained the names of the 343 FDNY firefighters who gave their lives on 9-11. Joe gave them one year of his life.

Joe raised funds and funded trips for the firefighters and family members of the lost firefighters of Engine 55. His “Let Freedom Sing” tour went coast-to-coast receiving critical acclaim.  People were able to personally thank the New York firemen for their rolls in healing our country after 9 –11.

Joe let everyone know that he welcomed help from anyone else who wanted to feel what he was feeling and before long a “Let Freedom Sing” team of volunteers had been assembled with people who wanted to do something.

Schaumburg Fire Photographer Roy Hervas stepped up to the plate and made T-shirts and built a float that the New York firefighters would ride on in Chicago area parades. Roy and his wife Lynda gave of themselves for hours and hours every single day helping Joe with everything and anything that needed to be done.

Joe’s cousin and his former High School coach, Rich Arceri and his wife Sharon, put their lives on hold for a year and teamed up with Cantafio and Hervas. They did whatever it took to make the project successful. While Joe sang on stage they sold the T-shirts and drove the New Yorkers anywhere they wanted to go in rented vans while visiting Chicago.

Local Barrington, Illinois firefighter Ron DeAvilla joined the team and did whatever he could, working wherever he was needed. Ron even drove equipment  and merchandise halfway across the USA to make life easier for his brother New York firefighters.

Although “Let Freedom Sing” started in train stations and small pubs, it grew and soon they were performing at festivals in front of thousands of people. Sometimes the show went five hours long, … without a break!

Cantafio said; “During the ‘Let Freedom Sing Tour,’ I was in awe and honored to be standing with New York’s bravest,who put it on the line at a time when the world was watching and needing a real hero. The brave men of FDNY Engine Company 55 are those heroes.”

Cantafio learned that you don’t need a gun to fight terrorism, sometimes a guitar will do.

While on that tour Joe became very close with FDNY firefighter John Olivero and Cliff Russell. Russell is the brother of lost New York firefighter Stephen P. Russell of Engine Company 55. 

In the days that followed the attacks of September 11^th, Stephen P. Russell never came home. His older brother Cliff helped raise Stephen from a child. Cliff taught him how to fish and swim. He showed Stephen how to use tools and build things, how to sail and scuba dive. They had a very close and loving brother-to-brother relationship. Now, frustrated and sleepless, Cliff had to do something to bring closure to his Mother and Father and his family.

On September 14, 2001, Cliff reported to the firehouse and with the help of the firefighters of Engine 55, he put on one of his brothers uniforms and worked at Ground Zero for weeks. Cliff personally helped in the recovery of the bodies of 23 New York firefighters until his brother’s body was recovered in October 2001.

Although the “Let Freedom Sing Tour” showed the Russell Family that thousands of people, miles from their home really cared about them, Russell asked Cantafio, “How do I continue to heal from the loss of my brother?” Joe answered, “Take it to the troops.”

Cliff was obsessed and possessed with that vision, telling Cantafio that while performing on his “Let Freedom Sing Tour,” he was doing all the right things for all the wrong reasons. Bringing his message to the American’s now dealing with these cowards that killed his brother would be doing the right things for the right reasons.