To me, that’s our job as artists. That’s the job description. You must bring joy. I think that’s the assignment. I have no doubt about it. – Bobby McFerrin

It’s no secret that life has it’s ups and it has it’s downs. Whether it’s on a global, local or individual level – there is always something going on somewhere that is a challenge to overcome, and whilst there are many reasons to create and write, this is the area we want to look at for this post.

When we face a problem, art, of any form, allows us to take that problem, express how it makes us feel BUT THEN offer hope about that situation. When we create, we can express ourselves in a way that words don’t allow us to, but we can also create a reality that we aren’t yet seeing.

One of our favourite lyrics at Root Academi was penned by the late, great Leonard Cohen – “There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in”.

Once we acknowledge the ‘cracks’ in a situation, we can start to see how and where the ‘light' can get in.

During our songwriting workshops with young people, often of primary school age, we see this happening in the lyrics they’re writing.

We invite students to write about a situation that they can speak about from personal experience, often topics like bullying, self-confidence or friendship come up, and the groups write fantastic lyrics addressing these issues.

Some lyrics written by primary school students in recent Root Academi songwriting workshops went like this;

“Be yourself, be unique, be happy, be who you want to be”

Another,

“If you’re always kind, you’ll never get left behind, if you’re happy through the days, you can always mend your ways”

And another,

“Cowboys and Indians make their amends, no matter how different we can always be friends”

These are songs about being yourself, being kind, and accepting each others differences. Pupils were recognising problems they face in every day life and using songwriting to creatively express the effects and then the solutions to those issues.

Music and singing affects us on a deep level, the more we create, sing and hear positive messages, the more they sink in and affect our every day lives.

Creativity is so important and such a powerful tool for shaping our reality.

We will finish this post with a small part of the transcript of a fantastic Ted Talk by Robert Gupta, called ‘Music is Medicine, Music is Sanity'