On the short list of universal truths, it seems fair to say that all music is medicine – something to uplift sagging spirits, a true balm for the soul during troubled times. And the world has seen some pretty troubled times of late. So it comes as no surprise to find that, since the start of the global COVID-19 pandemic, more songwriters are choosing to create music designed for healing.
While any music can offer positive benefits to its listeners, these creators are intentionally incorporating traditional healing techniques in their songwriting, with the goal to provide health and wellness – to themselves as well as others.
Desirée Dawson is a singer-songwriter from Vancouver who won the CBC Searchlight contest in 2018. Dawson’s powerful, moving video for her song “Meet You at The Light” won the Music Video of the Year Award at the 2022 edition of the South by Southwest (SXSW) Music Conference and Festival. She also received a 2022 JUNO nomination for Adult Contemporary Album of the Year for her most recent release, also called Meet You at the Light. She’s a yoga teacher as well, who first witnessed the transformative power of music in her classes.
“Before I was performing onstage, I started singing in my yoga classes,” she says. “At the very end of class, I would share one song. Honestly, I was getting a response from people, like, ‘What did you just do? What was that wizardry?’ Having an intentional space, where people were allowed to be vulnerable and allow the music to wash over them, I think it made me realize this is a really powerful thing.”
Lia Liza is an R&B singer, songwriter, and model born in Vancouver and now working in Los Angeles, who admits her goal is no less than raising the frequency of the world through her music. She first felt the connection between music and healing as a child in church, and now uses various meditative practices, including gong baths, in performance – with the intention to bring others to a state of high vibration that will lift them up.
“A gong bath is the type of meditation where you bathe in the healing vibrations of sound,” she explains. “I was able to do a gong bath meditation to start off my friend David Sebastian’s album release party. And just the response that I got from people there, how they were able to relax, and really get present, and be in a state of awareness, and focus on his album after… it really set the tone. And I love to see that blend.”
Music and Mental Health
As a kind of corollary to the idea of music as medicine, many SOCAN members are moving toward an acknowledgment of mental health issues as a first step toward wellness. For one example, Serena Ryder’s JUNO Award-winning album The Art of Falling Apart, was inspired by her own keynote address dealing with the subject. For another, young singer-songwriter Charlie Houston recently released Bad Posture, the title of which refers to the way the artist’s posture shifts whenever she’s sad, nervous, or anxious. She says, “Mental illness these days is more commonplace. Every young adult right now is struggling with something.” That said, music as a healing medicine is more crucial than ever.
In July of 2020, in the wake of the first pandemic restrictions and the reaction to George Floyd’s murder, Liza held a “Rhythm & Rise” event in Vancouver for herself and others to “come together as a community to love and support one another” – including breath work with Andrew Ao, and mindful conversation with Dora Kamau. Donations went to Hogans Alley, G.L.I.T.S Inc., and the Vancouver Black Therapy & Advocacy Fund, and contributors included Lululemon, Harlow Skin Co., and Woash Wellness.
Some may equate sound healing with New Age music, a mostly instrumental style of soundscapes first popularized in the 1970s. But one major difference with these artists is that they’re composing popular music with lyrics – where the words, vocal incantations, instrumentation, and intentions all combine to produce a new version of music medicine.
“New Age really was just a word to describe the discovery of global cultures by White European settlers,” says Alysha Brilla, whose global folk fusion music has been nominated for several JUNO Awards. “I think we’re coming to a place where we can appreciate that all of these global medicinal traditions aren’t really new, and are very rooted in scientific healing. And I think the more that the West embraces sound as a legitimate healing modality, the closer we’ll be to being able to help where we are in society – which needs a lot of bridging, I think.”
Each of these songwriters has been working with sound healing techniques for much, if not all, of their careers. But all acknowledge that the pandemic brought a greater interest in health and wellness, which inspired a more direct approach to writing songs that might help.
Brilla’s 2022 album Circle was a direct result of the pandemic, and wanting to create music to uplift. It includes the track “Hold the Hope,” which invites listeners to lean on her when they’re feeling low.
“Once COVID hit is when I started working on this album,” says Brilla. “And I noticed that all of my musical peers, all of my family, all of my friends, everyone, was especially needing to talk more about mental health, and how to care for ourselves. That’s how this album came to be.”
At the same time, these are artists are committed to ensuring their own mental health doesn’t take a backseat either. Prioritizing self-care in a business that can grind you down isn’t always easy. On a recent tour with Serena Ryder, Dawson found herself losing her voice, and her bandmates convinced her to cancel a gig for the longer-term good.
“We’re in an industry where we’re told to run ourselves dry, and to just go, and go, until we literally collapse,” she says. “I feel very grateful because so many people that I surround myself with are, like, ‘Hey, let’s do this differently, so that our music is also a reflection of how we’re living.’”
Brilla, who was signed to a major label deal with Lava/Atlantic in her teens, admits that being an independent artist now allows her to make decisions that benefit her own health, and stay in line with the message in her music.
“I’ve always known it’s more rewarding to be able to build community and focus on the real, altruistic, medicinal power of music,” she says. “I don’t think I was born into this world to make millions of dollars. I think I was born into this world to help share the healing power of music.”