Spoken word and music give students a medium through which to express their concerns and hopes, writes SYLVIA THOMPSON.
"Be yourself in everything you do Don't be afraid to express the real you"
THE ABOVE lines are the chorus of a song that a group of transition year students at Trinity Comprehensive school on Ballymun Road were practising in preparation for last Friday's showcase of songs and spoken word pieces at the Axis Arts Centre in Ballymun, Co Dublin.
Clapping out the rhythm as spoken word lines linked into the chorus, the students gave us a demo of a song they wrote as part of an innovative project aimed to prevent suicide in this vulnerable age and socio-economic grouping.
Led by singer/songwriter Colm Quearney (aka Q) and comedian/rap artist Dean Scurry (who came to prominence during Des Bishop's TV show Joy in Da Hood), the Invent project involved up to 80 teenagers in schools and youth groups in Ballymun.
"They really surprised us with the quality of material in their lyrics," says Quearney.
"It was an amazing way for them to have fun, express themselves, be creative and let loose," adds Scurry.
It seems the students themselves have also found a new resource to draw on. "It expands your creativity and builds your confidence," says Mark O'Sullivan (16) whose own song includes lines such as "all my friends being torn apart, and babies being born in the park, 'cause their mother's only 13", and "If you're taking stuff just to be high, you're going to die, so you might as well say goodbye".
"It got me more involved in school. I enjoyed both the writing and the singing," says Natasha Shaw (16). Her song quietly expressed what the project meant to her.
"I have gotten up from the crowd, from being in the back and not being heard, to standing up in the front to let the whole world hear me."
"It gave me the confidence to say stuff about teenagers," says Gavin Tracey (15), who plays the bass guitar in a band called Over The Edge.
"We sang about fear, we sang about death, we sang about everything even crystal meth," are lines from one of Tracey's songs.
The Invent project was funded through the Pobal/Dormant Accounts Suicide Prevention Measure in conjunction with the HSE and MZone Liverpool Youth Music Zone.
"The idea developed from rap workshops that MZone gave in Axis. We saw how the guys started rapping about their families and personal stuff so Ray Yeates, the director of Axis, had the idea that it would be a great medium for young people to develop a voice for themselves," explains Mark O'Brien, arts development manager at Axis.
"Suicide is the end point of something. We were looking at getting young people who might be seen as not able to express themselves openly and giving them the medium of song to explore their lives and share that without being prescriptive about themes or topics," he says.
"Then, we worked closely with the management in the schools, at Youthreach and with the Ballymun Regional Youth Resource to develop a real partnership between arts development and youth development," adds O'Brien.
All facilitators, youth workers and teachers received training in suicide prevention and there were opportunities for students to be referred for counselling if necessary.
"What I noticed most was that the students chose to write about really important things and it really helped some of them come out of themselves," says Emma Connors, who co-ordinated the project.
"Many of them said that they'd keep writing after the workshops were over, which means that they can use it to get stuff out. They never had an opportunity to vent before," she says.
Kate Clarke, English and drama teacher at Trinity Comprehensive, adds: "It gave the students a rare chance to show what they are made of.
"It can be difficult to capture their imagination, but this project cut through to the real heart of them. They were here in body and mind during this project which allowed them to have fun in a school environment."