Jay's story
Read the story of 'Jay' by Richard Stilgoe OBE and how lyric and song writing can empower young people to express their inner most feelings:
Every week more than 32 million lottery tickets are sold. When you’ve got your ticket, three things can happen.
If you’re really unlucky you can win eight million pounds, move to a bigger house, lose all your friends and crash your new Lamborghini.
If you’re quite lucky you can win five hundred pounds and have a party. But in most cases you just lose. But those are the tickets that make a difference.
Those are the pounds that go to causes like Youth Music, and change lives. This story comes not from a Youth Music project, but from the Orpheus Centre, which was built with a generous grant from the Arts Council lottery, and which does the same sort of work as Youth Music.
I do a lot of song-writing sessions with young people with various issues.
Here’s an example. Jay (that’s not his real name) walked into his session. I asked him what he wanted to write about. He said he didn’t know. I said, okay, what makes you angry? (This is a useful starting point, I’ve found).
He said “My Dad never comes to see me.” Jay has Down’s syndrome, and his dad walked out soon after he was born – a number of fathers see the birth of a disabled child as a sort of insult to their genes, and do a runner. Mums tend not to.
Jay went on to say that his dad was meant to come and see him every Friday, but often didn’t turn up. I asked Jay what he thought of this. He thought. “It’s a sin,” he said. Then I asked what sort of style he wanted for his song. This time, no pause for thought – “Rap!” he said.
I explained that rap was not my signature skill, but I would do my best. Very quickly, now that he was fired up, Jay produced:
Hey – Dad – ya never come and see me. Hey – Dad – where you bin? Hey – Dad – ya never come and see me It’s a Sin!
Quite quickly we added some verses – the rhyming scheme is not too strict, and rap only works if written quickly. Soon Jay had his finished rap. Written by him – not by me. I just try to encourage and give permission.
We were doing this as part of a song-writing week, with a public concert of the work we had written on the Friday – the day Jay’s Dad was supposed to come and see him. So one of the staff rang Jay’s dad and explained that Jay was performing in the concert, and on the Friday night, with a full band behind him, Jay marched on stage. We had put Jay’s dad in the front row. Jay fixed his gaze on him, and sang:
Hey – Dad – ya never come and see me. Hey – Dad – where you bin? Hey – Dad – ya never come and see me It’s a Sin!
And the crowd went wild, and Jay’s dad watched his son, the son he’d abandoned because he represented failure, as the triumphant centre of attention.
I’d love to say that Jay’s dad hasn’t missed a Friday visit since; but he does turn up far more often and he rings up if he can’t come. And he thinks of his son as a bit of a star. Jay would never have talked to his dad about how he felt; but we can all be a bit braver in song.
Jay is now out in the community, living a more normal life. He probably buys the occasional lottery ticket. I’m afraid I hope he loses – because it’s the losing lottery tickets that pay for the sort of work that changes lives like his.