Our Women’s Ukulele Group, developed in partnership with One Small Thing, was part of a short pilot programme that supported women that have been through the justice system. Through instrumental learning and musical performance, these music interventions aimed to empower women, promote community cohesion and reduce the risk of re-offending. The feedback we received on the group was incredible and echoes what we hear about other sessions we run that combine therapeutic work with music – they’re fun, they’re light – and yet they have huge impact. We hope to source funding to run the Group again.
Kayleigh began attending the group on a weekly basis in Spring 2022. This is her story, in her words.
What did you enjoy most about the sessions?
All of it, I’m not gonna lie! I’ve fallen in love with it. Like I’ve been bigging it up to everyone. It was, for me it was just to do something completely…I haven’t learnt an instrument since I was made to do piano in school so it was good to do that. And I would just take it [the ukulele] to other groups and just bring it out and just start playing. And yeah, it was really fun and it wasn’t like too in your face. Kate made it… we were laughing literally the whole way through every lesson.
But you don’t realise how much you’ve learned in one session. We actually walked away and we did like play a song. But it’s fun and light, and it wasn’t…we’re literally learning through laughing at each other when we mess up. But the more you mess up, the more you’re actually learning ’cause you can then hear it. It’s good. I’ve borrowed a ukulele from here. I literally take it everywhere. I’ve got builders outside my house and they often hear me in my room playing the ukulele – they like it!
How are you progressing with the ukulele since the programme finished?
Kate showed us some people on YouTube that are really easy, like chords and things in it. So we’ve just been practicing and we almost got all the way through ‘Let It Be’ last week!
How does music and music-making make you feel?
I use music all the time. There’s always music on but to be able to make music was quite fulfilling I think. To be able to like take away from the session that we literally just made something with all of us playing it rather than just listening to ‘whatever mood I’m in’ type of music. And it’s something we wouldn’t have necessarily listened to that we were learning so it like broadened our knowledge, I guess, on music.
And how have the sessions supported your personal journey? What difference has it made, if any?
I really struggle with slowing down. So I put my heart into everything. And yeah, when I first moved over here, I actually burnt myself out and I was really poorly. So having that time every week, where I had to concentrate on, well, nothing really, was…it was just enjoyable. I put pressure on myself but it’s not pressure from other people. But pressure to study pressure to get things done pressure to do well. And yeah it’s really good for me just to have that time out every week. And then obviously, because we’ve taken the ukulele home I was making sure that I was doing it for like 20 minutes, here and there, just to take my mind away from other things. So yeah, I mean, everyone laughed at me, because I learned the ukulele. For me, it was just taking that time out from the stresses and the pressures that I was putting on myself. And it’s actually helped me to slow down and reconnect to myself, I guess.
Even though we were doing the ukulele, she’d (Kate) still manage to talk about our feelings. And you don’t even realize you’re doing it and all of a sudden you’re playing a chord about how you feel today. If she’d just asked me how I felt today I would have gone: ‘different’. But because you actually think about how you were feeling and how to express it through the ukulele, it made you think about how you’re feeling that day. And then by the end of it [the session], you’ll be feeling completely different, the chords would be different.
And would you look to join a music group that took place outside of the One Small Thing building?
I’m not quite ready to go out into the big wide world, I’m not going to lie. This is like my safe space. I’m not ready to mingle with people I don’t know. I have this real issue with trust, so because I trust everyone here, it’s really easy and it’s comfortable. And you know you’re safe in here. Whereas, I would struggle to go to somewhere [else] and be me. Like, there’s still too many other factors that I can’t cope with right this minute.
