Lizzie Perring

After a singing workshop, the young men spent a day discussing and developing their ideas in words and music with Lizzie and created the basis for the song to be recorded over the the next two days at Born in a Barn Studio. The group wanted to present an upbeat number with a positive message. They needed to reflect on their loses and their lonlieness as part of their status as young refugees but the big message from them all was just how valuable friendship had been in coming to terms with life in UK. Each young man comes from a different ethnic background and only one had written a song before. One young man has written many poems.

The wonderful cooperation between these guys helped the process so much. There was no competition and no quarrels. The whole process was carried through with shared decision making from the entire group. As a song writer myself, I was amazed at how they coped with only having a couple of lines each in the song. I would have found that very hard. Small elements of their stories emerged as the song took off and the whole process was very emotional.

Each contribution was recorded individually

The studio was an exciting place to be

Each person wanted to do their best

The song contains powerful messages about family

Searching for just the right words was so important

Roger steered the ship into harbour and rounded the whole piece off with great technical mastery and patience. We were so pleased to be able to include them all singing in their own languages as part of the song.