Trust, time, and tea: insights from the Carer's Music Fund

Host: Ingrid Abreu Scherer, Civil Society Lead at the What Works Centre for Wellbeing. whatworkswellbeing.org

With huge thanks to the project staff and participants who spoke to us for this podcast, and shared their music-making.

Peter and Gina from the Monster Extraction project in My Pockets, an award winning production company based in Hull and East Yorkshire. My Pockets make innovative and heartfelt films, music, digital campaigns and social art projects. http://www.mypockets.co.uk/

Laura Roberts from Jack Drum Arts, a sustainable, locally-based social enterprise providing cultural opportunities for communities in County Durham and the wider region through a range of workshops, courses, theatre, music-making and outdoor events. https://www.jackdrum.co.uk/

Teya-Jean Bawden from the Lullaby Project in Fèis Rois, enables people of all ages to access, participate in and enjoy the traditional arts and Gaelic language through a diverse programme of activities in Ross & Cromarty, across Scotland and beyond.

Ruth Hollis from Spirit of 2012. The Carers’ Music Fund was made possible by funding that Spirit of 2012 received from the Tampon Tax Fund, awarded through the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS). 

This episode features interviews with:

Ed Whiting, Director of Strategy at Wellcome Trust

Before joining Wellcome in September 2016, Ed worked in a number of Whitehall social and financial policy departments, including HM Treasury’s financial stability team during the 2008-09 financial crisis. He was most recently at 10 Downing Street as Deputy Principal Private Secretary to the Prime Minister, leading on public services.

As part of his role, Ed is also the Executive Leadership Team sponsor of Wellcome’s policy function, strategic partnerships and mental health priority area. 

Deborah Hardoon, Head of Evidence, What Works Centre for Wellbeing

Deborah leads the centre’s research, heads a team with evaluation and analytical expertise and is responsible for the centre’s evidence approach and standards. An economist by background, she was previously Deputy Head of Research at Oxfam GB, and Research Manager at Transparency International, responsible for the global corruption measurement tools, including the Corruption Perceptions Index.

John Pullinger was the National Statistician for the United Kingdom, serving in this role from 1 July 2014 until retiring on 30 June 2019.

Margreet Frieling is a sociologist and principal analyst with KOATA Insights. She has worked as a senior analyst at both Stats NZ and the Treasury. Within these roles, Margreet has developed conceptual frameworks for a wide range of wellbeing constructs and researched best practice approaches for measurement, as well as undertaken research projects.

Margreet has a strong background in measurement and statistics. Her work over the last ten years has focused on the conceptualisation and measurement of wellbeing within a public policy setting. Key areas of focus have included social capital and social connectedness, Māori wellbeing, subjective wellbeing, civic and cultural engagement, health, and housing outcomes. 

Chair - Deborah Hardoon, Head of Evidence - What Works Centre for Wellbeing

Panellists:
Adrian Bethune, Primary teacher and founder of Teach Happy
Richard Crellin, Wellbeing Policy and Research Manager - The Children’s Society Praveetha Patalay, Associate Professor - UCL

Guests/who is featured:

Dr Daisy Fancourt, University College London
Dr Daisy Fancourt is an Associate Professor of Psychobiology & Epidemiology at University College London. Daisy has researched the health impacts of singing across a range of clinical and non-clinical settings including bereavement, postnatal depression. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Daisy is leading a team running the UK's largest study into the psychological and social impact of the virus, providing weekly data to the government, the World Health Organisation, and hundreds of community and third sector organisations (www.covidsocialstudy.org). She is also leading the COVID-MINDS Network: an international network of longitudinal studies exploring the global mental health impact of the pandemic (www.covidminds.org).

www.ucl.ac.uk/epidemiology-healt…re/people/fancourt

Tess Berry-Hart Citizens of the World choir
The Citizens of the World choir is composed of refugees and friends covering 29 different nationalities and ranging between 17 and 76 years of age. Set up in 2017 by a group of volunteers after the closure of the Calais Jungle refugee camp in Northern France, the choir has now performed on BBC TV and radio and nationwide from the Welsh Eisteddfod to St Paul's Cathedral, the Royal Festival Hall and Shakespeare's Globe Theatre where they performed alongside Basement Jaxx and Sting. During their seventh season the choir transformed rehearsals and concerts online in the summer of 2020, co-creating bespoke online musical experiences with Imogen Heap, jazz singer Ian Shaw and actress Emily Watson.

www.citizensoftheworldchoir.org/
Twitter: @cotwchoir
www.facebook.com/CitizensoftheWorldChoir/

Richard Bloodworth, leader of Sadberge church choir
A retired secondary headteacher, Richard Bloodworth has been a keen amateur musician throughout his life. His musical experiences are varied; he conducts a large local choral society which is supported in performance by professional orchestral players and vocal soloists, but is also artistic director of Opera Nova - a small group of opera enthusiasts which creates semi staged performances in community venues and churches around the Tees valley. Church music has always been a passion, and he finds working with and developing a small but enthusiastic choir in the village of Sadberge is as rewarding as his larger scale interests.

What Works Centre for Wellbeing resources

Music, singing and wellbeing whatworkswellbeing.org/resources/mus…nd-wellbeing/

Guidance: How to measure your impact on wellbeing measure.whatworkswellbeing.org/

Music featured on the podcast

Manamou: The Citizens of the World Choir of Refugees and Friends
Here’s our Soundcloud of Manamou, a song written by all the choir together during a workshop with our patron, actress Emily Watson. It features all the places that our choir call home, and the journeys they took to get here. Original libretto by Emily Watson together with the Citizens of the World Choir members, and original music by Tom Donald.

User-255043543 – Citizens-of-the-world-choir-manomou

Flocks in Pastures Green Abiding: Sadberge Church Choir

Theme song: Ketsa, Multiverse