CrEaTiVe PrOjEcT | Sound of Pen

When I first started the Sound of Pen project, it was with enormous help from my good friend, Simon. We met in 2004, when he was playing guitar in The Trend (later to become Narration). I managed his band for the next five years. Later, the two of us wrote some songs together – under the name of Children of Graffiti – including a track called ‘When Boys Are Boys’ – a track inspired by the death of my old school friend, William.

With The Trend/Narration, we had ambitions of headlining Glastonbury Festival and making music a career. The band featured alongside the likes of Paramore and Bring Me The Horizon in national magazines and recorded with Fightstar’s producer.

The Children of Graffiti idea wasn’t driven by the same dreams. By the time we wrote ‘When Boys Are Boys’, we both had families and had started new careers outside of the music industry. All we really wanted was an outlet for our creative energies.

I want YOU to feel as motivated as we did to get your own thoughts and feelings down on the page! And to have as much fun spending time articulating and recording those ideas and emotions!

ACTIVITY 1

‘When Boys Are Boys’ started life as a poem/lyric. Write a poem or lyric about something that is important to you.

ACTIVITY 2

Create an audio piece to go alongside the poem/lyric. Perhaps you’ll turn it into a song. Maybe you will think of it more as a spoken word piece and read it aloud. Possibly, if you don’t feel comfortable using your own voice, you’ll use online tools to help you adopt a different voice.

ACTIVITY 3

Create a video to go alongside the lyric. You could film something yourself. I took all my clips from sites like Pexels and Pixabay. These sites host videos that you can use for free and are not restricted by copyright. You might have your own editing software, or there are various video-making platforms online: Canva’s is pretty easy to use.

Have fun!!