The birth of Song Healing Trauma began as a collaboration between Naia Kete and the Alianza Project; a school-based trauma-focused therapy, youth leadership, and community support program in Holyoke, MA.
Naia worked with 7 participants, cultivating trust, listening to their stories and translating trauma to song. These songs were written and recorded at The Institute for the Musical Arts, a nonprofit dedicated to women in music, rooted in the legacy of progressive equal rights movements.
Trauma survivor and songwriter join together in a process of storytelling that reflects back to both the feelings, thoughts, and experiences that were felt throughout the life of the trauma survivor. It also encompasses those feelings that are shared in the interaction itself. There is power within this interaction for somatic healing through the ways in which tone, harmony, melody, and rhythm make their way into and through the body - as well as narrative healing through the ways in which the young person gains control over their story, re-writes it (or writes it for the first time) in partnership with the songwriter.
The songwriter/healer creates and holds a love-filled space where all feelings - including those of unbearable pain - are welcome and tended to. In this process, the trauma survivor is able to look through the mirror that has been held up to them and see their strength, know that they made it to the other side, that there is power to be harnessed there, that they are seen, and that their story matters.
