Bristol Beacon premieres last ‘A New Song For Bristol’ track – Lloyd Coleman’s ‘When Music Says A Thousand Words’

Bristol Beacon has today (9 June) released a new track as part of its ‘A New Song For Bristol’ project – a new track by musician, composer Lloyd Coleman entitled ‘When Music Says A Thousand Words’.

In Nov 2020 Bristol Beacon launched ‘A New Song For Bristol’, a city-wide project calling out to the Bristol public to submit their experiences of life in Bristol over the course of the last year, through words and music.

As part of the project Bristol Beacon commissioned six Bristol-based artists to write original tracks, directly inspired or co-created with groups of Bristolians of all ages, developed through a number of special online workshops.

‘When Music Says A Thousand Words’ was written by Lloyd during the last lockdown and was created in collaboration with members of Bristol Youth Choir, and features the voices of young people talking about their experiences during the pandemic, following a Zoom workshop as part of A New Song For Bristol.

Listen to the new track via Bristol Beacon’s YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/Mpoa-bLemoI

On making the track, Lloyd commented, “When I was asked to create something for A New Song for Bristol, I knew immediately I wanted to hear from young people and children living in Bristol. The pandemic has been challenging and continues to challenge so many of us – but in the heat of public debate I feel the voices of young people are often drowned out. To redress this, When Music Says a Thousand Words is a tiny snapshot into the brilliant minds of members of Bristol Youth Choir.

I hope listeners are as inspired by the young people’s intelligence, wit and charm as I am. I only wish I had time to include more – there were so many brilliant contributions! Thinking back to February – our city and the UK as a whole was in the grips of one of the darkest months of the pandemic but listening to these young singers talk to me and each other gave me a real sense of hope when it was easy to feel despair.”

'When Music Says A Thousand Words’ is the fifth ‘A New Song For Bristol’ track out of seven to be released, sharing the work of the New Song For Bristol collective of artists and the groups they have been working with.

The tracks already released include ‘Trousers Optional’ by This Is The Kit, inspired by the creative submissions from members of the Bristol public received by Bristol Beacon in response to its call out; ‘Revolution’ by Kwazi, X4 and CVNCH created with songwriter and vocalist Javeon, followed by ‘Only For Now’ written by electronic artist and producer Kayla Painter in collaboration with FLOW Creative, Bristol Beacon’s accessible music-making club for young musicians, and last week ‘Boombox’ by KALA CHNG, inspired by members of the Filwood Community. The remaining tracks are by Saffron Records artist Grove, who ran workshops with Bristol Beacon’s programme for children in care, Hope Creative; and songwriter Lady Nade has created music inspired by Bristol Beacon’s choir for Key Stage 1 children, Mini Singers.

Funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Help Musicians, PRS Foundation Talent Development Partnership and Paul Hamlyn Foundation, ‘A New Song for Bristol’ is part of Bristol Beacon’s ongoing work to uncover and share the historic venue’s heritage and role within the city alongside its multi-million-pound transformation.

All submissions for ‘A New Song For Bristol’ are being collated into a living archive, which will be included in the heritage displays at the re-opened Bristol Beacon.

To listen to all of the ‘A New Song For Bristol’ tracks, the public can visit the Bristol Beacon website at https://bristolbeacon.org/anewsongforbristol