Peter Spafford - Song Portraits

During the first Covid-19 Lockdown of 2020 Peter Spafford created 9 Song Portraits of older people in Leeds. Each Song Portrait was a picture of a person in words and music at a particular moment of their lives. Each song built up through a series of conversations over the phone, and in collaboration with the song’s ‘subject’ or ‘sitter’. 

All the participants were referred by agencies who were important partners in the project - Headingley Methodist Elders, Neighbourhood Action New Farnley, Time to Shine & Fall Into Place Theatre. 

The aim was to offer the project particularly to older people without internet access; hence the use of the phone. In fact a couple of the participants did use the internet, but in very limited ways. One participant had conquered initial fears to embrace the net for her own needs (which became the main narrative and thematic heart of the song entitled The Learning).

The lyrics were published in Shine magazine, the project featured and songs played on BBC Radio Leeds and on East Leeds FM. The songs were retweeted widely by various people, including Ian McMillan and Eliza Carthy. But most importantly, the participants themselves expressed their own satisfaction with their particular song and shared it with their family and friends. 

“everyone from that time (of the memories in the lyric) is gone now. But I’ll have the song for myself. The song is always there.”

“when I played my song to my daughter, she said: Well, that’s you’.”