Your first communication with the outside world is sound
and that's why I think it gets all of those hormones going
because it's the first communication you ever have.
So all the emotions that music can show to people
are in those first moments.
I often feel that my voice is stuck,
when I'm having conversations or I don’t know what to say
or I'm shy.
With the singing, it just cuts through all this.
I'm quite a fragmented person
but somehow I just keep coming back to this.
You're aligning your voice, your inner self
with lots of other people that you may not even know.
Your voice is so personal to you compared to an instrument.
That's why we're so sensitive about singing in front of people
but it's also why it gives us such a buzz
because we are being watched for exactly who we are,
no holds barred.
If you're really low and down,
then singing could be scariest thing you could think of doing.
So if you can get over that fear by having a supportive environment
like a choir, then you're off.
I was happily married with three children for 20 years
and then the wife turned round and divorced me,
and I was thrown out with no money, no job, no children, nowhere to live.
We're all different people, with different problems
and when we're there we're all one.
We've got to all depend on each other.
Music accesses more parts of the brain...
than nearly any other activity.
They're also making pathways between each side.
It fires off so many different parts of the brain
that surely things are going to be starting to change.
We've evolved to be a species who want to be
in communication with other people.
Music has actually evolved to be a tool to do that.
It's like a biotechnology. You have to breathe together,
you have to sing in tune. Well, you don’t have to but...
You have to sing in rhythm with each other, you might move together.
You're suddenly in it together and that builds trust
because you know that everyone is doing it for the group.
This particular choir is unique because it gives you courage.
It makes you feel connected.
It's a bit like having a hug I suppose,
it brings you back to being a human being.
Singing is an unusual expression,
it sort of throws your insides out.
It doesn't bother me now that I am not a perfect musician.
It just matters that I can actually stay alive.
I found that so much working in the mental health world
is that somebody would be very happy to sing a very intensely
emotional song,
but to talk about anything afterwards would be really difficult
because they don’t know where it's going to go,
but they know the song is going to end.
When I had a spine problem, I had chronic depression.
Your physical health can lead to your mental health.
You don't have to be good.
First thing you have to feel that I want to sing and that’s it.
You know you don’t have to be 100%
because you don’t have to be a hero in a day.
In philosophy, there's epistemological solipsism,
your brain makes up your world.
So we've all got our own little worlds in our head.
And so we're all very individual
because all our brains are not linked by the internet.
That's where music is such an important, vital tool,
because if we're all individual we could just say,
"I want your cheese sandwich, I'm just going to take it."
Or "I want your house I'm just going to move in."
Or "Actually I want your wife I might just kill you."
These are the animalistic kind of things that an individual,
primal being would do.
So the way that we can then process these primal feelings,
is to do it through a safe way, sublimate it and do it through music.