How music has helped me through my battles!
Well done Steve!
Earlier this year with the help of Anna Leigh Vocal Studios , Anna Middleton and a few friends and family including Alex Hooper a student at ALVS. I grew the confidence to set up shop as a solo artist, I had always dreamed of playing live music to people, and especially my own songs, from the age of 8 I’d yielded a guitar, and pretended to be on main stage Glastonbury blasting Oasis songs out of my bedroom window, with my Argos special Encore guitar and little practice amp. But life happened, I got into a rut and dreams changed. I developed a depressive disorder from constantly being knocked down to the ground in life and was that low that I nearly took my own life 3 times. In 2004 my old school friend took his own life, and with that made me think of how his family felt, it gave me second thoughts and made me look in the mirror and really take stock of what I had, but being depressed it’s hard to see through to the positives, but I decided to go and get help. My school friends family set up a charity to help, and prevent people from taking their own lives, and it was called If U Care Share Charity. I decided one day I’d pay my respects to my school friends family by doing charity work for them, after I’d won my battle.
Years later I started to pick the guitar up again, I got most of my problems sorted, I attended singing lessons from Anna Leigh Vocal Studios, and eventually after trying to set up a band for a year, decided to become a solo artist. I started performing my first gigs and it was great, I got some really good advice from Oliver Speck (Walcot band), Alex Hooper and ALVS.
I thought back about my school friend, and If U Care Share Charity, and decided I’d set up a music Festival for them, they agreed and we talked details, it seemed to come easy how I would set the whole thing up. I’d find a venue with a beer garden, get all they acts, entertainment and decide the ticket price.
After a few months of organising and some of my daily battles, I’d found 15 acts who were good enough to give their time up for free, sourced a full PA from Overall Studios Washington, found kids entertainment, sorted tickets out, and with the help of my mother sorted raffle prizes for the day. A few of they acts dropped out over a 3 month period, and I found replacements for them. On the day the kids entertainment couldn’t make it, so me and my girlfriend had to dress up as Spider-Man and Belle for an hour, then I had 10 minutes to get changed and go on stage as I was the first act on Stage 2. After a long day and lots of hard work from all the acts, my mother, my girlfriend Stevie, Neil Stoker (sound engineer) and The If U Care Share team, the day was a success! We raised a fantastic sum of £750 for the charity! Success!
Steve x