Music is as air to me. It always has been. To hear it, to feel it, to make it: my breathing in, my letting go.

In July 2011, while serving as a minister in Fraserburgh, I began writing and playing songs with friend and colleague, Stephen Brown.

I was reluctant at first, stage-shy really. But Stephen’s hand at my back, his “what’s the worst that can happen”, pushed me on. And the songs themselves drew me in.

In time we took to playing under the name “Thursday’s Child” because there was something searching about the songs we were writing. They felt to be for the “far to go” ones, ourselves included, those searching for peace, for faith, for firm ground to stand on, those unafraid to ask questions however unyielding.

We recorded two albums together, “Is screaming an option?” in 2014 and “However far” in 2016. Both reflected our commitment to give voice to the hopes and disappointments, joys and sorrows that are part of all our living.

Stephen died suddenly just days before our second album was due to be released and mid way through “The Unwritten Letters Project” which would see the release of a third album, “Skin over bone”. The project culminated in a series of gatherings in June 2017, drawing in friends from around Scotland and far beyond to explore migration stories through word, music, art and song.

One night, when the project and much else seemed in tatters, I went along to a Karine Polwart gig part hymn to the earth, part cry for shelter. At the interval, I found myself telling the story of my days to the American woman in the next seat. “I used to write songs too,” I was saying. “I used to write songs with my music partner. But he fell one day and never got up. And now I don’t know how to be.”

Later, at the end of the gig, as the audience began to rustle and rise, the woman caught my gaze and, mindful, watching, said, “Pursue your art, sing your song, be well.”

Pursue your art, sing your song, be well. Those words have become as a refrain to me. And I want to make truth of them.

As I wrote in a song once, this broken one will not keep from singing on…

And I will not.

photo by Rob Janovski