Wellness Center Original Song, “Family Fun!”

For the past year and a half, I’ve had the wonderful opportunity to provide virtual music therapy groups through the UCSF Wellness Center for Youth with Chronic Conditions. We call these sessions our Wellness Music Jam groups!

Designed for youth ages 8-12, Wellness Music Jam gives participants a space to connect, get creative, and explore music together. As part of the Wellness Center’s rotating group programming, Wellness Music Jams are offered during select months as a four-session series, with each series centered around a different music-based activity or intervention.

Earlier this summer, we dedicated our May series to songwriting! Across four group sessions, we explored the different steps that go into creating a song and practiced fun ways to come up with original lyrics. Participants shared their ideas, built off one another’s creativity, and worked together to decide what our song would be about.

And their chosen theme? Family Fun!

Throughout the month, the song continued to take shape as we worked together on lyrics, musical ideas, and the different pieces that make a song feel complete. By the end of our four sessions, all of those ideas came together into one original group song!

Each participant had the opportunity to contribute their own ideas and share fun family memories that they wanted to include in the song. And with a little help from their parents, the participants even recorded themselves singing their own parts at home! Their individual recordings were then brought together for the final song, allowing each participant’s voice to be heard and making the finished piece something truly special!

We’re excited to share the final result with you. Check out our “Family Fun” song below!

If you’re interested in learning more about the UCSF Wellness Center and its services, please feel free to check out this link for more details!