Good morning.

I decided to try something different from my day job and joined a cabaret singing group.

I’ve never done such a thing before. The couple who run it are very flexible and are looking at all genres of music but seem to know a lot about musicals.

Last night I heard about Six, which is a musical based on the Six Wives of Henry VIII, written by two students at Edinburgh University, one reading History and the other Music. It was performed at the Edinburgh Fringe.

The six wives come alive for the night to tell their side of the story, and the rest, as they say, is History. The musical has been performed all over the world.

It made me think about the importance of having a voice.

Not just to sing but to be heard. Henry’s wives might well have had a lot to say but history has not allowed us to hear it.

Socially and technologically, we have a huge advantage over our ancestors, firstly, many of us can read and write and secondly, the writing process is helped enormously by using a computer instead of a quill and vellum.

So it is easy to write our side of the story if we want to.

I mentioned legacy writing in an earlier blog. Sometimes we don’t want to write something about ourselves, but our children might want us to.

A friend of mine went through her mother’s things and was amazed and saddened to find tiny water colour paintings in her journals.

She had no idea her mother painted. Her mother had also started a Legacy project, written entirely in rhyming couplets.

She cantered through her early life, effortlessly producing energetic poetry, happily galloped toward marriage but it seemed when the children were born the poetry dried up, concluding with some pretty ugly rhymes, the worst being ‘oughta’ and ‘ daughter’.

We agreed it was a shame, and that if we’d known about the project  I could have been her Writing Coach.

I’ve nothing against rhyming couplets they can be fun to write, so I am sure if I’d been at her side, we would have  finished her Legacy poem.

If you want to know more about  legacy writing, using a writing coach or writing in rhyming couplets please do get in touch.