Song Writing as Reflexive Practice.

I would like to contribute to the “songbook of our lives” inquiry through a performance which takes two perspectives on songs. The first of these is from the perspective of an individual who is moved by songs, the second, as a songwriter/researcher/autoethnographer moved to write songs from my research. In the former, I share story fragments that reveal how my life, body, and story has been touched, shaped, and moved by music and lyrics and through narrative fragments trace some of the beginnings of this journey. In the latter, story fragments reveal how song writing has become a way to counter silence, lack of knowing how to respond, and as a way to stand with participants where together we might find a voice of resistance, communion, and transcendence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]