Songwriting Works™ Educational Foundation is a 501c3 non-profit charitable music education organization dedicated to restoring joy, hope health and community through song. By bringing professional songwriters and music lovers of all ages together to compose orginal songs using research-vetted facilitation methods, Songwriting Works catalyzes vitality. We provide experiences that turn loneliness into connection, depression into happiness, and illness into health. Our award-winning songs and songwriting process busts through doubt, disease, prejudice and denial, uplifting individuals and communities. Professional musicians bring their skills into service using music to transform and empower: Strangers become musical collaborators, neighbors become friends. Those who never dared sing before - or who have been left out or silenced because of their circumstances - find their creative voices and are celebrated. Those who have been playing and singing for years find new meaningful ways to bring their skills into service. Elder and younger folks, families and old and new friends meet in powerful musical adventures as participants and collaborators in workshops, performances, recordings, video projects and community events. SW's participants-turned-composers include people who are living with Alzheimer's and dementia, Parkinson's, chronic illness, depression, stress, isolation, grief and other life challenges. Each person brings their wit, humor, history, melodies, rhythms, insights and creative intelligence into these original community composed songs. Family and loved ones joined in. With songs complete, we celebrate, sharing the music – and honoring the composers and their communities – in concerts, recordings, scholarly publications and radio, television, film, and internet broadcasts We welcome you to join us in our mission and bring the power of music-making, and the proven health and social benefits of music engagement and empowerment, to those in greatest need. THANK YOU FOR YOUR INTEREST. We look forward to hearing from you! Learn more at www.songwritingworks.org "I've never sung before in my life and now I'm singing!" -- SW participant Erna Neubauer, age 90