This 2-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

A Light in Darkness arrived at some point during the pandemic when I needed to remember that I have it within myself to be the light I need when the state of things seems bleak. This song acknowledges the faith needed to persevere. The second verse came in like a friend offering to help carry the load, as many hearts tending embers is a strong and sustaining fire. I love it sung a cappella, drawn out, like the howl of wolves hanging in the air of a winter night.

This 3-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Awake Your Wild was a pep-talk I needed to shake myself out of cabin fever the winter my family and I were living in close quarters in a large town~ this country mouse needed to get back to the basics! I love this song for its uplifting, invigorating energy. Its uplifting vibe gets people moving their bodies, so it’s a great warm-up or morning song for kids and adults alike.

I love singing the four "celebrates" in this song by themselves, and the original song came through in that simple way. The lyrical line that can be added on top after the choral harmonies are happening is optional; I wrote it to give voice to my gratitude for being so provided for. This is a great song for "beginners", or as a warm-up song because there's only one word to remember.

This PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

This 2-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Down to the River first came through like a babbling brook bouncing over many stones, as I watched a swollen spring river tumble by. The loose harmonies were less coordinated, with each line meandering at its own unspecified pace that varied depending on who was singing it. I noticed some folks were uncomfortable with that much freedom to explore an unknown song. I reflected that even the most loud and busy rivers are actually quite organised when you pay attention; sections of water move in repeating patterns dictated by underlying topography, water volume, and perhaps a few other factors. So I tightened up the harmonies so that the braid of voices is smooth and consistent.

This 2-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Glorious Day happened when I was sitting on the lush green grass of my back yard one morning drinking coffee with the sun rising in promise of another gorgeous summer day, already warming my face. I opened my channel to create a song for greeting the day, which I’d wanted in my repertoire for a while. It’s important for Part 1 singers to really draw out the word hand because that’s when the harmony with glorious day really hits home. Especially at that moment, this song feels like praise!

This4-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

If I Had One Day is one of my oldest songs, which recently had a revival when a third part came through. At the time I first wrote it, it felt complete with two parts and harmonies. When a new part arrived more than a decade later it also whispered that songs are not fixed and stagnant entities. Some of them are lifelong friends whose destiny is to keep growing and changing to serve our evolving needs and stay in relevance with us as we grow too.

This 3-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

With Journey Far, I feel a Misty Mountains influence from the film The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. I love the scene in Bilbo’s house when after a jolly feast the Dwarves become solemn and bring their voices together in memory of their lost home. The song unites them at the beginning of their shared quest to reclaim their ancestral lands. Similarly, Journey Far works as a send-off song, perhaps for kids going on a camp overnight for the first time, or for a rite of passage ceremony. I like to imagine the village circle singing this song until the questers are out of earshot, off on their journey. It can also mark the beginning of a new personal or community creative endeavour.

This 3-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Ocean & Stars arose in the socio-politically polarising climate of post-pandemic times. It’s a call to recognise our shared humanity, our shared evolutionary origin as a path to honouring our absolute connectedness as brothers and sisters. When we tune into our likenesses rather than focusing on differences, we’re choosing to make room for compassion and empathy. The living dream in this song is the utopian vision that should love guide our thoughts and actions, we’d find peace and harmony as members of the same family.

This 2-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Oh the Sky came to me while I was tending the Red Tent at a multi-generational nature connection gathering called the Art of Mentoring, in Ontario some time in the early 2010’s. This gathering tends to evoke a wide range of emotion in folks present, and I observed a beautiful paralleled in the sky that week. We experienced warm sunshine, wind and clouds rolling in, a huge thunderstorm that washed out the hearth fire, and then calm and rainbows. I love how real it is that nature is our mirror.

This 2-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Only Love Can Do That came part way through my 52 Weeks Song Project, where I wrote and was accountable to sharing one new original song every week for a year. As my deadline approached on this particular week, I wasn’t feeling the creative flow and decided to look up random quotes to see what might jump out and inspire me. I found the words of Martin Luther King Jr. first and put them to a melody. I liked it but it didn’t feel like a complete song yet, so I looked again and came across the words of Eleanor Roosevelt. Committing to writing a weekly song for a year as creativity natural waxes and wanes allowed me to confirm that songs are always possible. Perhaps they’re waiting in different realms, whose roads of access can be mental, emotional, and/or intuitive.

This 2-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Rooted Through Darkness was channeled in the rich context of a Wild Belonging experience I co-guide with my soul sisters Carly Joynt and Laura Gilmour. One spring, following the thread of what emerged over the weekend, it felt necessary to bring in an equinox song to acknowledge the transition from winter energies to those of spring. In the strong container of natural belonging that was a result of our tending that weekend, I opened the channel and in came this song. It’s been my experience that simple potent songs flow more effortlessly in connected community environments.

This 3-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Sacred Woman is one of my first community songs, and probably the most travelled. I had dreamed up and successfully co-guided my first Celebrating Women’s Gifts retreat, and was floating on sweet post-gathering sisterhood connection vibes. It was such a powerful moment for me, to realise “Yes! This is the work I need to be doing!” I walked to my local river friend, and heard this song. While I feel a deeply personal resonance with this song in its address of the sacred feminine healing journey, I am okay with it being sung using other identifiers such as “human” “child” or “being” to make it more inclusive.

This 6-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords with diagrams.

Snow Falling Lullaby was the first of the 52 Songs Project I embarked on in 2016. It was the first week of January after the rush of the holiday season, so a gentle sense meditation is probably just what I needed. The hushing of snow as it blankets the earth makes for good lullaby material. I love the teaching I received from The 13 Original Clan Mothers (Jamie Sams) that every snow flake (ice web) holds a dream and keeps it safe until the earth is ready and the spring thaw releases the dreams into flow.

This 3-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords with diagrams.

Soaring Eagle came as I looked out the window of my sister Sarah’s kitchen early one November morning. There was a large bird of prey circling in the distance, so high that I couldn’t make out who she was. I began to imagine what she could see from up there, how far the horizon must have stretched, how small I must have seemed from that perspective. I find it a comfort to remember that I’m a speck in the grander scheme of the universe. My heart is one of billions if not trillions beating on this planet, and every heart belongs to a being who sees the world through their own eyes. How much of our perspectives overlaps? How much do they differ? Keeping a wide-angle view allows us to remain curious, and to not stunt our growth by forming opinions and making judgements.

This 4-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Sun Will Rise is the very first multi-layered community song that that ever came through. I was driving to visit my sister’s family in Toronto from my home about two hours north, watching the sky change as evening set in and the sun went down. Multi-lane highway driving requires extra vigilance compared to my day-to-day country roads routine. There are tense moments, and singing to myself is very soothing and centring. I had no recording technology with me, so had to rely on multiple repetitions of all the parts as they came through, and then return to singing former parts so they would not slip away. It felt like a “this too shall pass” mantra and I arrived at my destination in a calm zone.

This 4-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Teach Me to Slow Down was inspired by a dream of a Grandmother tree of mystical genus, somewhere in the mix of oak and redwood giant. There was the holding of two truths: reaching upwards and living in the kiss of the sun, while holding deep and steady in the dark earth. There was self-knowing and unshakability, which gave strength and foundation enough to be curious and to aim for the stars. A tree is a bridge between earth and heaven, and there’s no rush in simply being who we’re meant to be. I brought in the verse about the stone to invoke calm endurance, timelessness. The line about humour refers to cosmic humour, and brings the stone to life in terms of reference to watchful ancestors.

This 4-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Waiting Out a Storm is a mantra for finding centre amidst uncertainty and chaos. If the image is a hurricane, this song is being in the eye of that storm where there’s calm. The eye travels with the storm until eventually the storm dies down. Heartbeat and breath bring us into our bodies and ground us. The mmmm ma dé ho vocables further calm us even in their seeming lack of meaning, as we can’t always make sense of the circumstances we face. Making the mmmmm sound, like humming to ourselves or chanting om, raises internal vibrations and promotes feelings of bliss and calmness while clearing negative energy.

This 3-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Walk of the Wild Ones is one of many songs that found me while I was driving in my car, this time along country roads in Muskoka. Sometimes my kids are with me when a song arrives, and they’re used to me slipping into the zone, start humming and singing to myself. On this occasion, I was on my own. This one came in like a speeding train, and I had to pull over or else risk letting it rush past me. The song happened in less than ten minutes, including harmonies. There was no particular event or incident that directly provoked it; I feel it’s likely a result of the collective spirit moving through in these times of reconciliation. It also goes further back in time, and calls for the remembering of the lost wisdom of our more ancient ancestors who suffered the destruction of their cultures and traditions. I acknowledge that this type of persecution is still taking place today.

This 2-page PDF file includes vocal score sheet music, lyrics, guitar chords and diagrams.

Wild Moon to me is a very hopeful song. It started coming in one night of a full moon, where there were long and distinct shadows being cast in the forest beside my house and across the lawn. It was one of those magical moonlit nights where it almost feels bright enough to be day. I felt a deep stirring, and electricity in my body, like I was about to be struck by lightening. When this happens I know a song is asking to come through, and like a radio antenna I tune into the right frequency and there it is. I love the song’s message at face value, and also the deeper meaning of the healing sacred feminine rising within us all, and the unfathomable power that this medicine has for personal and global healing. Since such a bright moon is only possible because of the burning sun, this song is also about the healing sacred masculine. It is as things should be when these two forces align in right relation, each supporting the other in becoming more fully activated than they could ever be on their own.