Peace Sounds label is a project founded by Elina Pen and Joe Holtaway from Wake Up London in 2012 to celebrate Thich Nhat Hanh’s visit to London that year.
The idea for the label was to gather artists from in and around the Plum Village Community, creating an album of songs speaking for and about peace. Those who are in touch the Plum Village tradition will know the importance of songs. A young activist during the war in Vietnam, Thich Nhat Hanh both loved and inspired songwriters, listening to them play and allowing his poetry to become their lyrics. This love of song continued during his time in America, as he organised retreats for artists to get together and create – Betsy Rose was among them, a name you may recognise.
Peace Sounds 2 continued on in 2016 with a new collection of artists and from one project, Peace Sounds became a label, raising money, on this occasion for Wake Up London to send young people on retreats and help fund the central London space that had become the group’s home.
In the preceding years the culture of evenings of music, poetry, story and song became quite a regular event, with some of the Sangha (among them some of the Peace Sounds artists) offering fundraising concerts, singing groups, workshops and now a Wednesday night sangha with a choir.
This latest album, Peace Sounds 3, released in aid of The Being Peace Practice Centre, journeys on with 12 new songs; voices from New York to France, from Mexico to Vietnam and London to Brazil among others, singing into being the beauty of the world we have and hope for our futures. Hip-hop and rap, sit beside folk and harmony inviting us to stop and rest as Melissa James sings..’oh what beauty to be seen, when we’re standing still’ and invites us to bring our true selves to the world with love and strength, in the words of Rising Appalachia…’I am resilient, I trust the movement, I negate the chaos, Uplift the negative, I’ll show up at the table, again and again and again’
Join us to hear the album alongside some of the artists who will sing a few live songs for us too.
For peace sounds 1 and 2 visit www.peacesoundslabel.org
