Sounding Redemption

Adam Green is Founder & Musical Director of the Prison Choir Project. We talked to him about its work…

A multimedia article by Rupert Bedford

Published on Apr 5, 2020

“I think singing has an extraordinary restorative power”, Adam Green reflects, “It’s something people are not necessarily aware of when they’re involved in it and you just come away feeling better for it. And I think for us at the Prison Choir Project it’s exactly that. It’s a collective endeavour with people coming together to be part of something and feeling good about themselves for a bit.”

The Prison Choir Project was established by Adam in 2016 in response to the ‘prison crisis’. The Project works in a number of prisons, including Dartmoor Prison in Devon, and has the stated objective of ‘rehabilitating prisoners, ex-offenders and people experiencing mental disorder by the advance of the arts and culture, in particular through the performance of opera, song, and choral music’.

Adam explains that, at its simplest, it’s an opportunity for them to go in and work with the prisoners and give just a level of hope and a ‘light at the end of the tunnel’ and an opportunity to be involved in a group activity that takes them outside the daily routine of prison life.

He points out they don’t know what crimes the prisoners have committed so they don’t judge them. It is simply a chance to take the inmates at face value and work towards a common goal. The Project employs professional musicians to work alongside the inmates and Adam enthuses as he tells me that the inmates get swept along with this and suddenly adopt a can-do attitude and find themselves taking on some of the main roles in these operas and musicals. “They’ve got scripts to learn. They’ve got to act, they’ve got choreography to learn, they’ve got to sing the choruses. And some of these guys, they’ve never even set foot on a stage before, let alone open their mouths to sing”.

Adam is passionate about his work and believes that renewed self confidence and self belief are important transferable skills that can prove vital in preparing inmates for life outside the prison gate once the inmates are released.

‘No one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails’
Nelson Mandela

Adam also sees the Project as an opportunity to get as many members of the public into prisons as possible to have a better understanding of what they are really like. And the prison choir performances and concerts provide a good opportunity for this.

And he has first hand experience of the personal impact the singing sessions can have on the inmates. “I’ve even had inmates take me aside during rehearsals”, he says, in more somber tone, “ and say, quite literally, Adam you’ve stopped me from killing myself by allowing me the opportunity to come and do something”. He pauses to reflect… “so I mean I think we’ve done our job if we can come away and say we stopped people from doing that”.

Certainly the feedback from inmates has been positive and encouraging. After a performance of Carmen one inmate shared his thoughts…

“Take a group of dispirited, demoralized and devalued men called convicts. Persuade them they can join together in producing a famous musical extravaganza that’s good to look at and brilliant to hear. Do it in a barren, famously grim setting known as Dartmoor Jail. Make it a thunderous success. That’s what the man from ‘outside’ did. He came among us one day with his passion for music, his prodigious ability and a committed energy that carried us along with him. Three weeks later, he had inspired us beyond our dreams. We were in Seville helping to create those Spanish rhythms. We sang with Carmen, we tried to woo those achingly pretty ‘factory girls.’ We could feel the heat of the midday — and, yes, we had our day in the sun. Now the magician is gone. He and his theatre troupe — those enchanting singers and instrumentalists are a memory — gone to that great, free outside. But we whom you inspired, we’ll never be quite the same again. Bravo, bravo, bravo.”
Written by Nick, inmate at Dartmoor Prison

Adam points out that it is surprising how much talent, artistic and otherwise, there is in prison and, if they’re just given the opportunity to discover it, then they have the time to commit to it.

With influential supporters such as Terry Waite CBE on its team and visits by HRH The Prince of Wales and senior politicians, the work of the Prison Choir Project is gaining momentum…

“I really believe in second chances. And I think we face a real crisis in the prison system. If there’s anything we can do to get into these places and make the lives of these inmates better and more constructive and build their self confidence and resilience and prepare them for a life beyond the gate that is better than when they got in, then I think that’s our mission if you like”.

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Rupert Bedford is a UK based journalist and documentary maker with a background in law. His short documentary ‘Sounding Redemption’ is available to view at rupertbedford.co.uk

© RB Media.

If you are interested in publishing this story please contact Rupert at rupert.bedford@rbmedia.org