Awen Cultural Trust is delighted to partner with Live Music Now Wales to bring the celebrated Lullaby Project to families in Bridgend, thanks to funding from the National Lottery Community Fund.

An initiative of Carnegie Hall Weill Music Institute, New York for the past 10 years, the Lullaby Project now extends internationally. Over eight sessions, families are invited to create and sing personal lullabies for their babies with the help of professional musicians. Creating, singing and sharing lullabies promotes maternal health, child development and parent-child attachment. Songs are recorded and celebrated with a performance at the end of the project. Participants can sing their song individually, as a group, with the musician or the musician can perform for them.

Live Music Now are one of two Carnegie Hall Lullaby partners in Wales and have already delivered successful projects across Swansea Bay Health Board, with Flying Start groups in Neath Port Talbot and Cardiff, as well as a specialist research project with perinatal mental health services in Cheshire & Merseyside NHS and West Yorkshire NHS.

Claire Cressey, Head of Theatres and Creative Wellbeing at Awen said: “We are grateful to the National Lottery Community Fund for their support of the Lullaby project in Bridgend. Families have had a tough time over the past few years, with the pandemic isolating communities and then the cost of living crisis increasing personal pressures. Having quality time with your child, building new relationships with other parents, writing a personalised message that is recorded professionally and will last for generations is such a unique and special opportunity that brings real joy to all involved.”

The first Lullaby Project in Bridgend will run in partnership with Splice Child and Family Project in Pyle this spring.