‘Raining joy on everything‘: Oregon Symphony helps parents write songs for their children

When Hunter Chamberlin, a young Portland father, sat down to write a letter to his 3-year-old son, poetry poured out.

“You strike like lightning, raining joy on everything,” he wrote to his son, nicknamed Pogi after the Tagalog word for handsome.

Those words are now part of Pogi’s personalized lullaby, which will be performed next Tuesday at the Alberta Rose Theatre in Northeast Portland by professional singer-songwriter Bre Gregg and a sextet of Oregon Symphony musicians.

“It was awesome to get help from an artist to be able to put your thoughts and feelings into a song,” said Chamberlin, 26.

Gregg and Chamberlin co-wrote the song as part of the Lullaby Project, a program started by Carnegie Hall’s Weill Music Institute in 2012. The program gives parents who have lived through trauma the chance to work with professional musicians to write lullabies for their children. More than 35 American cities now host similar programs, connecting with parents in hospitals, jails and various social services programs…

Read the full story on The Oregonian/OregonLive.com.

Photos by Vickie Connor