AHEAD of this Saturday’s SSE Scottish Music Awards, it has been announced that the event’s headline sponsor, SSE, has commissioned Scottish musician and composer Alex Menzies (otherwise known as Alex Smoke) to create a special piece of music titled ‘Seven Rare Deems’.
The annual star-studded awards ceremony is the main fundraising event for Nordoff Robbins Scotland, the country’s leading Music Therapy charity, and with the organisation celebrating its 20th year, this unique track has been specially commissioned by their partner SSE to highlight their incredible work.
Using recordings from several music therapy sessions held in Aberdeen’s Alzheimer Scotland centre, Menzies worked with a number of women suffering from the condition who provided vocals and instrumentals for the track. He named it ‘Seven Rare Deems’, translated from Doric as ‘Seven Excellent Women’, as a tribute to those he met through the experience.
Talking about the sessions, he said: “It was just a very positive experience. Human interaction is what I like, so it was just an enjoyable thing to do, enjoyable to meet people and enjoyable to record music in that kind of way. It’s a very different environment from what I’m used to, so it was great. I thoroughly enjoyed it.”
The significance of music therapy cannot be underestimated, and the partnership between Nordoff Robbins and SSE ensures that many lives around Scotland are changed for the better. Having established itself as one of the highlights of the annual events calendar, it is estimated that the money raised by at the SSE Scottish Music Awards provides music therapy sessions for over 450 vulnerable children and adults around the country. It takes place this Saturday 26th November at the Old Fruitmarket in Glasgow, where a selection of awards will pay tribute to over ten acts across a wide variety of genres.
Meanwhile, ‘Seven Rare Deems’, the special track created by Alex Menzies, can be downloaded here with all profits going to Nordoff Robbins Scotland.
