The Music Business Buddy
A podcast that aims to educate and inspire music creators in their quest to achieving their goals by gaining a greater understanding of the business of music. A new episode is released each Wednesday and aims to offer clarity and insight into a range of subjects across the music industry, all through the lens of a music creator for the benefit of other music creators. The series includes soundbites and interviews with guests from all over the world together with commentary and clarity on a range of topics. The podcast is hosted by award winning music industry professional Jonny Amos.
Jonny Amos is a music producer with credits on a range of major and independent labels, a songwriter with chart success in Europe and Asia, a senior lecturer in both music creation and music business at BIMM University UK, director of The SongLab Ltd and the author of The Music Business for Music Creators.
www.jonnyamos.com
The Music Business Buddy
Episode 56: Exploring Mental Health with Tonic Music's Jeordie Shenton
What does it truly mean to take care of our mental health in the complex, demanding world of music? This question sits at the heart of my conversation with Jeordie Shenton, Programmes Lead for Tonic Music, a pioneering UK charity dedicated to mental wellbeing for everyone who creates, works with, or simply loves music.
Music creators experience significantly higher rates of depression, anxiety, and other mental health challenges compared to the general population. The causes are multifaceted—financial instability, demanding schedules, performance pressure, burnout, and the often isolating nature of creative work. Yet until recently, conversations about these challenges remained largely taboo, with struggling artists either romanticised, demonised, or excessively medicalised by media and industry alike.
Tonic Music stands apart through its nuanced understanding of the music ecosystem. Rather than viewing "the music industry" as a monolith, they recognise the diverse experiences of everyone from international touring artists to buskers, roadies to venue staff, fans to hobbyist musicians. Each group faces unique challenges requiring tailored support. Their four-tiered approach—offering therapy sessions, peer groups, skills workshops, and training courses—provides flexible, accessible resources that participants can engage with according to their specific needs.
What struck me most during our conversation was Jeordie's insight into how isolation affects people across all corners of music. The peer support groups Tonic facilitates have become lifelines, creating safe spaces where individuals from vastly different musical backgrounds connect, share experiences, and form lasting support networks. These connections extend beyond formal sessions, with many groups establishing their own communication channels for ongoing support.
Looking toward the future, Jeordie emphasises that while awareness has grown significantly, we must now focus on action. This includes integrating mental health education into music curricula, creating clear pathways to support for everyone in the ecosystem, and continuing to challenge stigma through open conversation. Though major artists can now cancel tours citing mental health without significant backlash, this same freedom rarely extends to grassroots musicians or crew members who fear replacement or financial ruin.
Ready to learn more or access support? Visit tonicmusic.co.uk to discover their programmes and register for a personal consultation with their mental health team. Together, we can create a music world where wellbeing is prioritised alongside creativity and success.
https://www.tonicmusic.co.uk
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The Music Business Buddy. The Music Business Buddy. Hello everybody and a very warm welcome to you. You're listening to the Music Business Buddy with me, johnny Amos, podcasting out of Birmingham in England. I'm the author of the book the Music Business for Music Creators, available in hardback, paperback, ebook format. I'm a music creator with a variety of credits I'm a consultant, an artist manager and a senior lecturer in music business and music creation. Wherever you are and whatever you do, consider yourself welcome to this podcast and to a part of the community. I'm here to try and educate and inspire music creators from all over the world in their quest to achieving their goals by gaining a greater understanding of the business of music.
Speaker 1:Okay, so in this week's episode, I'm going to be exploring a very, very important subject, and one which I've not really tackled properly on the podcast until now, and that is the subject of mental health in the music industry. The music industry is facing a growing mental health crisis, with musicians experiencing higher rates of depression, anxiety and other mental health challenges when compared to the general population. This could be factors such as burnout, financial instability, growing demanding work schedules, performance anxiety, even the pressure to just kind of maintain public persona. It could all contribute towards this crisis. Now, fortunately, there are resources. There are organisations dedicated to supporting the mental wellbeing of music creators, of people in the industry, of music fans even, and those even creating music on a recreational level.
Speaker 1:So in this week's episode, I will be interviewing Geordie Shenton, who is Programme's Lead for Tonic Music, a UK-based charity that was founded in 2012 upon the belief that participation in music is good for mental health. Originally based in Portsmouth, they've developed into a registered charity operating across the UK through the provision of both in-person and online services. Now, from their initial work in kind of raising awareness, they now champion action. This is achieved by providing mental health support to ensure people continue, professionally and recreationally, to engage in music. The Tonic Music team includes qualified mental health practitioners, each with significant experience participating in the music industry. So I will now pass over to the interview with the wonderful Geordie Shenton and the role that tonic music play in the music industry. Geordie, welcome to the music business, buddy, I've been aware of you and your work for a while and it's really, really, really good to have you here, mate. First and foremost, most importantly, how are you?
Speaker 2:Wonderful, it's been having a great time, very busy, busy time, busy time in the world of music, but all positive, all positive stuff good man, good man.
Speaker 1:Well, may I just start, geordie, by just, you know, kind of congratulating you right on the success of of what music tonic helps people to achieve. Um, you know, music making is is a process that is generally, you know, considered to be something that's good for one's mental health. But the flip side of that, sometimes, you know, it can create burnout or isolation or things like that. But this is something that Music Tonic seem to have been a little ahead of the curve on, you know, because you know Music Tonic's been going for a while now. So how has the organisation kind of evolved in recent years?
Speaker 2:Yeah, ok, I'll give the lowdown of the history of Tonic Music. So Tonic Music was founded in 2012 by our current CEO, steph Langen. It originally started as a non-profit, based in Pompey, portsmouth, providing music workshops for people in the local community, particularly as a sort of recovery through music element, and then in 2019, tonic music become a registered charity. And then, with the covid pandemic, there was a need to move services from in person to online. Now, with by doing that, you kind of then are able to work nationally. So, weirdly, the pandemic kind of sort of led to Tonic Music becoming a national charity and we're very proud.
Speaker 2:You know, over the past five years, we've established this aim of essentially establishing good mental health within music communities. Essentially establishing good mental health within music communities. That's our aim as a charity and with that, we provide tailored mental health support to two distinct groups that are part of music communities. We have Tonic Rider, which provides mental health support to people working in music. So musicians, roadies and crew managers and agents, festival and venue staff, anyone who is earning any form of income from working in music, and we don't have an economic criteria for that. So, from the sort of musician side, that can be international stadium touring artists, or it could be a busker, it could be someone who's playing the grassroots circuit, the pub circuit. We don't have that economic criteria because we see it as working in music. And on the flip side, we have the Nevermind, the Stigma programme, which provides mental health support to music fans and hobbyist musicians.
Speaker 1:That's brilliant. I saw that on your website. The different strands, if you like that, fall under Music Tonic, as it's kind of changed over the years. It's so interesting to hear about that. So would it be fair to split it into kind of three the music industry side that you mentioned there, the fan side and then the kind of the youth side of it. So providing access to the original starting point for Music tonic, that kind of access to programs, is that still an aspect of the of the company?
Speaker 2:yeah, so interestingly, um. So I guess over the past five years, tonic music is really um, I don't want to say pilot years, but we, you know, we've been developing. How do we provide this tailored mental health support? How do we position that? So we've come to the point of having the two programmes that one is the kind of for people who professionally engage in music and the other side for people who recreationally engage in music. And you mentioned the programme we provided for young people. So Tonic Futures, which is for 18 to 25 year olds, so that it still exists. It just comes under the tonic rider program, so it's kind of a project rather than its own program.
Speaker 2:But yes, we so we launched last year, last last spring, um, through funding via the christopher meredith foundation, tonic Futures package of mental health support, which provides very much similar to Tonic Rider same elements of mental health support, but it's exclusively for 18 to 25-year-olds who work or study in music. So originally we were doing that with some partners, but now it's open to all 18 to 25-year-olds who work in music. Very much is that kind of preventative approach because, you know, equipping skills in terms of as they develop their career, but also as well it can be. It can be difficult for a young person to go on to a group of course, a workshop with people who are 20, 40 years, experienced in the industry. Maybe it can be quite daunting.
Speaker 2:So we felt the need to have that kind of package of support. And since then as well, over the last few months, we've launched kind of a second project on the Tonic Vida which is called Agents and Managers, which not the most original title, but it's just very much. It just it does what it says on the tin. It's mental health support tailored for music agents and music managers. So again having their own kind of area of mental health support to focus on that. Because we recognize that with a lot of conversation around mental health and music, music agents and managers are either not included in discussion or to some extent kind of blamed in that discussion and that's not, that's not correct. So we felt the need to offer that um exclusive mental health support as well I did read a little bit about that um, and I was, so.
Speaker 1:It was so nice to to see that um. There's a number of things that really really touched me about the charity actually, but one of the aspects was exactly that, because it is sometimes the, you know, it's like the focus is solely on music creators. So often we look through that lens of what it's like for a music creator. This podcast does that, you know, but that's solely a piece of the puzzle, isn't it? You know, there's all the people that have been active for many, many, many years, that deal with the ups and downs, who are just people, right? You know? It's the same thing as you know well-known musicians that get up on stage, that play to big crowds. You know a lot of people that fall into that category. They're just people, right?
Speaker 2:absolutely, but also as well. I we feel that there's lately been this kind of focus on you notice, I haven't yet used the word industry yet and it goes. That's quite. It's a bit of a tactic. I try not to use the word music industry because I do, yeah.
Speaker 1:Why is that so for two?
Speaker 2:reasons we we're kind of just trying to move away from the term. Firstly, it should be plural, so it should be industries rather than industry, because it's like we're talking about multiple kind of sectors, aren't we that overlap? Good point Also as well. There's this kind of when you say and it's very difficult for me to not use the word industry, because for 10 years of me being in this field it's been mental health in the music industry, but it's it kind of takes the focus away from the people within this ecosystem, the sector, and kind of focuses this kind of almost emergent level of property. That doesn't. You know, we're kind of dehumanising that discussion when we're looking at it from the kind of industry. And let's look at what do we mean by working musician? And I'm writing a piece at the moment that says you know what comes to mind when someone says the word musician or working musician, usually there's two people that will come to mind a pop star, rock star, someone from the popular music world, or be someone from the classical music world in an orchestra. But these are not the only musicians that are working.
Speaker 2:There's, of course, multiple genres within popular music. There's multiple genres within the kind of more art music side. You know there's opera, there's musical theatre. You know, let's not forget, you know djs come into that, songwriters who don't perform come into that as well. You know you've even got as well, military musicians, church musicians, you know they're still working musicians slightly different industry but nevertheless some of the same stresses, um, and and also then looking at, like I mentioned earlier, about buskers, but also music therapists, community musicians, um, you know people who. You know music teachers. So again, you wouldn't straight away if you thought about the word musician, wouldn't think oh, yeah, yeah, music teacher, you most likely think of popular classical.
Speaker 2:So that's the other thing as well is to kind of try and look at it as people working in music, which is a clunky term but it's kind of taken away from whatever this industry is, because for a lot of particularly working musicians they may not see themselves working in the music industry. If you're playing the pub, they may not see themselves working in the music industry. If you're playing the pub circuit, do you see yourselves working in the music industry or is it kind of seen as something a little bit more on an arena level, if you're unsigned, so if you're not with a label or you don't even have a manager. Are you in the music industry? Yes, but there's kind of elements where a lot of artists have made that kind of proactive choice to not work with a label, not have a manager, because they're kind of almost rejecting that industry tag.
Speaker 2:So I think at Tonic Music we very much are kind of trying to look at it in different ways and kind of, ok, yeah, it's always been about mental health in the music industry, but let's look at it in a different way and who are the people that work in music and how can we be a voice for them as well, as opposed to just adding these kind of terms and labels, which doesn't apply to everyone who works in music. And that's very much been, particularly I mean, I've been at charity for four years but it's very much been kind of a learning process for us of, okay, how do we represent this community really?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, good God, I love that. Like you've really challenged the way that I think there um in in a really cool way. Um, I've often wondered about. I've never really been vocal about that before geordie, but I I'm now thinking the same thing. Yeah, it's like um, sometimes I'll talk to um, like my students at the university where I teach part-time and that you know, and they'll say at what point am I in the music industry?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I'll often say I'll try and be as useful as I can in my response, but I kind of go well, it's when you say, really, you don't necessarily kind of open the door and walk in and go, hey, I'm here now. It's more like if you're an active part of a community, if you're releasing music online, whatever it might be, you're inserting yourself into either a real or a digital realm or both, and therefore you know you're a part of that. You're a piece of the fabric, the whole tapestry of what connects us all. And if you feel like you're not, then it might be, you know, just because you're in a different subsector. So the music industries. I'm going to use that for now. Yeah, I believe it was.
Speaker 2:I might be wrong. I believe it's Martin Clunan who came up with that. It's definitely a citable term. I might be wrong in terms of the citation, but also, as well to note, our most senior psychotherapist on the team is Dr Adam Frycheck. Oh, I know Adam so drummer from Baby Shambles but also psychotherapist and, in my opinion, the number one expert in mental health in music.
Speaker 2:And it's very much been Adam who has kind of helped us with that kind of approach to how to view this kind of subject, because adam um has completed his doctorate and he's published, uh, two journal articles I think there's a third on the way and without you know, giving too much work because it's very much for adam to talk about. But he focuses on the term musicking sort of music, as a verb rather than a noun, and he brings that in his research around the mental health of musicians. Absolutely recommend people check out dr Adam Frychek's work. It's free to access it's the journals are in. It's free to access. Um, to just put you know Adam Frychek into Google Scholar and his journal articles have come up.
Speaker 2:I think it's a very refreshing way to look at this topic and to look at this kind of group of people, shall we say, because it's very much been an industry focus and there's researchers out there who say the music industry is inherently bad or evil and it's like it's. It's by taking that approach. It's a not looking at the individuals in terms of musicians. So musicians, you know, there's personality traits that lead to poor mental health, there's childhood experiences that lead to poor mental health. There's, you know, potentially genetics that lead to poor mental health. You's childhood experiences that lead to poor mental health. There's, you know, potentially, genetics that lead to poor mental health. You know pre-existing conditions before working in music that lead to poor mental health.
Speaker 2:So by having that industry focus, you completely ignore that, completely ignore the experiences of musicians. And let's not forget, for a lot of musicians they will become a working musician because they started playing music as a coping mechanism and they might have written songs about negative times in their life. So of course there's going to be a vulnerability to poor mental health. It's not completely the industry. In quotation marks there are these other elements. So you know, the researchers and the kind of the advocates who are 100 percent focused on the music industry are not doing musicians any justice at all by talking like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a very good point. Adam featured in my. He and I used to play music together a very, very long time ago, but he featured in. I interviewed him in my book last year and he talked about many, many wonderful things. One of the things and I don't want to butcher his quote here because he's far more articulate about it than I am, but he talked about the difference between mental health and mental pressures and kind of defining the difference between the two and just kind of accepting that there is a difference. And, my goodness, he explains it a lot better than I do. But it really got me thinking. I thought wow, yeah, it's, you know he's. So, jordan, you're in, you're doing a PhD at the minute. Right, I am.
Speaker 2:I am doing a PhD, which the PhD led me to joining Tonic Again. Just contacted Tonic because of my PhD and then now working as the program leader, tonic music, which is amazing. Yeah, so my phd focuses on, uh, substance use amongst working musicians. So looking at the prevalence and contributory factors of substance use within the population of working musicians, but again taking that perspective of not just popular recording artists, not just orchestral musicians, but all working musicians and it's an international study. There's a survey that's currently out which people can complete and it's open to anyone, regardless of history of substance use. So people who have abstinent to people who are heavy users across legal substances, so alcohol, so alcohol, tobacco, caffeine, illicit substances, misuse of prescription substances, um, so looking at like that, looking at substance use as opposed to addiction, just looking at the behavior of substance use. And very much the research has been influenced by working at tonic music, which has completely changed my perspective of the research, because before it was very much industry, popular musicians, recording artists, but again working at Tonic Music has helped, you know, kind of change that approach.
Speaker 2:And of course, working with Adam, who was a massive inspiration when I started sort of researching this topic nine years ago, it was Adam who was my biggest inspiration because, oh wow, there's a. There's a musician who's a psychotherapist. So it's amazing that years later he's a colleague and he continues to inspire my work, and we are also as well. We're currently working on a research project the data collection is complete with Zara Vernon from the University of Portsmouth, which is where I go for my PhD. We've just done a survey around mental health in music, but in a different way than what's been done before. So we're at the point of analysing that data and then that should hopefully be published this year. So, again, another amazing thing is I get to work with Adam on a research project, which has been just an absolute pleasure. Do you know what?
Speaker 1:I mean oh, what a collaboration.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he is he. He he's just just like you said about the way he can articulate. Stuff is just like just phenomenal how he can kind of deconstruct. I mean I just I find it uh fascinating and he has been the biggest influence because you know the way of looking at things differently, taking this sort of different perspective. Um, you know, I love how he uses musicking within his work. I think that's really great because for me it's like, yes, we look at musician work as portfolio careers, but musicking goes one step further to that. So I think that's very much great. So his research is fascinating. It's really really good.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's brilliant. Wow, you're sending my, sending my best, weren't you? When you speak to him next I love adam, that's uh wow, very good, yeah, and so, yeah, that's, that's the thing.
Speaker 2:And, and like I said about the, with my research it is, uh, yeah, just looking at substance use, which is an interesting topic because it's like we seem to know so much about it, but don't so. That's why it's always fascinated me to kind of look at it in that way.
Speaker 1:Um, yeah, so well it's. It's certainly a huge, huge issue um, throughout the creative industries, um, and and and. Whereabouts are you in your studies? Are you kind of halfway through towards the end, or Probably?
Speaker 2:quarter way through it, it's part time.
Speaker 2:I mean, most of my work is around tonic music, which to me I always felt like I did the kind of career progression the other way around, because I think you know, I did academia, did start my PhD a long time ago and, for Covid and different reasons, had to pause it. But I think I always would have wanted to go into kind of working with a charity that provides mental health support, because that's what I originally worked in health and social care and did health and social care years and years and years ago. So to meet Steph and then that lead into me working with Tonic Music and be part of an amazing team. We've got an amazing team that's built these two programmes. So the PhD for me has now become a point of I'm doing it for to give knowledge and understanding to particularly working musicians but also people who work in music, this information. So yeah, it's kind of gone the other way but it's yeah, very good stuff.
Speaker 1:Wow. So is one of the goals there presumably to kind of spot patterns and then work on the preventative side.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say so. So we at Tonic Music we do a substance use awareness workshop in music, so looking at the different factors that contribute to substance use and it'd be great to develop that. So, yeah, to provide knowledge on the prevalence, provide knowledge and contribute factors and then work on something with tonic music about okay, how can we kind of with a lot of harm adoption approach Do you know what I mean? Because there's some great work out there around therapy for addiction, but it's like what's the kind of psych ed stuff that could be done around that? Because it's, um, just very much about you know it's pitfalls. You could never. It's never about kind of go right, you know substances should be removed from music environments and etc. It can never be about that because that's not the, that's not the answer in terms of how reduction people can use substances and it never becomes problematic. We know that. We know that there's certain kind of different factors that lead into to it becoming problematic for someone. So it's about identifying them and what can we do.
Speaker 2:In our work, I think the position we tend to take is it's a lot, it is a lot easier to be able to adapt the services we provide as opposed to making changes in the kind of music industries themselves, because it's a money-making kind of world, isn't it? It's very difficult to be like. This is what needs to be done here. Very, very difficult it has been, you know it has been done. There's been, you know there's been great advocacy work but it's hard and that also leads into it kind of has a level for each. It has an impact on each of the levels we provide in terms of mental health support. So the work we do at tonic music we have four levels of mental health support which you could you could say is kind of a progressive progression, recovery based sort of thing, but really participants register and they can access the services whenever they like, in whatever order, however they want to do that. But the four levels we provide on the first level we do provide therapy sessions. Of course there's always. You know the demand outweighs the amount we have to offer, but it's developing and that's psychotherapy, that's counselling.
Speaker 2:On the next level level we provide peer groups. So we do peer groups that are open to anyone in music. We do peer groups that are exclusively for women in music. We do peer groups around neurodiversity in music. So all different kind of six-week peer groups led by psychotherapists we do on the third level, skills workshops, that kind of psych ed stuff and then on the fourth level skills workshops, that kind of psych ed stuff and then on the fourth level, training courses. So if you think about, the workshops are equipping skills to support yourself, the training course is equipping skills to support others.
Speaker 2:So that's why we provide mental health first aid and suicide first aid, light, so it's that kind of more. You know, it gradually gets more preventative as you go along the programme and with the substance use stuff that could for us go into any level. And we've got a range of expertise in the team as well. So my colleague Jade, who's one of our psychotherapists, also runs peer groups for SysEx. Our peer groups Loads of expertise in music performance anxiety for example. So I've been able to develop a peer group focusing on music performance anxiety, a workshop on music performance anxiety, support sessions on music performance anxiety. So that's been, you know. So there's a great range of expertise on the team oh, that's brilliant.
Speaker 1:I particularly love the um well there's. I mean, that's all fantastic and inspiring to hear, but the peer groups there is really interesting, because music can be a very isolating thing for a lot of people. I mean, I know it shouldn't be, but it's easy to say that and it's harder to do, isn't it? And I was recently talking to Matt Griffiths from Youth Music. He was on the podcast a few weeks ago. We were talking about that subject, because the unusual thing is Geordie is that in this current era of the podcast, I'm talking to a lot of people from the create tech world, ai builders and stuff.
Speaker 1:And then, on the other hand, you know, I'll go and talk to people like Matt or yourself or others, and I see, in the middle I see a bit of a disconnect sometimes of kind of tools that are being built that enable people to work on their own, and then problems with isolation and loneliness, which don't seem to be getting any better. I mean, I know that you work, obviously, with a lot of kind of you know, gen Z, 18 up to 25 in the programs that you mentioned earlier. It is is loneliness, isolation. Is that a common problem that you witness huge?
Speaker 2:thing and it's interesting. Yet you know, the age range the youngest participant ever had is 18, because it's that's the youngest someone can be. Uh, the oldest I think is 82 I think we've had, wow, um, it's a big range, uh, big differences in career, um, and isolation is a huge thing. So with the peer groups, we've been running the peer groups now for over four years. We must have run 30 or 40 peer groups now, um, and they're a lifeline to people because it is isolation. You know, and we've done peer groups on different themes, different aspects. We did a peer group for I don't really know how you kind of said it, it was kind of a peer group for working musicians who would reduce their kind of working career, so kind of I don't want to say semi-retired or anything like that, but you know, for different reasons, um, uh were less able to work in music, did a peer group around that. Um, really, really vital.
Speaker 2:And we found that many of our peer groups will form whatsapp groups. I've found our own WhatsApp groups, even if they're from different roles, so it could be one person's a festival director, another person's a roadie, another person is, say, for example, an orchestral musician, but they'll form a WhatsApp group. They go oh, I'm going through this, what do you guys think? And we also now. Well, I say now we've been doing it for over two years but we do a drop-in group. So for anyone who does one of our peer support groups and attends at least half the sessions, they get invited to a weekly drop-in group, which is kind of all former peer support participants and that just runs every Wednesday for 90 minutes with two of our psychotherapists, adam and Jade, and it's just there as much as participants want it. So some weeks they may, you know, they may attend for several weeks and they might have a break, but it's just there as that kind of people who work in music group to talk about their experiences and what's going on. And, of course, and our facilitators, as well as being mental health practitioners, they're all from the world of music, so there's that kind of empathy and understanding and that's been a great success. So that's that's now funded also by Christopher Meredith Foundation, the peer groups and the drop-in group, and it's great work. It's really really good and um, and it's nice how new participants join and they're welcome into the group and it's um, it's a safe group because there's mental health practitioners. So safeguarding processes are in place as well and just really really wonderful that we, that we do that.
Speaker 2:Um, because they're, you know it's it's completely isolating career and sometimes the relationships you make can be, you know, sometimes built on paper because it's like it's a professional relationship, not a personal relationship. And so how do you, you know, because it's capitalism, music is capitalism, that's what it is, so it's. So sometimes relationships can be, you know where's the boundaries as well as isolation. Boundaries is a really big thing and it can be difficult. It can be difficult to talk with your bandmates. If there's bandmates, if you're experiencing poor mental health, you maybe can't talk to your label, maybe you can, but maybe you can't. Maybe that kind of fear of replacement is a big thing as well. So the peer groups and drop-in groups provide that safe, confidential, non-judgmental space.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it's so specialist as well to have people you know, like Adam, like Jade, with their background and their knowledge. I mean, excuse me, they are uniquely positioned there. I mean, it's not every day you come across such specialists. I mean, you know, with some of the major music conglomerates now have like a kind of dedicated artist and staff well-being department, and contemporary music institutions are also kind of going the same way, which is really really good. But very often it is just a kind of referral, which I'm not downplaying. It's brilliant, because that never used to be a thing, so it's wonderful. What do you want the future to look like in terms of mental health awareness across the music industries?
Speaker 2:Interesting question. So I feel we've had 10, 12 years of mental health awareness in music, particularly since Amy Winehouse died. For me, that's where I see the turning point. There was loads of research before. You know, in the 80s there was Jeffrey Wills and Susan Rayburn who did research around mental health in music. So there were conversations. I mean it goes back to the 50s, it even goes back to, um, you know, the 1890s. There's loads, there's research out there, but it never seemed to kind of stick. That seemed to be the turning point. We've had a real long time. You know, steph myself, adam jade, we we talk about, you know, we've had this mental health awareness. Now times of mental health action. Now for that we need kind of, we need everyone who's part of these industries as ecosystem to be proactive, whether that's organisations having their own welfare team I think there's a debate around that.
Speaker 2:I don't think it's a simple yes-no answer. But there is also the value in, for example, tonic Music. We are a registered charity, we are separate to those organisations. So it means it's increased confidentiality, or at least certainly increased perception of confidentiality, because you know if you're receiving support within the organization you work in, there's always gonna be to at the very least kind of have an area where it's like if you're experiencing poor mental health, here's where you can go. Here's tonic music, here's Other organisations, for example, here's NHS. Let's not forget, in crisis it's always NHS. It's never a charity, it's always the NHS, 999, a&e that's where they go for when it's a crisis point. But having that real, clear information, that is almost just anyone who works in music knows that's what to do.
Speaker 2:I think, in terms of the arts, music is way more ahead than acting dance, circus, performance. I just feel it is because there's a lot more charities, there's a lot more discussions, there's more books, there's more research. It just seems to be ahead of the curve, maybe because music is so widespread, because you're, you know you go into a shop and there's music. You go into a cafe, there's music. You know there isn't always other forms of art, for example. But then I also feel there's other industries where maybe it's you know I take I look at football and there's certain football gambling charities, for example. I feel like every young footballer probably knows they exist. That has become part of the conversation. That is already there.
Speaker 2:We also feel and we were very privileged this year because we were able to provide our first two actual university lectures on mental health in music that were part of modules, so not just to get an extracurricular were. That were part of modules, so not just like a extracurricular. It was part of modules and we did that at the university of Huddersfield and we did that as well at the Royal Northern College of Music. But there is a need for particularly music courses to have maybe it's a whole module, maybe it's a lecture or two focusing on mental health in music, and I am aware that there are certain modules at certain universities doing this. But it needs to be kind of not enough though yeah, and it's not and it needs to be.
Speaker 2:In classical you're performing arts medicine, so in classical music you're performing arts medicine. I don't think it's ever really took off with popular music I don't know.
Speaker 1:I've never heard of that yeah, it's um.
Speaker 2:So there's a whole. I'm, for example, part of the performing arts medicine association and I was. I was very lucky to present both my PhD last year at the conference in London and also the tonic music research that we're doing. But I just don't feel that, you know, I'm performing arts medicine, focused not just on mental health, but vocal health, hearing health, musculoskeletal health. I just don't think we have that conversation enough, particularly within popular music, certainly not on popular music courses. There needs to be more. There needs to be more, but it takes time. It takes time for curriculums to change, but again, it would be good to have a lecture that focuses on that. But at the end it's like and these are the services that are here, you know, tonic music, for example that would be really strong as well. So there's a long way to go, but the progress has been good. It's been good at least. It's a lot better than if there'd been no progress.
Speaker 1:For example, um, yeah, that's, that's true. Well, you mentioned about change there, geordie, and of course it does take, uh, change and change makers, cultural shifts. Um, on that note, I just want to circle back to something you said earlier that really captured my imagination, and that was about how attitudes, perhaps towards mental health awareness, shifted when we lost the late great Amy Winehouse. I've never thought about it in that way before, but there was a shift at that point, wasn't there?
Speaker 2:I felt there was, and this was actually before I even did research on the topic. This is just when it's just an interest. I've always had an interest in music and musicians and behaviour, I guess. But I kind of see that before the passing of Amy Winehouse there was a kind of well, I always look at it as three kind of strands.
Speaker 2:I see that poor mental health in music has either been romanticised by the media, so kind of like sex, drugs and rock and roll, heroin, chic, et cetera, et cetera. If it's not romanticised it's been demonised. So again with Amy Winehouse, that kind of real, that venomous critique of amy ryan house, that was really cruel within the media. Or then it becomes medicalized, which is good, but then it becomes sometimes over medicalized, where it's like a musician is seen as unwell as opposed to musician. So then you, you kind of sometimes it gets a little bit too much and it's important that we have the medicalization, but also empathy. Empathy is the key thing with this conversation, that understanding, that non-judgmental approach and non-celebratory approach as well. I feel it shifted with Amy Winehouse and I know there's colleagues of mine that agree. Not particularly sure why that at that point, but if you think about before. The way the media spoke about amy winehouse in particular it was very negative, cruel, you know very press taking photos left, right and of course that still happens in terms of the press. But I I don't think the media is as venomous with discussions around poor mental health, particularly with musicians, maybe celebrities as a whole, because if you think since then there's been the passing of Chester Bainton, chris Cornell, keith Flint, avicii, taylor Hawkins, liam Payne, that beforehand the media weren't quite as nasty. There was little bits with Liam Payne I noticed that were a little bit negative, but I don't feel it's so much so.
Speaker 2:I kind of feel that change led into more research in the UK. That change led to charities focusing their work on mental health. That led to suddenly there was more psychotherapists that were from the world of music. I'm not saying the psychotherapists did their training for that, but I'm just saying it just was. It was interesting that after that there just seemed to be a lot more attention on this, on this kind of field, and it has become a field.
Speaker 2:Mental health music has become an academic field. It's become a field in terms of charity and mental health support work. There's books on it. There's a lot more discussion about it. There's a lot of young people. So when we go and do talks at different universities, whether that's on the curriculum or not, we're also noticing that a lot of particular young musicians and young people working in music are a lot more open and have more conversation and have kind of an increased emotional intelligence around mental health in music, which is really encouraging because, you know, but there's a lot more to go. Yeah, really encouraging because you know it's good, but there's a lot more to go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like it's really great that we see major artists cancel a tour, postpone a tour and saying it's due to their mental health. But you can't do that if you're a grassroots artist because of that kind of fear of being replaced. If you hit a certain level, you know, if you're a certain art, you know certain level artists you're not. There's no one that can replace you into. In that regard it's not quite the same on the grassroots level. Yet it's not as easy and and again, it's not. You know, whereas that works for the international artist, that the tour manager for that tour or the roadies or crew on that tour can't do that as well. So there's still a lot of work to do, but we're heading in the right direction yeah, good, uh, good point.
Speaker 1:Wow, um, geordie, I'm mindful of time, but I I want to say a huge thank you to you. Um, you are, uh, you're, a top guy. Uh, you do, uh you do, a lot of really, really good things for a lot of good people and, um, and you are yourself a change maker. You know, uh, you personally, as well as music tonic, and you know, on behalf of the silent majority, I thank you for what you do that's great.
Speaker 2:It's very much with tonic, it's very much a team thing. It's it's I'm uh, cog in a wheel, is you know? Amazing team um, like I mentioned, steph, our founder and ceo, dr adam feitchek, jade on a mental health team, stan on our mental health team, um, and then the support as well that we have our support team with, with billy, with dave, with jen, with resh um trustees, patrons, ambassadors, volunteers, volunteers, leo as well. So Leo, who does the logistics? You know, a fantastic team all around. Two of our volunteers Ma and Pa Langen. Ma Langen is in her 80s, now works at a lot of our festival work because we provide mental health lounges at festivals, both front of house and backstage across the UK.
Speaker 2:So again, you know, and that's an amazing support we offer. So it's a massive team. It's well, it's not, it's a small team, but it's a massive community I feel we have with tonic, and it's it's we're all needed within that. It's. It's um, yeah, and also as well, you know, for anyone who wants to know easy to access tonic music services, tonicmusiccouk. Put that in the is it's a url? Do you call it the address bar?
Speaker 1:yes, yes, I'll put a link to it. Yeah, without a doubt. And then there's a tonic rider button.
Speaker 2:There's a nevermind a stigma button, and then it gives information about the programs and how to register for them. Which, um? They're online. So there's no, there's no. So you don't have to travel anywhere. And everyone who registers receives a one-to-one consultation appointment, a video call with one of our mental health team, prior to going on to the program, to explore, you know, what would be beneficial for them as well. So it's a whole great sort of process of support, wow.
Speaker 1:Inspiring. Okay, I'll drop a link to that then, geordie, underneath the podcast description so that people can find it. No, thank you, top man Right. Well, we'll leave it there for today, but thank you so much for your time, geordie. It's greatly appreciated.
Speaker 2:It's been a pleasure.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much. Geordie's great. What a good, good dude, I must say. We actually carried on talking for about an hour after that, but just about the subject of football, so I didn't include that in the podcast, so that would be a different podcast. Anyway, you know, guys, it's very interesting to hear what tonic music do. It's so needed, isn't it what they do? It's so important In the decade that we're in now.
Speaker 1:We hear a lot, don't we, about mental health, and for good reason. But for the benefit of those that don't know, you know, the polar opposite used to be true, and when I say used to be, it wasn't all that long ago. You know, tonic music set up in 2012, as I mentioned earlier and as Geordie mentioned, but since then they've evolved and if you think about it, the world has evolved quite dramatically, hasn't it, since 2012, especially in terms of technological use. It's very interesting as well that our conversation never touched upon social media, which I thought it would and and it didn't, because, of course, that that can be a factor right in mental health and self-comparisons and that kind of thing.
Speaker 1:I you know, we're in an industry that has a lot of highs and lows, and when we go up and when we go down and we go back up again and we go down, that does something to somebody, and it's very important that we are aware of that so that we can avoid it and also so that, when we get to that point, we know what we can do. And that used to be a very, very difficult thing to do because it felt very isolating, and thanks to Tonic Music, that's not really the case anymore. They are there for everybody, not just those that work in creating music, but those that work on the business side, music fans, young people that do a lot of preventative work. It's nice to be able to shine a light on what they do and their importance in the bigger picture of everything. Ok, that's enough from me today. Thank you for being here. Everybody, wherever you are, have a great day and may the force be with you.
