A music video from children at Ty Hafan Children’s Hospice has gained the backing from Hollywood and UK celebrities, including Michael J. Fox, Will Ferrell and Rob Brydon.
The video’s accompanying song, which originally started off as a series of musical sounds from three children from the hospice, has been written by husband and wife composers Laura and Daniel Curtis from Bedwas.
The aim of the project is to promote a global message of support to children suffering from life-limiting illnesses and to raise funds for Ty Hafan Children’s Hospice.
Laura said: “We visited Ty Hafan children’s hospice in Cardiff and the staff explained how they used music and art in innovative ways to allow the children to make their physical creative mark on this world.
“We saw an art room with wheelchair paintings and handprint art, and a music room with a range of instruments that were designed to mould around whatever ability a child had to make noise. This inspired us to embark on this particular project.”
A total of 54 celebrities sent in random noise samples to be used, including Pointless host Alexander Armstrong, Only Fools and Horses star John Challis, TV Chef Gino D’Acampo, Welsh rugby legend Sir Gareth Edwards, comedian Matt Lucas and actor Sir Patrick Stewart.
Other celebrities include Welsh rugby star Leigh Halfpenny, former Tottenham Hotspur manager and I’m a Celebrity winner Harry Redknapp, The Chase host Bradley Walsh, dancer Anton du Beke, and actor Ed Westwick, who stars in Gossip Girl and White Gold.
A number of Coronation Street actors, including Jack P Shepherd and Michael LeVell, have also taken part.
Pupils from Ystrad Mynach Primary School also made noise samples to send to the project.
The composers began with no idea of how the song would sound. Musical elements such as the key and tempo were set by the sounds they received from celebrities and groups, as well as the recording at the hospice.
Daniel said: “We had to make sure everything worked around the sounds we had, so for example the whole tempo of the song changes to fit perfectly with Matthew Rhys’ beat-boxing and then again to accompany Michael Flatley’s tap dancing. Reece Shearsmith sent us a clip of him playing the kazoo in the key of A major and so we had to orchestrate six key changes into the piece just to make sure we could include the notes he randomly chose to play.”
To make a donation to Ty Hafan, visit www.justgiving.com/tyhafan.