Wolverhampton-born musician releases charity single to raise money for health staff
A West Midlands Ambulance Service control room dispatcher with a passion for music has brought his dreams to reality, after releasing his first song when a melody 'popped' into his head while on shift - and he will be donating every penny made from the piece to charity.
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00:00Hi, I'm Aaron and I'm 38 years old, born and raised in Wolverhampton, now living in Stafford.
00:08I work for the West Midlands Ambulance Service as an emergency medical dispatcher.
00:13The song that I've created is Stand Together.
00:16The idea of this is to raise funds, as all royalties, any royalties that I can raise will go to charities
00:24such as the TAS, which is the ambulance service charity, but also the Midlands Air Ambulance.
00:31It started off with just a melody, with lyrics that were sort of following the melody.
00:36I was sat at work managing the ambulance service and all of a sudden I had this melody come to my head
00:42and so literally just ended up making note of it, recording that sound to my phone.
00:50Next thing you know, I then started adding some lyrics.
00:54I wrote these lyrics to go with the melody that came to me and these lyrics were very much close to me
01:02and that they were from within, to be honest.
01:05And every period of time I got the chorus, the verse, and I sat back and I was like, wow, these are powerful.
01:16A destiny awaits as skies turn blue.
01:26With time I ended up going back to my very small setup at home where I had literally a keyboard, synthesizers
01:35and I was able to record this music, this melody, where my strengths are within percussion.
01:43I wanted some big drums, I wanted big sound, I wanted that to give that anthem sort of impact.
01:59Historically, my inspiration and my influences were my parents.
02:04They were both musicians, the fact that I'm sure they met through a band
02:09and they played just at the Manda Centre in Wolverhampton many, many years ago.
02:13Over the years, my dad has recorded lots and lots and lots of music and he's always kept it in his room.
02:21He's never actually released it up until recently and I felt that this music that he was producing was fantastic,
02:29all a hidden gem, and I felt, okay, if he can do it, I can do it.
02:34So I ended up doing this stand together, majorly influenced by my dad.
02:40Prior to the release, I wanted to get some feedback.
02:44I couldn't go to my parents because the song was very much influenced by my dad.
02:48So I went to my eldest brother and he listened to the song and he's very much into theatrical.
02:57He's a director-producer for a theatre company and I knew I could get an honest response from a sibling.
03:04So I played it to him in my car, nice sound system in my car, and his response was actually, it's a really good song.
03:14I was like, okay, I did not expect that whatsoever.
03:18Quickly followed though by him hastily saying, it could do with re-recording the vocals though.
03:25Once I'd finished this song, the song was then released on the 27th of September to reach a wider audience,
03:32not just my close family and friends, but more to the ambulance service staff and now further beyond that.
03:38I've had a radio presenter play it literally last night.
03:41Again, he messaged me saying he was in tears whilst it was being played on air.
03:48The idea is it's an uplifting, powerful song and the reaction I'm getting from not just my family and friends,
03:55but beyond, people are overwhelmed by it.
03:58That touches me that I'm actually achieving what I wanted to do with this song.
04:04If you are looking to show some support, obviously you can access my song on Spotify, Amazon Music, Apple, iTunes.
04:16Any musical platform really, YouTube as well.
04:18Anytime that you listen to the song, you're contributing to those charities.
04:23100% of the royalties that I would earn as an artist go straight through to the charities that I've chosen.