Winter-Spring 2025: Heart Songs Schedule

What: Heart Songs: Lament, Longing, & Love (an online community space for you to bring your heart and your voice)

When: 6:30-8p CDT (05-UTC until Daylight Savings Time ends)

Dates for Winter-Spring 2025:

• January 13, 27
• February 10, 24
• March 10, 24
• April 7, 21
• May 5, 19

Where: Online: https://zoom.us/j/431161455 (see call-in options on Heart Songs' main page)

Gather for an informal singing time to re-center our hearts in community. Simple songs will be led paperlessly/taught by ear by Conie Borchardt, Nancy W, Sarah M, other song leaders, and you, if you have a song to share.

Join us. Bring friends. (Signup for the email reminder here; select Heart Songs)

Songs will be about the human experience and in that way, spiritual in nature, but not specifically religious.

This is a space intended for self-care, however that shifts for you in every moment. Bring water. Come and go. Sit in a chair, lie on the floor, or stand as you need to.

Jan 17 + Mar 7: Songs for Tending Our Hearts

When it feels like the world is falling apart, when everything is literally on fire, singing in community together heals and centers us—we’re not alone.

Our culture desperately needs spaces where it is safe to feel your sorrow and the weight of the world. Come sing through the small and large griefs in your life and give them space to breathe.

When: Bimonthly Fridays in 2025, 7:30-9p

• Jan 17
• Mar 7

Where: Yess Yoga, 

105 E 26th St, Mpls

Song leaders Conie Borchardt and Liz Digitale Anderson (aka GOOD TROUBLE) hold care-filled circles for you to find freedom in your voice, de-stress your nervous system, and move your body.

Every voice is welcome! We teach all the songs call and response- just open your mouth and echo back. We’ll sing songs to ground you, heal you, and help you breathe in the days to come.

Pre-register + pay what you can here: https://www.yessyogastudio.com/yoga-workshops/
$5-$20 sliding scale (No one turned away for lack of funds; we want you there!) You can also pay on the door.

**Notes**

- Masks May Be Required when Covid is surging. Masks will be available.
- Parking can be kind of tight around this block - leave yourself some extra time to find a spot! 
- As we're in a yoga studio, we ask people to leave their shoes at the entrance to keep the studio clean. If you want to bring a clean pair of indoor shoes to support your feet that's fine. Thank you!

Winter 2025: Singing for Liberation Songleader Incubator Series!

SINGING FOR LIBERATION: We're excited to be offering an 8-week series this winter to train up more songleaders for movement work! Singing is an essential organizing tool and we want to help you learn more songs, grow more confident in leading them, and think through how singing functions in building the world we want to live in.

We'll meet on Monday nights at CTUL, from 6:30-8 pm, starting January 6, 2025 and ending February 24th. Folx can come just to sing and drop in as they please, or come to all the sessions with the intention of practicing their songleading and skilling up.

Liberation movements throughout history have taught us that singing together helps us celebrate, march, grieve, stay true to our vision, and that the songs anchor our courage for the work to come. We're not singing to perform, we're singing because it changes us-- every voice is needed in the movement.

Songleading will be anchored by GOOD TROUBLE, aka Liz Digitale Anderson + Conie Borchardt, and friends. We're grateful to be partnering with Inquilinxs Unidxs and CTUL to make this happen! A sliding scale donation is requested of $5-20 per session, or $30-$100 for the whole series, no one turned away for lack of funds.

Pre-register your interest here and we'll send you reminders when it's time to roll!
https://forms.gle/U8WtG35GoGngXSMr5

Facebook link here.

Hosted at CTUL (Centro De Trabajadores Unidos En La Lucha) + Inquilinxs Unidxs @ 3715 Chicago Ave, Minneapolis

Setlist from Nov 22: Songs for Tending Our Hearts @ Yess Yoga

Friends,

Here are the songs we sang at Songs for Tending Our Hearts at Yess Yoga on Friday night, November 22, 2024:

• Holding Song (Ian Carrick) - Bandcamp
• The Hard Times (text: Bertolt Brecht; tune: Ahlay Blakely)
• One Body (Ahlay Blakely) - Bandcamp
• Grief (Sarina Partridge)
• The Cure for the Pain (text inspired by Rumi; tune: Yam)
• Tubwayhun lawile, trans: Blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted (Neil Douglas-Klotz)
• What are we gonna do with all this grief (main lyric from Prentis Hemphill’s book, “What It Takes to Heal,” tune by Liz with melodic frame influenced by Ana Hernandez’s “Set it right again”, Black Blues + Spirituals, and Whiskey Shivers’ “Who’s gonna dig these graves”) 

* An online audio or video recording has not been found. Let us know if you find one in the comments!

Some of you asked about the Resources we shared. Here's a short list...

• About the Card Decks: Having a tangible tool to sit with and reflect our feelings back to us helps us slow down, process, and make space for emotional work and intentions we otherwise tend to ignore. We typically spread out two: 
1.  The Artist Grief Deck (https://griefdeck.com/) which was created by hospice workers during the pandemic
2. and the Rest Deck by Tricia Hersey (https://thenapministry.com/rest-deck/) based on Hersey's book "Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto"
• Instruments we use: 
• CajonTab by Louson Drum - Conie has a 12" CajonTab; Liz has one of the Pro series. Get to know a bit of the cajon's musical history here. Use Liz's affiliate link to get 10% off!
• Shruti Box, literally "sound" or "singing" in ancient Sankrit, replicates the sound of the Tambura, an East Asian Indian drone instrument. Part of the family of drone instruments that show up in many cultures, related to bagpipes and harmoniums. Conie's instrument is from Shrutibox.com run by Ron Kravitz of https://www.musicinthemoment.com/ in Philadelphia, PA
• Where else to sing in the Twin Cities? There's three places you can check! 
• Twin Cities Singing Circles (Facebook group)
• Perfection-Free Community Singing (Facebook group)
• AND this Google Doc of regular circles that Liz DA put together.

We are grateful to you if sang with us and to Yess Yoga for hosting.

If you'd like reminders of upcoming singing gatherings, sign up for the In-person Sings/Good Trouble mailing list here to get an email beforehand. Or just check the Yess Yoga's website.

Keep singing and stay warm, graceful, and creative!

Love, Liz and Conie, a.k.a. GOOD TROUBLE