FAC Insights: Sam Lee: Bridging Music, Nature, and Activism with EarthPercent
FAC Insights is a forum for us to showcase and share long form pieces looking at various parts of the music industry and the society that shapes it. Pieces take the form of videos, interviews, discussions, articles and more.
This month, we are thrilled to hear from EarthPercent and Sam Lee.
FAC board member Sam Lee is a Mercury-nominated folk singer, whose music shines a light on lost English tradition and storytelling, seeking to reconnect listeners with nature. Environmental activism is at the heart of Lee’s work and mission. He is a co-founder of Music Declares Emergency, as well as a supporter and close collaborator of EarthPercent, the music and climate charity co-founded by Brian Eno. For this issue of FAC Insights, Lee sat down with Alice Pelly, Development Manager at EarthPercent, to discuss the inspirations behind Lee’s work and the intersection of music and activism.
1. Sam, thanks for taking the time to talk to me today. To start, I’d love to set the scene a little—can you share where you are right now, and what’s been inspiring your work lately?
Right now I'm at home, which I haven't been in for a long time, in the sunshine, on my sofa. The inspiration for my life at the moment has been very much about seeing the incredible upsurge in nature defenders, and people working to connect us back with nature.
It's been such a powerful last few months of seeing things happening, and people doing really extraordinary work.
2. Nature and environmental concerns seem to be a crucial part of your work. What role do you think artists can play in climate messaging, and what makes their voice unique?
We have a situation where we have more evidence, more data, and more scientific understanding of the state of the world. But we are in a real dearth of ways that we can communicate that information, and the implication of that information to the masses. That's where the big breakdown is. We don't need anything else to tell us that we are imminently in dire straits, and what the consequence will be of that. So that’s where the artist steps in, as they always have done, as being the communicator. The person who translates the emotions, feelings, concerns and ideas of one group, and transmits, metabolizes, and reimagines them in a way that can speak to the world, and can be received through the heart, and not through the head.
It's that unique form of expression, of being able to identify the things that we are closed off from hearing - because of saturation, noise and manipulation of media. Music can just cut straight through that and tell or sing it like it is. It allows people an understanding that doesn’t require a PhD in biosciences, but can just be felt. It can tell us: this is what is coming, this is what we need to do to change. And it can paint a picture of the alternative, because it's the artist that can sometimes communicate the beauty of the alternative vision.
3. Your latest release, ‘Bushes & Briars & Birds (feat. NATURE)’ was released as part of Sounds Right, the initiative from UN Live in partnership with EarthPercent which launched NATURE as a recording artist for the first time, with 50% of recording royalties going to nature conservation. What was that experience like, and what does it mean for you to be able to give back to nature through your music?
Firstly it was really nice to have an excuse to just get shit loads of birdsong on a record in a slightly profuse, obscene and indulgent way. Usually I've been very subtle in incorporating a bit of nightingale, a bit of curlew, some swifts, which for me add a textural quality which is super powerful but actually might go somewhat unnoticed. In this remix of Bushes and Briars, adding an orchestra of these birds made me think - why didn't I do this before? It was brilliant to be able to bring birds I think are so beautiful into the music... not as Musak or as a soundtrack, but prominently.
I spend lots of time bringing people into nature but it's very abstract and circuitous the way nature actually benefits from that. So to be able to have a guaranteed way that nature is certifiably being financed to protect, restore, grow and foster abundance through streaming royalties... that's brilliant.
4. What advice would you give an artist who was looking to step into climate activism for the first time?
I think, firstly, bravery. Rage and anger are often repellents, so we need to ask ourselves how we can start to amplify stories of hope, resilience, and social change.
That might be in your music, but it might also be that you are supporting things in a different way. I would say don't try and be a campaigner for all issues. Find the ones that you have a personal relationship with, and see how you can be a voice of that... be it raw sewage in the rivers, or plastic waste in the oceans, or different farming practices, or vegetarianism, or fossil fuels. Find the thing that is what you want to put your voice behind.
5. In the context of the climate crisis, how do you see the worlds of music and activism evolving?
Well, big picture, we are fucked, and the human systems that allow us to live these wonderful, indulgent, and entertainment-rich lifestyles are going to be highly compromised. So I think the music world has to start to look at where it adapts. Music won't end, it just might have to scale back in certain ways, and actually we start to see some of the more old-world, simple types of gatherings and economies around music starting to take precedence.
I think it’s vital that resilience is built into the music world, to ensure that new art is maintained, and that music is there to respond to the times we live in... to speak to the crises, and issues, the broken hearts that are going to abound in these times ahead. So I think being able to bring music back into a connection with protest, and for speaking about essential issues - that needs to be supported.
Any final things you would like to mention?
If people want to learn more about how music connects with nature, they can get involved with Singing With Nightingales. Come and join me in the forest in the spring, and experience what it's like to collaborate with a wild bird in the dark, in incredible musical synthesis, and
also support the artists that you see, myself included, who are making music that is in one way or another celebrating nature, and trying to bring about a deeper sense of wonderment, enchantment towards the natural world, and thus a greater sense of responsibility to protect and restore it.
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To support the Earth through your music, get in touch with EarthPercent at:
hello@earthpercent.org