Through an ARPA - Wyoming Arts Council grant, a music therapist led songwriting workshops with healthcare workers at the Jackson hospital to address work related stress and burnout due to the pandemic. Four groups of health care workers shared stories and processed work-related trauma to write songs about their experiences. Four songs were officially released.
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A Casper-based nonprofit, ART 321, is holding its first statewide conference aimed at addressing the health concerns of Wyoming residents through the arts. Wyoming has the highest youth incarceration rate and one of the highest suicide rates in the nation.
But ART 321 plans to fight against those things using the arts.
The conference is scheduled for May 20 to 22 in Casper. And Wyoming Public Radio s Naina Rao talked with the nonprofit s executive director, Tyler Cessor, about the need for a conference like this right now.
Tyler Cessor: Everything that was a concern before the pandemic is only exacerbated now, right? So this is the first statewide effort to bring together a coalition of artists, health care providers, community service providers, anyone that is interested in improving the health outcomes of Wyoming residents through the arts.
Itâs often said that Jackson Hole is like an island: isolated, self-contained, self-created, maybe self-absorbed. Populated by endemic species that maybe seem weird to outsiders.
Itâs an apt simile for one of Jackson Holeâs newest bands, Inland Isle, which on Friday will release its debut CD, âTime Has Changed Us,â eight engaging but probing songs that feel like a wide-open window after a long winter, or a long pandemic.
âDusty came up with the name,â songwriter-guitarist Patrick Chadwick said of his bandmate, lead guitarist Dusty Nichols. âOur songwriting is introspective, and âInland Isleâ makes you think of that. . And our songs are very Jackson-specific that talk about specific issues: housing and income inequality, moving here and being a big fish in a small pond, as far as gig opportunities go.â