The Bobby Bones Show - Emily Cavanagh Singer/Songwriter/Activist/Artist-Takin A Walk

Episode Date: August 4, 2023

This week Buzz Knight is Takin' a walk with Emily Cavanagh Singer/Songwriter/Activist/ArtistFor more than ten years, Emily has worked at the intersection of service and the arts-both as a singer/songwriter and a social worker combining her two passions-music and activism.She has worked with individuals living with HIV/AIDS, medically frail children, seniors with memory loss, and refugee women.She continues to be dedicated to using her voice to help others find their own.In 2020, she launched “A Song for You” for patients and families hit hardest by Covid 19.The organization writes and records songs for patients and families, primarily in hospice, as a way to bring comfort, peace, and a bit of joy to those at the end of their life.Please support “A Song for You” here https://hereisasongforyou.org/ *****Thank you so much for listening to the TAKIN’ A WALK PODCAST SHOW hosted by Buzz Knight!  Listen to more honest conversations with a compelling mix of guests ranging from musicians, authors, and insiders with their own stories. Get inspired, get motivated, and gain insights from honest conversations every week that can help you with your own journey. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, and be part of this blessed family.Website: https://takinawalk.com/Twitter: https://twitter.com/thebuzzknightLinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/buzzknightLinkfire: https://lnk.to/takinawalk Please consider subscribing, leaving a review, and sharing it with your friends and family!Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human. When a group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist, they take matters into their own hands. I vowed I will be his last target. He is not going to get away with this. He's going to get what he deserves. We always say that trust your girlfriends.

Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe. On the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you. you get your podcast. What's up, everyone? I'm Ago Vodam. My next guest, it's Will Ferrell. Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo.

My dad gave me the best advice ever. He goes, just give it a shot. But if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat. Just hang in there. It would not be...

Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks, Dad, on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In 2023, Bachelor star Clayton Eckerd was accused of fathering twins. But the pregnancy appeared to be a hoax. You doctored this particular test twice, Ms. Owens, correct? I doctored the test ones.

It took an army of internet detectives to uncover a disturbing pattern. Two more men who'd been through the same thing. Greg Gillespie and Michael Mancini. My mind was blown. I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trapped. Laura, Scottsdale Police. As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences.

Listen to Love Trapped podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Bob Pittman, Chairman and CEO of IHeart Media, and I'm kicking off a brand new season of my podcast, Math and Magic, stories from the frontiers of marketing. Math and Magic takes you behind the scenes of the big. businesses and industries while sharing insights from the smartest minds in marketing. Coming up this seasonal math and magic, CEO of Liquid Death Mike Sessario. People think that creative ideas are like these light bulb moments that happen when you're in the shower. It's really like a stone sculpture.

You're constantly just chipping away and refining. Take two interactive CEO, Strauss Selnick, and our own chief business officer, Lisa Coffey. Listen to Math and Magic on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. to taking a walk. Here's Buzz Night. Well, Emily Kavanaugh, it's so nice to be taking a walk with you in New York City. And with you. Thank you so much for having me on. You have an amazing story. First, let's talk about your singer-songwriter career.

When did you know you were first booked on music? Well, you know, my grandma was a singer. So I grew up on the south side of Chicago, 57 first cousins, very close-knit community. You know, growing up it was kind of everything was about community and togetherness. So any chance for a family party, we took one, any chance for a sing-song, we had one, very big, very Irish, very, well, Irish American,

just all together all the time. And I think I learned from an early age that if you could tell a story or make someone laugh, life was good. So that sort of encouraged, I guess, that piece of me. And who were the musicians that influenced you at an early age? So mom listened a lot to CSNY, a lot of Joni Mitchell, a lot of Joan Baez, Carol King. My dad was more of the John Denver, Nat King Cole, Louis Armstrong variety. And those were the records that really played in our house.

And Chicago, really known for lots of different music and styles. So did you get out and see shows there? I did. My first show, I was 17, was actually Bob Dylan. And I think that that has stayed with me all these years later. He's still probably, I would credit, as one of my biggest influences. What was the venue? Do you know what? I want to say Ravinia. Does that feel right?

I'm not sure. You're like I wasn't there? I don't know the venues in Chicago. It might have even been Northwestern put on some big event, but I was just touched with my parents let me out for the night, And I'm proud that the first show I ever saw live was Dylan. Have you checked out the philosophy of modern song, the Bob Dylan book? No, and everyone always asks me that.

Oh, you have to. You totally have to. You know, it is, you may not recognize a lot of the music, but you will definitely recognize his voice as he analyzes these songs. Yeah. And you'll recognize some of them, too. We're in the studio right now, actually, recording a version of Girl from the North Country,

which is one of my most favorites of all of his songs. Oh, my God. Do you recall when he jumped out on stage if it was one of his better nights of performance because he's known for... He could be up and down, and he could get away with it because he's Bob. You know, I think when you love an artist so much,

there's almost like blinders on. Like I love him in an unconditional way of, to me, it's always Dylan, and so it's always good, and there's always something to take away from it. So I do remember a little bit of a magic to seeing him that young. I have to share, I just recently discovered this amazing performance with Dylan and Susan Tedeschi, that if you could find this, it's Susan at a very young age, and Bob clearly blown away by her brilliance. Yeah. It's like magical.

I would love to check that out. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So what are the shows do you remember seeing in Chicago that really made an impact? Well, you know, as a little girl, I listened a lot to folk music. I also was really taken by jazz. my grandma was a jazz singer and so all the songs in the 30s

40s when I was little we would hear Judy Garland I have a memory of it's almost a little embarrassing that my grand sounded so much like her that I remember hearing an old recording of Judy and thinking it was my grandma there was just such a similarity

in the sound you know so that played into my earliest influences I loved Joni Mitchell I loved Joan Baez. I loved Jefferson Airplane. I loved a lot of music that came long before I was even born. Did you look that?

I think more modern influences. Like I was really into Soundgarden. I loved Eddie Vedder. I loved all of the folk scene, the rock scene. Not much of that turns up in my music, but it's a lot of what I listened to. Has anybody told you that you have a little resemblance to Joan E. Mitchell? I feel like that's too large a compliment, but you're awfully kind.

That means they have, right? I'm a huge fan. I'm a huge fan. And how magical is it that she's out and about more, right? Yeah, and that so many young artists are bringing such attention to her. It's amazing. Like Brandy Carlisle has done not wonders for Joni's career. Joni's career is already so big, but I think really putting a spotlight back on how brilliant she was and what she's done for so many people who've come after her.

I agree. Yeah. I agree. So, how did you end up in New York City? Cue the siren. Since I was a little girl, wanted to move to New York. And it's funny because I knew I wanted to sing, and I knew I wanted to do something to kind of be in the world helping.

You know, I never felt responsible enough to be a teacher. I never really saw myself as someone who could plan a lesson or do something like that, but I felt very comfortable at what has become the intersection of music and service, right? So I loved singing for kids who are coming out of homelessness. Like I loved working with people who were in certain situations in their lives where maybe, you know, they were down on their luck, but like through writing a song, they could talk about it. In ways that I think sometimes other forms of, say, therapy or, you know, are useful, but not perhaps as free. And so as, you know, sort of a free spirit myself, I just felt like that was the way that I could bring those two together.

So as a very little girl, I wanted to come here and sing. And I am so lucky that it's all these years later. It's 18 years later, and that's what I'm doing. But then you stumbled into something pretty amazing called a song for you. I wouldn't say stumble, but... No, that's right. It was a bit of serendipitousness to it. So talk to the audience about how that happened.

Yeah. Yeah, that was entirely unplanned. I mean, had there not been a pandemic, I don't know that I would have thought to start something like this, right? Like in the middle of this global epidemic, I'm sitting watching Netflix, eating all my feelings. You're in Chicago. Binging Schitt's Creek. Oh, you're here then?

Well, I was here in New York. But right when everything hit, I did go home to be with my family for three months. And so that was one of the very few silver linings was I got to be there with my dad on his 70th birthday and go for walks with my mom. and be with my brothers and sister, you know. And I just, I remember sitting watching, like all of us, the stories every day of what was happening in the world and thinking, is there any way I can help, you know? And honestly, the answer is a singer-songwriter in a global pandemic

is probably going to almost always be no, you know, my skill set is fairly limited. But I knew I could write a song, and I knew that in the communities that I, travel in, so can most of the other people that I'm friends with. And so I just started thinking, well, what if there was a way that we could start telling the stories of the people who are in these rooms where their families can't reach them? And so even if it was just to send a song to offer a little comfort or bring a little piece to people on behalf of their families, that was where the

idea was born from. You know, I think for everyone, there's something that stood out in the pandemic, that they just couldn't wrap their head around, be at loss, or the sense of time, or this feeling stuck inside, or whatever it was for each person, you know. But for me, it was just this idea that people were, you know, essentially dying in rooms where no one could be with them and hold their hand. And so I did this really low-fi, low-budge, honestly, low-quality recording of, I want to hold your hand. And I started just cold-calling hospitals and hospitals.

and saying, you know, do you have a patient that might need a song? And initially the answer was, you know, we're up to our eyeballs, like we're very limited bandwidth. There's not much that we can do, even if we love this idea. But in, you know, three to six months time, I started getting calls back, social workers, volunteer coordinators, chaplains, we have a nurse that would love a song. She's in isolation. We have a family member that just can't reach their person, that they want to send them

something to say I love you, can you write it? You know, can you send it? And so what began is, let's just send a few songs, turned into let's write and record personalized songs based on the stories of the patients in the rooms. And this was all over the country? Well, initially, honestly, it was just, it was really Chicago and New York. Then it was California that called, you know, that called back. Then it grew from, you know, we wrote, we probably wrote maybe five songs in the beginning to over 200 in the course of 18 months time, even writing for staffs. You know, staff is small. A staff is small as 50 health care workers to 300 health care workers to 15,000 health

care workers in a system in Idaho at Christmas. Were you ever at a point you were, were you discouraged that you weren't hearing back from people? No, I never felt discouraged because I recognized. I recognized the moment, you know, I mean, the world was shut down, right? Like, this wasn't something that I was hoping, um, that I ever even thought would have the spotlight on it that has, has come to be. It was really just something to do in a time when, as an artist, you know, venues were dark,

work was scarce, um, sounds were plentiful. People, people, that I loved and that I knew, we're stuck at home. I mean, for all of us, right? And so it was more like, it was almost more of a surprise, to be honest, when people reached back out and said, we could use this. It surprises me to this day that it's grown into what it has. So how did the charity then become a full 501 C3? Yeah. Well, so we're still pending the 501. We're still a little ways away from that. But the kindness of the community, you know, the kindness of the press, the kindness of the health care workers, the kindness of the people that were sharing their stories with us, and then sharing our story

on behalf of what we were doing. You know, so the writers of People Magazine and Upworthy and Medium and ABC, and it was just really such a generous response that kind of serendipitously, a man that I had met in a copy shop years before who I had struck up a conversation and then what turned into a friendship with. He and his wife were this amazing couple and he was this great businessman. She was this wonderful ballerina.

She was always encouraging him to do a bit of philanthropy. We became friendly, the three of us. She encouraged me to keep at the service side of my work and my life but to really cultivate that through the arts. She ended up passing away not long after this had started. And her husband reached out to me and said, you know, I love this work that you're doing. I want to be a part of it. Charlene, his late wife, would have loved to be a part of it too.

And the irony, Charlene, when she passed, she ended up passing in a hospice that we were already writing for here in New York City. And so it was really just a full circle moment. And he said, you know, I want to, I believe. believe in this and I want to help you and that seed money that he donated got us started as a nonprofit and so we we went from this tiny little initiative to still a very tiny but organization here in New York that now rights for patients and families and hospice and hospital across the country but you're also it's just you and then other people who volunteer to write and record the music.

Yeah, the kindness of all of the volunteer artists, the local to Grammy nominee to Grammy award-winning songwriters who have all shared a song of theirs, either on behalf of our initiative or on behalf of

the family that really needed a song. Talk about some of those folks. Sure. Oh, my goodness. I mean, I don't even know where to start there. So I could talk about what I would call my first co-writer. And so my first co-writer is a 16-year-old girl in Arizona who sent me a song request on behalf of her dad, who ended up passing away shortly after he received a song. But she

basically shared, you know, she wasn't very close to him growing up. She didn't know much about him. She was a little angry with him because he had left, you know, her and her mom. And it really wasn't until she discovered how much she loved music that she reconnected with her. with her dad because it was the one thing they could bond over. And so, you know, I sent on the intake to our social worker out West. Shout out to Lisa, she's a star. And Lisa passed on this, you know, questionnaire to this wonderful girl. And she just wrote pages.

You know, some people will write back, I want a song for my mom. She loves country music. And that's okay. That's all that they want to share. But this girl just wrote a novel. And essentially the sentiment she wanted conveyed was no matter what has happened, no matter what our relationship, like after you're gone, I'll go on singing your name. And that ended up being the title of the song. And I feel like it almost speaks the best to our mission because it's this idea that even after someone has left, their legacy can still live on through a song.

So, I mean, from someone, you know, like Kayla to, you know, friends of mine over in Ireland who have, you have. won all sorts of awards and were kind enough to send songs, to family and friends back in Chicago, to local musicians here in New York, to Grammy Award winner Jesse Harris, who wrote all of the songs that won Nora Jones for Grammys, Sasha Allen, who sings backing vocals for the Rolling Stones and took time out of her life to send a song. You know, Sophie B. Hawkins, who wrote my favorite song when I was 16, as I lay me down to sleep, sent a song to a song to a out West with a personalized shout out to say, you know, this song is for you. Amazing.

Yeah, so the response from, I mean, everyone has said yes. That's what's blown my mind. Like in such a dark time in the world that there was the lightness of these amazing people who just said, sure, I'll send a song, I'll write a song, I'll share this mission with my community. That is what always keeps me going. So as somebody who observes this process and understands music, what's the impact of music to these family members, to these individuals? Talk about the healing force of music.

I mean, it's so interesting. I could talk about that one. For hours, how long is your podcast? As long as we need. As long as this walk. I can speak to it personally, and then I can speak to it, you know, on the collective. I think in a time like the one that we were living in, everyone just needed to feel some sort of connection. And I personally don't know of a better connector than music. I think it's universal.

I think it goes beyond borders. I think it goes beyond race. It goes beyond age. It goes beyond. You know, it connected Kayla to her dad, who for a very long time she had no relationship with, right? So on the personal, knowing how much of an impact it's had in my life and how much, besides my family and my friends, it has been the constant source of joy. I think it's really incredible that for so many other people in such a dark time, that was the thing they were turning to, right? Like, people went on live streams, record sales went up in terms of people bought old record players, and they were listening to.

the songs of their childhood. It was like having a friend in a room with you when you couldn't be in a room with your friend, or it was like having a meal that you love, you know, listening to these old songs from when you were growing up. So I guess in a way, I've always found that music is sort of that bridge between people who might not otherwise have a connection. And then if you already have that connection, but you just can't be in the rooms with the people you love. Like, it's all the more powerful. So I think that's what we found. Like, even now people will say to me, will you ever do like a live performance? Or do you go into the hospitals?

Or I don't understand the process. Like are you like musicians on call or music therapists? And we're, you know, all of those places I so admire and revere. But why we're a little bit unique and we're not doing anything that no one's done before. But where we are unique is that this was born in a time when no one could be in the room with each other, which for me has always been what music is. So this was a way to sort of almost re-referral. create the sense of being with the people you love when you couldn't be. So now that we have the

opportunity to be live again or go into a room, I almost don't want us to because it was born in this time that I want to still honor. And I love this idea that you can have a recording, you can have an MP3, it's tangible, you can hold on to it. So families will reach out to me now and say, you know, I still listen to that song. Like it still plays in my playlist. Like we wrote a song for a woman who wanted to marry the love of her life. on Valentine's Day. And she knew she didn't have much time left. And so he wrote out a whole intake and explained all the reasons he loved her and all the things

that were amazing about her. And they ended up getting married in California under this large tree with friends of theirs around. And they danced to the song that we wrote for her as their first dance, you know. And so he still gets to play that song, even though she's no longer with us. So when you first became attracted to music, could you have ever imagined that you got so close to it as a healing force? No, never in a million years. I was living for a long time at the intersection of working in both service and music. And so I just feel so lucky that in this intersection, this is sort of everything that I've been doing for a long time, but it feels much more intentional.

So if musicians listening to this want to help, how do they participate in the song for you? Well, we would love that. I mean, in this moment, I'll be honest and say, I think our demand for songs has grown past our resources. So, you know, when you're doing something for free for a long time, you get to a moment where you have to make a decision. And while we still want to maintain our mission of providing free services to help. families for as long as we can, we also want to be able to pay our artists and our musicians and our studios and, you know, be an artist-based organization that also does good by the artist, right? So I always put out there, like, we're still doing these songs primarily for free.

So if there are artists that are in a position where they can donate a song, we would be so grateful. And if there are artists that just want to spread it to their community or share it with their people to get even more eyes and ears on it, that would be amazing. We're also looking for people in development, people in fundraising, people who have that part of the brain that you can imagine as an artist isn't my strong suit, right? So I can write the songs and I love sitting with people and I love that element of connecting with folks and connecting folks, but in terms of how we're going to fundraise, how we're going and make this a sustainable mission.

That's where we can definitely use other people. And of all genres of music. Absolutely. Anywhere. Anywhere. Globally. Globally. Because we do have a global audience.

Well, hello. Taking a walk. It's right. Take a walk to New York and write a song. Yeah. So they can get a hold of you, how? So they can reach me at Emily Kavanaugh music at Gmail. They can find me on all the socials.

Again, that's just Emily Kavanaugh music on Instagram or Facebook, Emily Kavanaugh on Spotify. And our website, I want to give a shout out to our great designers, is here is a songfor-you.org. And I personally will attest to Emily Kavanaugh music on Spotify with an amazing version in particular of Fly Me to the Moon. Oh, you're so kind. Which is just wonderful.

Do you want to know something funny about that? I used to sing in a little piano bar in Chicago when I was saving up to come to New York called Fly Me to the Moon. And it was one of my favorite memories in music. Gregory ran the show. He was a blast. He was such a character. We had so many fun nights there. And all these years later, I went back to check in and just to say hello and to see, you know, my people.

And Fly Me to the Moon is now called Grigleyville Weeners. Jeez, I like Fly Me to the Moon better. for sure wow so where would we be without music oh man I can't imagine like I can't imagine my life without it I mean it's like

it sounds dramatic it's like breathing but it is such a basic part of life like it is such a primal everyday I mean even just in the sounds that we can hear in the back here background of the city cars and the buses and some are less melodic than others but um yeah i mean i can't imagine a life without music i think it would be it wouldn't be half as joyful well you're doing

amazing work uh it's it's stunning what you're doing and uh anybody who can reach out to you should uh donate also they can donate the the green That would be incredible. How do they do that? That is a good question. So, no, we are in the process of setting up. If you go to our website, there's a place where you're able to send on more about that. All right.

So great to have you on taking a walk in person. It's so nice to take a walk with you. Thank you, Emily. Thank you. Taking a walk with Buzz Night is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. When a group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist, they take matters into their own hands. I vowed, I will be his last target.

He is not going to get away with this. He's going to get what he deserves. We always say that trust your girlfriends. Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe, on the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, everyone? My next guest, it's Will Ferrell.

Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo. My dad gave me the best advice ever. He goes, just give it a shot. But if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat. Just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be.

Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks Dad on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In 2023, Bachelor star Clayton Eckerd was accused of fathering twins. But the pregnancy appeared to be a hoax. You doctored this particular test twice in so-ins, correct? I doctored the test ones. It took an army of internet detectives to uncover a disturbing pattern.

Two more men who'd been through the same thing. Greg Gillespie and Michael Miancini. My mind was blown. I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trapped. Laura, Scottsdale Police. As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences. Listen to Love Trapped podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hi, I'm Bob Pittman, chairman and CEO of IHeart Media, and I'm kicking off a brand new season of my podcast, Math and Magic, stories from the Frontiers of Marketing. Math and Magic takes you behind the scenes of the biggest businesses and industries while sharing insights from the smartest minds in marketing. Coming up this seasonal math and magic, CEO of Liquid Death Mike Cesario. People think that creative ideas are like these light bulb moments that happen when you're in the shower. It's really like a stone sculpture. You're constantly just chipping away and refining. Take to Interactive CEO, Strauss Selnick, and our own chief business officer, Lisa Coffey. Listen to Math and Magic on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.