Moorlands and Music: The Arts as a pathway to wellbeing
Recently, I spent a day on the wily, windy moors just next door to Haworth in Brontë country, one of my favourite places in the UK, exploring Wild Uplands, part of Bradford 2025 City of Culture. In short, it was great. Thankfully - as I’d forced my friend to drive me there and dragged them around for a few hours on a Sunday.
Wild Uplands, Bradford City of Culture 2025
There are four large-scale artworks dotted around, taking about an hour to walk through in total. Some works blended seamlessly into the landscape, almost as if they had grown from the ground itself. Tower by Steve Messam was a 10-metre structure clad in the raw fleece of Derbyshire Gritstone and Lonk sheep. It explored the building blocks of the moors and their connection to Bradford’s wool and textile heritage – a bold and somewhat fluffy reminder of how deeply place, industry and culture intertwine.
Tower by Steve Messam
Others caught me off guard, appearing suddenly out of the heather. 99 Butterflies by Meherunnisa Asad of Studio Lél, inspired by Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish’s haunting question “Where will we go after the last frontiers? Where will the birds fly after the last sky?”, was a solemn comment on displacement and longing that felt especially important.
99 Butterflies by Meherunnisa Asad of Studio Lél
Vanessa da Silva’s Muamba Posy sculptures reflected the cycles of nature on Penistone Hill, connecting body and environment in a wacky colour palette harking back to when the land would have been a tropical paradise 300 million years ago. And The Children of Smokeless Fire by Monira Al Qadiri, inspired by the Cottingley Fairies and Islamic depictions of Djinns, added an uneasy, mythical touch of mystery
Being outdoors and walking around art in that wide, open space gave my restless mind a rare and welcome quiet that my pal and I talked about for the rest of the day over a glass of red.
Not long after my escape to the Moors, I attended ABRSM’s symposium on Music, Health and Wellbeing. It brought together researchers, practitioners and educators to explore how music supports people’s health throughout life’s cycle. We heard about group singing that helps new mothers cope with loneliness, songwriting projects that gave families connection and joy during lockdown, and music therapy with dementia patients that helps ease agitation and distress.
ABRSM symposium panel
Music, like the artworks on the moors, offers us something deeply human. It helps us feel less alone, process what we’re going through and connect across generations.
At a time when ‘wellbeing’ is too often reduced to a marketing buzzword, used to flog dog yoga, scented candles or wellness packages, it feels vital to say clearly that the arts are not a lifestyle accessory. They can be a practical, powerful pathway to health and healing. From music therapy that supports people living with life-changing conditions, to creative practices that help us process grief or simply experience joy, the arts and culture sector deserves to be taken seriously as part of a holistic approach to public health.
This was the strong call to action at the ABRSM event: for policy and decision-makers to recognise that the arts are not just enrichment, but an essential route to improved health outcomes. It’s something I’ll be thinking about a lot and trying to incorporate more of in my life and work.