CLEVELAND student Travis Lord has beaten more than 170 other young song writers to win a VIP recording studio session with leading hip-hop artist Illy.
Travis will also have his lyrics featured in Illy’s new song Back Around by taking out the Queensland government’s Stop the Hurting: End domestic Violence Music Slam competition.
Families Minister Shannon Fentiman said the competition offered budding rappers and lyricists from 12 to 17 years the chance to win a recording studio session with leading hip-hop artist Illy and the opportunity to have their lyrics featured in his new song Back Around.
“Over the past few months, we have been holding music workshops in schools and communities across the state to help young people share their feelings, re-frame their ideas about healthy family relationships and to let them know there is support available,” Ms Fentiman said.
“We received more than 170 entries to the competition, each representing an incredibly talented young person who has engaged with the domestic violence issue and are standing up to say it’s not okay.
“At only 16 years old, Travis’s lyrics certainly hit home and are a powerful reminder that unfortunately a lot of kids find themselves in these horrible situations.”
Travis, who finishes school in six weeks, said writing came naturally to him.
“I’m no good at maths or science or anything like that,” he said. “But I love writing.”
The Cleveland District State High School pupil said although he had been writing from a young age, it was only in the past 12 months that he had concentrated on song writing.
“Don’t ask me how many songs I’ve written,” he said. “It must be more than 100 by now.”
He said he was lucky and surprised to win the competition and considered himself fortunate to be able to work with Illy.
Ms Fentiman said she hoped the Back Around song and the Stop the Hurting campaign would help empower people to speak out and seek support about violence.
“Domestic and family violence is one of the most complex and damaging issues affecting Queenslanders right across the state and we don’t want kids to grow up thinking the behaviour is normal,” Ms Fentiman said.
“Any relationship where another person is abusive, violent, intimidating, threatening, or is making you feel scared is considered domestic and family violence. It’s not just physical and that’s exactly what this campaign is helping to explain.”
Illy said he was excited to collaborate with young people and to spread the message about domestic violence.
“We chose Travis from the shortlist we compiled, because the verse was just so awesome,” he said.
“There's layers to it which made it stand out to me. It's not easy to tackle an issue like this with nuance at a young age.”
Travis’s parents, Nick and Vikki Lord, said music was Travis’ passion and he would like it be his career.
The final version of the song will be released later this year.
