Brooklyn-based children’s music project Mil’s Trills facilitates inclusive collaborative music-making experiences that inspire positive change and culturally responsive social emotional learning. Through our highly responsive and play-centered approach, Messy Music Method, the creative process becomes a practice in navigating emotions, disrupting bias, and strengthening interpersonal relationships. Incorporating student experience in real time, we transform failure into growth and reframe mistakes. By focusing process over product, Messy Music allows us to be transparent with others, accept differences, and activate radical empathy towards social justice.

Image: Amelia Robinson, Photo by Daryl Getman