Sing Me A Story; Connecting Kids with Songwriters at Riot Fest

By Jen DeSalvo, WLS-AM 890 News

“The one thing all kids have, regardless of circumstance, is imagination,” Austin Atteberry told John and Ray Friday morning.

Atteberry is the Executive Director and Co-Founder of the nonprofit, Sing Me A Story. The group encourages children in hospitals, children’s homes and hospice organizations to write and/or illustrate stories about anything that they want, and in turn, distributes those stories to songwriters who turn those stories into songs.

“If we could bring those imaginations to some of the biggest microphones in the world to remind us that we all have a lot more in common than we often attribute to ourselves, we will have really done something,” Atteberry says of Sing Me A Story.

“We have about 2,000 songwriters who participate in our program,” Atteberry said.

The organization began partnering with music festivals across the country to work with artists, recording these stories turned songs on-site. This weekend, Sing Me A Story has partnered with Riot Fest, Sinai Children’s Hospital and The Chicago House to work to turn children’s stories into music.

Past musical partners have been Mayday Parade, Less than Jake and a handful of other songwriters in Nashville to turn the product of imaginations into music.

Listen to Austin Atteberry on the John Howell and Ray Stevens morning show: