The Power of Singing for Incarcerated Women

The afternoon my mom and I first walked into the Portland Intergenerational Women’s Choir, my sister-in-law was in labor with her first child. We took a brief pause from our support role, drove across town, and stepped into a light-filled room led by choir director Crystal Meneses.
We sang a song for her, just the two of us, mother and daughter. Something lit up instantly for all of us. There was no question.
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We were in.

From that night forward, every Monday became a nourishing anchor in our weeks. Women and girls of all ages gathered. Some steady in their voices, others still discovering theirs. We learned songs in ways that stretched us, comforted us, challenged us. Sometimes the learning came easily, threading voices through the room like light. Other times the process required patience and breath. But always, we were healed and changed by what we created together.

Mom and me, bonded so much by a life of singing together.

The choir rehearsed in elder care facilities so residents could join us. We moved through different facilities over the years, and no matter the location, it became a sanctuary of community, a place where music softened the edges of our lives. We performed in hospitals, shelters and community spaces as a service to others and to ourselves.

And then we sang at Coffee Creek Women’s Prison.
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We prepared for weeks. There were conversations about what it meant to enter a prison with our voices, about the responsibility of showing up with integrity, kindness, safety. By then, my mom and I had been singing together for decades. You can learn more about that journey here, but please read on first. She had written a song called “Queen of Diamonds,” a fierce, vulnerable, powerful a capella piece we’d performed up and down the West Coast since I was a teenager. It had even been adopted by the Aurora Chorus; it had brought countless people to tears. But no one in our choir had heard it yet.
Until Crystal asked us to sing it at the prison.

Aurora Chorus performing “Queen of Diamonds” by Connie Cohen, March 2016.

There were about fifty of the seventy or so choir members there that day. There was a rigorous check-in process in order to enter. The sound of doors unlocking again and again as we walked through hallways and rooms until we were in an auditorium on a stage, packed in tight. We sang a few of our ensemble pieces, and the power of many voices filled the room. Then, to the surprise of the choir members, Crystal quietly asked my mom and me to step forward.

I knew the song would be emotional, but I didn’t expect what happened next.

​We stood at the front of the stage, with rows of incarcerated women in front of us and our choir sisters behind us. The first lines left our mouths and the whole room was pulled into a portal of time slowing down. A few verses in, tears were flowing for women everywhere in the room.

I’ve performed this song many times. I’m used to the tears it provokes. But this was different.

You could feel something unnamed inside the room lifting, loosening, being witnessed. It was as if the music created a bridge between us: women on both sides of the stage, all carrying our own stories, suddenly connected through the power of this song.

I could barely get through the final lines. My throat tightened, and I let myself feel it, this profound, collective moment where sound became healing, where our presence together became medicine.

And when I think about that day, and all the songs we’ve shared with so many, especially now, I feel that medicine asking something of me. Of my mom. Of all of us. 
Because the world on many levels feels heavy. Fearful. Disconnected in ways that ache. And I’ve been feeling a pull - a quiet, persistent tug in my chest - to return to community singing, to the medicine it brings, to the joy it opens, to the belonging it restores.

So I’m creating something for us. 

A space to Sing for Your Spirit.

For healing. For hope. For joy.

For community. For breath. For the simple miracle of being alive together.

Why singing matters

Singing in community isn’t just uplifting, it changes your biology. Studies show that singing stimulates vagal tone, supporting emotional regulation, resilience, and a sense of safety. And singing in community increases endorphins and dopamine, lifting mood and cultivating joy.

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Here I’m warming folks up to sing at Living Room Realty’s annual kick-off event this year (they didn’t know it yet and felt wonderfully connected afterward!)

💜 Singing releases oxytocin, the bonding hormone that eases stress and strengthens connection.

💚 Group singing synchronizes heartbeats - literally bringing people into coherence with one another.

💛 Singing lowers cortisol, soothing the body’s stress response, even after just a few minutes of vocalizing.
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In other words: your body loves when you sing. And it especially loves when you sing with others. 
It’s not just what singing does physiologically. There is a spiritual resonance that happens when we sing. It clears distractions and noise, harmonizing all levels of the self and helps us remember why we’re here in this life. The vibration of your voice is like a tuning fork for your cells, bringing them into balance and literally, powerfully, healing your own body and bloodline. When we sing in community, our voices together multiply this healing; not only are we healing ourselves but our voices are medicine for each other. When we add intention to heal, this further calls into alignment deeper more far reaching levels of support and healing. And then we sing meaningful uplifting words, they carry potent patterns of resonance that become medicine as well!

Sing for your Spirit 

So here is my love and spirit filled offering for you. 

We’ll gather every 1st & 3rd Monday of the month 6-8:30pm in North Portlandstarting January 5th and sing circle songs and rounds in the oral tradition. Some will be original, many from around the world, mostly a cappella and all with uplifting meaning. We’ll weave in guided visualizations, sound healing and somatic practices to help you land in your body and soften your nervous system. And then we’ll have tea time to connect and build community. No experience is necessary, only a heart willing and ready to show up. 

If something in you is yearning for connection, for release, for joy, for a place to exhale, soften and receive… join us! Even if you’re shy about singing. Even if someone once told you not to sing. Your voice is beautiful and carries potent medicine for you and for the world. Don’t let those old stories hold you back from receiving. 

And yes, my mom, my incredible, powerful, beloved songstress mom, will be there with me. If you know her, you already know what a gift she is. If you don’t yet, you’re about to.
This is my most accessible community offering—rooted in love, healing, and the power of our shared voices.
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I can’t wait to see you, to sing with you, and to create something beautiful together.

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