#songwitch

Content Warning: brief suicide mention

What is a Song Witch?

A witch who uses music/song in their craft. Crystal witches use crystals. Cosmic witches use planets. Kitchen witches use kitchen things. I use songs.

My grimoire has lists of songs instead of crystals or herbs. I sing my wards into place. I put together playlists prior to spellwork so I can play them during.

Why be a Song Witch?

Music is in my blood, soul, and heart. 

Music was the first religion I ‘claimed’. I grew up being made to go to church, but once the pastor started spewing homophobic rhetoric I stopped and I’ve never been to church since. I had always wanted to believe in something bigger than myself, but I never really believed in anything. And after separating myself from Christianity and the church, I became a hardcore atheist for a bit over a decade.

This changed in August of 2018 and I can remember it vividly. My wife and I went to a Panic! at the Disco concert. I’d always enjoyed that genre and especially P!atD, but it took on a more emotional meaning to me after one of my close friends committed suicide.

I can remember one time I was driving and my van was full of my noisy and boisterous friends. And I was getting extremely overwhelmed. He pulled up P!atD on his phone and held it up near my ear (my radio had previously been stolen) because he knew it would ground me. He also made sure that I had them on my phone/laptop/whatever listening device. 

He passed in the middle of the Death of a Bachelor pre-release hype, when they were releasing singles before the album had officially dropped. The eponymous song ‘Death of a Bachelor’ was released the same month. It was...a very emotional time for me. I sunk myself into that album when it came out the next month. One of the songs on that album is Hallelujah. The following lyrics are the ones that hit me the hardest. It gave me ‘permission’ to grieve. An outlet for my sorrow.

Then the time for being sad is over And you miss 'em like you miss no other And being blue is better than being over it (over it)

Back to that Panic! at the Disco concert. This was the Pray for the Wicked tour. We drove three hours to get there (despite my driving anxiety) and rented a room at a hotel and had a nice mini-vacation.

The energy in the venue was astounding (and this was before I was officially a witch or had realized that I’m an empath). I felt supremely connected to the world in a way I never had before. All these people there for the same reason. So much queer representation, people with their pride flags worn like capes, or clothing emblazoned with rainbows. It was beautiful. 

I sang along to every song. Loudly. Some parts were more like...collective screaming. My throat was so sore afterwards. But, the pivotal point...that most important moment.

When they started playing Hallelujah, I felt so moved. That feeling I never had in church. The one you can see on the faces of the people with their arms raised in praise. I was feeling it. I had my hands raised as if in worship and was singing as best as I could while tears streamed down my face. It was the closest I had ever felt to some sort of something larger than myself. From that point, I declared music to be my religion.

Recently, when I was searching for a label...something to grasp onto, to ground me, I came upon Song Witch. It’s perfect and it’s me.

How to be a Song Witch