PODCAST INTRODUCTION
Welcome to another inspiring episode of the Free To Fly podcast.
Free to Fly is more than a podcast.
We’re a counter child trafficking organisation based in South Africa, working to protect and restore lives.
We’re excited to share our newly released song, Free to Fly, written by Ian, a father whose daughter was tragically trafficked.
Ian and his wife previously shared their testimony in episode three and we’re honoured to have them as part of our Free to Fly family.
In this episode, Ian shares the story behind the song, the inspiration for its lyrics and how he’s found strength and renewed hope despite immense challenges.
Listen, enjoy and share the song with your network as we continue to bring hope and raise awareness about Trafficking.
Thank you for being part of this journey with us.
PS: OK, good morning ladies and gentlemen, my name is Phinius Sebatsane, I have missed you but i’m back right now and today I have some amazing guests in the States that I will be talking to, you know, about a project that they’ve been working on I call the Sound of Freedom.
If you have watched the movie called the Sound of Freedom, you understand what I’m talking about.
And currently there’s another movie called the Sound of Hope, which I really recommend that you get to really watch them.
But today we’re going to be speaking about something very special with amazing guests in the States who have created something that’s going to help us, you know, navigate around this issue of trafficking.
This is Free to Fly, where we talk about issues concerning human trafficking, exploitation of people who are, you know, victims and perpetrators and yeah, thank you so much for listening to the rest.
Some of the podcasts that we have recorded, we really appreciate it and I hope this one will be as impactful to you wherever you are, wherever you are listening to us.
I’m just going to introduce the guest briefly, just to tell us who they are and then we’ll dive into the questions that I’ll be going through with them.
Interviewee:
Ian Provo
Tracy Matzke
Interviewer:
Phinius Sebatsane
List of Acronyms
IP: Ian Provo
TM: Tracy Matzke
PS: Phinius Sebatsane
So, Ian, I will start with you if you can tell us briefly who you are and maybe how you got into this organisation and this project.
IP: Yeah, I’m Ian Provo, I live in the Midwestern state of Illinois and my wife was part of anti human trafficking organisation, still does work in that field and became connected to the organisation Free to Fly through the international organisation Nicozy.
They asked us to share our personal story with a daughter who had been human trafficked.
And then over the years, it was during that interview that I decided that I wanted to do a music video.
I felt inspired and prompted to do a music video for the organisation.
And over the last several years I’ve been emailing in regular contact, as has my wife with Salome, and getting updates on the organisation.
And then in the last year as it came closer to the opening of the safe house, I started to work on the song in earnest.
PS: Wow.
I have to say though, I listened to the song and I was like, this is very helpful.
You know, as you know, the issue that we’re tackling and dealing with can be a little bit complicated, a little bit complex.
And every time when somebody hears human trafficking, everybody’s like, I don’t want to talk about that, I don’t want to hear that.
But I was listening to your song.
You know, I sense a sense of hope for the work that we’re doing.
So thank you so much for really creating such a beautiful song.
I’m gonna go back, I’m gonna go to you, Tracy, if you can just briefly introduce yourself, it would mean a lot.
TM: Yeah, I’m Tracy Matzke and I’ve known Ian for several years now.
We were in a band together and he played bass and I’m the singer in the band.
And when he approached me to do the first project we worked on was the Walls of Jericho, I, when I heard what it was about, it was a no brainer, had to be a part of it.
So naturally when he approached me with this new project, Free to Fly, I thought, okay, let keep going.
It’s amazing.
It’s just, I think this one’s the best one yet.
PS: Yeah, I’m super excited for the music video.
TM: Yes, it’s fantastic.
PS: But yeah, I think Ian, I’m gonna go back to you and ask you about how did you get to a point where the songwriting of the song, you know, how did you, how did you put it together?
What is the inspiration behind it?
TM: Yeah, I mean.
PS: In the introduction.
But what is the, what is the genesis of the song?
IP: Well, I knew that Free to Fly was going to put together a safe house for you that’s going to be opening very soon.
And so for me, I wanted to write a song from that perspective that has a message of hope, healing, resilience and restoration.
And I needed a title and the title is Free to Fly.
It was a no brainer and I just said I’ll write the lyrics around that title.
And I had a guitar in my living room after that.
We did our pod.
My wife and I did our podcast with the organisation and as far back as two and a half, three years ago, I was strumming out chords and the song evolved as, as it got closer to this year, this summer, I would go up to the studio.
There’s a studio up the street, 15 minute walk from my house.
And I would just work on different parts.
And then I spent time finding appropriate video clips.
But I sent lyrics to Salome to let her know, here’s what I’m looking at and here’s how I want this to evolve.
This is my vision.
PS: Yeah.
And Tracy, I mean, people don’t get to really understand the behind the scenes of songwriting, you know.
What, what, what did you have to do to prepare yourself, you know, for specifically the song?
TM: Well, once Ian gave me the demo of the song that he wrote and how he, what his vision was and how he wanted it to go, basically I just listened to it all day, everyday, I listened to it over and over again until it became a part of me so that I could do the best performance I possible could for it.
PS: Yeah. and Ian, what is it about the lyrics, what inspired you to really come up with such a song?
IP The lyrics were inspired by my work that I had done with victims of human trafficking and was doing.
And I kind of wrote the lyrics from a first person perspective in this, from somebody that’s come out of that life and for the first time is starting to have joy and seen hope and possibilities.
But there’s a line in that song where the singer says, I never thought I could feel this way.
That lyric was based on an actual session that I had with a client many years ago who had come from a home of horrific childhood abuse and for the first time in her life was feeling joy and happiness.
And she said to me in the session, she said, you know, I never thought I could feel this way.
And I liked it.
I stayed with me all those years.
Somebody else, another client, said something similar within a year of that.
And so that’s a direct quote from a victim of a childhood abuse.
And so in the lyrics I call back to that.
It calls back to that again and again, that line and I try to use images o faith and hope and keep it upbeat and keep it positive.
PS: Well, I think as you speak, I’m having this image.
I don’t know if you have seen this visually or I think it was a tattoo or something like that.
And I saw like a little, little cage of a bird flying out.
So that’s the image that I’m getting as he’s speaking.
It’s like this bird getting out of the cage and experiencing a sense of freedom.
So, so I really hope that as people listen to the song, they will be, you know, experience the emotions of, you know, because one of the things that I don’t like in, in the, in, in this sector of working with victims of human trafficking is that sometimes we can keep them victims.
And, and one of the things that I like about the song is that it frees people not to be defined by their circumstances.
So that’s why I think I appreciate the song, that it does not victimatize people.
It basically turns people into heroes who have been marginalised before.
So it’s beautiful.
I really enjoy it.
I’m gonna go back to you, Tracy.
What was your experience?
Because sometimes when we’re doing songs like this, something internally happens inside of us.
So what was your experience, or healing moments as you are recording the song?
TM: Oh, that’s a really good question.
I have never had a personal experience with, you know, being trafficked, and I don’t personally know anybody who has been.
I know Ian and through his personal story, that’s kind of where I had to dig from.
I mean, in my personal life, I have been sexually abused as a child, but it.
It was.
I’m sure my experience was different than anybody else’s, but through Ian’s story and with his daughter and the things he told me, that’s where I had to kind of visit and dig from there to be able to get to those emotions.
PS: Wow.
Thank you for sharing that so vulnerably.
I really, really, really appreciate it because I think one of the things that we’re trying to do through this, you know, podcast is to help people connect, you know, and for you to share that, I have to say, lots of respect for you and thank you for connecting with this song in that level because, you know, directly or indirectly, we’re all impacted by human trafficking and some.
Sometimes we gotta find a chapter in our book that helps us, you know.
You know, you know, relate.
So I can.
I can literally see your heart in this.
And I just want to say thank you so much.
I’m gonna go back to the clips on the music video.
What kind of message, Ian, are you trying to.
To give out there to.
To either people who are victims or perpetrators or like, normal people like myself, Phineas, who probably are very naive or not clued.
Clued at, you know, what human trafficking is and what it’s all about?
What message are you trying to portray through the music video and the song?
IP: One of the messages I wanted to portray, it was very important that the song not have a sad, slow tone to it.
I didn’t want to put any image in imagery in there of kids in cages or bound up or anything like that.
It was a message of, you’ve got out of the life and now there’s hope and possibility and resilience.
And I made sure it was very important to me that the video was a depiction that this is a South African organisation.
From the very opening information that comes up to the South African flag to the clip of clouds coming over Table Mountain.
And I tried to use clips that were very generic.
They did.
PS: Yeah.
IP: They look like they could fit South Africa.
I didn’t want it to be connected to the United States or any other country.
I wanted it to.
To stand on its own.
And all the women in these clips and little girls there, it was consistently they’re triumphant and standing and spreading their wings and.
And all these various scenarios. There was a clip, there was a woman climbing up the side of a mountain and my favourite clip in there is a young girl is looking in a mirror.
And the line in the song is mirror, mirror on the wall.
It’s a reference to Snow White.
And instead of saying who’s the fairest of them all the line is mirror, mirror on the wall I’m standing strong I’m standing tall and we have a wonderful clip of a young woman who’s looking into the mirror content and satisfied and then I included butterflies during the guitar soul because they were just symbolic of free to fly and transformation and I really liked the clip I was able to get for that because it’s a solo so there’s no words but to re reinforce this theme and the symbolism.
PS: Wow. I appreciate that because again you.
I’m a very visual person so so it’s funny that I haven’t seen the music video but as you speak I’m trying to visualise it in my head and one of the things that came out is basically a caterpillar becoming a butterfly and that sense of freedom but also free to fly creating a safe environment for this caterpillar to become a butterfly because what I realised with the people that we work with, you know, some.
Some of them, we find them as caterpillars, you know, cocooned, and it is our responsibility to unleash the best out of them, because you can think they are a caterpillar, but they actually are butterfly.
So I.
I hope and pray that this, you know, song will basically help the victim see that, hey, I’m more than what happened to me.
I am not a caterpillar I’m a butterfly, you know, and that’s the sense that I’m getting out of the song, you know, even without watching the visuals yet.
But I’m super excited to watch that and I hope the listeners and people going to be watching it, they will be able to see themselves in it or even, you know, even you know, their loved ones or people from afar who are facing human trafficking.
Tracy, I’m gonna go back to you.
In the completion of this project and this music video, what are some thoughts and feelings that you got out of it?
You know, just going through the whole process and seeing the final product of the music video.
TM: Once I saw the video and the song put together, it was.
It was absolutely amazing, you know, and I was really proud of being a part of it.
And like I said, I think it was better than the first one we did.
You know, it was definitely the best one yet.
Not only with the message and, you know, the words, but when we were working in the studio, there was that.
That mirror, mirror line that Ian was talking about.
That was the hardest part for us to get, especially for me, vocally.
That was the hardest part for us to get right?
And, boy, it’s the best part of the song.
PS: Oh, man.
You know, so.
So, Tracy, let me stick with you a little bit here.
What is your hope?
What do you hope that people get to experience?
TM: Well, I think you said it best that what happened to these people, it’s not what defines them.
So I hope that.
That they get the message that this.
This is something that happened to them.
It’s not who they are.
And with the safe houses that are being opened and.
And all the resources available, they can heal.
PS: Yeah.
Thank you so much.
I wish I could give you a hug right now, but I’m too far too.
TM: Virtual Hug.
PS: Yeah, exactly.
Again, I’m gonna.
I’m gonna, I’m gonna go back to you as as as as we close.
You know know I think same question.
You’re heart behind it.
I get it you know but, but but how, how do you want people to be able to connect with the song and the music video?
IP: I think Tracy articulated it very well that your personal identity, your sense of self worth and self esteem cannot be tied in to the negative things that happen to you that they don’t define you and when we were in the studio that’s where this project really becomes became fun for me because the song, you’re building the song we had a really good sound engineer that pushed me to do take after take after take and the vocal chorus thing we that Tracy did at the end of the song on the Outro was phenomenal but it’s meant to be positive upbeat it does have some faith based lyrics and references in there to again uplift people.
And I just love doing music.
And as I said earlier, in the podcast, when I first did our personal story I felt this incredible overwhelming sense of inspiration and influence that I needed to do this video I had, and it’s been nagging me for years and to finally finish it.
And again, Tracy and I’ve recorded in the studio before, but she comes to life in the studio.
We all get excited as the tracks are laid down.
So it was very.
Was a very positive energy there.
But we want to translate that energy and message to survivors and that they’re survivors, that they move from the status of being victim to a survivor and that especially with the safe house these are going to be teen girls they have a whole future ahead of them. Their life is ahead of them, there are possibilities they can heal, they can do restoration. I work with victims of trauma professionally, as part of my job, and that’s why I do this.
It’s to see the end result and that somebody’s healed and come out of that life. The message to the. I don’t know that I have a message to the perpetrators in the song. I read a different video for that one.
I don’t know how appropriate it would be, but I.
Yeah.
Leave the children alone is what I want to say there.
PS: Yeah.
Let my people go.
IP: Yeah.
Yes.
PS: It’s going to be like Moses every now and then.
And let’s say, let my people go.
Let my children go.
Tracy, any message from you?
TM: Enjoy the video.
I think it’s fantastic.
And like I said, get the message that there are possibilities that you are able to heal, you know, and this is not who you are.
It’s just something that happened to you.
But, you know, you got a bright future.
PS:
Listen, you’re both the best.
I wish I could hang out with you guys.
This was very emotional, very touching, very inspirational.
I want to say thank you so much for using your gift to advocate for honourable young men and young women all over the world who are trafficked, who are exploited, who need a sound of freedom, who need a sound of hope.
And I think you guys are able to provide that.
You know, and.
And the fact that that is attached to your stories, and this is personal.
It is moving, it’s encouraging.
But I just want to say, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for making the time and for creating something so beautiful that it’s gonna last for generations to come.
So thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.
In my culture, in, Sotho they say, kialevoha, you know?
So thank you so much for making the time to be with us.
IP: My pleasure.
And I hope to be over to Cape Town next year’s tentative plan.
PS: Yeah, Yeah.
I would like to see you guys come here, perform it live.
How about that?
Let’s go.
TM: Well, you buy, I fly.
IP: We’re looking at a mission.
My wife and I are looking up and also trying to set up a mission trip.
So that’s what we’re hoping to come over.
PS: No, definitely.
When you guys come around, let’s.
Let’s hang out, because I would like to.
IP: Oh, yeah.
PS: You never know.
We may have to translate the song in different languages, so.
Tracy, be ready.
TM: Like I said, you buy, I fly.
PS: Yeah.
Anyway, thank you so much.
I really appreciate it.
Ladies and gentlemen, [Phinius Sebatsane] thank you for listening to Free to Fly podcast.
As I told you, this is where we educate.
This is where we come together, you know, to fight against human trafficking, to make sure that the people that we work with just to feel safe and they become, you know, people that God created them to be.
As you listen to this, you know, amazing people, please do listen to the song, give us feedback on what you think about it.
But I pray and hope that it will bring a sense of freedom to you, a sense of hope, and also you will engage and make sure that you play your big or little role in making sure that those who work with people who are trafficked get the support that they need in order for us to live in a world that is full of, you know, that is just.
That is full of freedom.
And that’s our hope, that we educate one another.
We journey together.
So thank you so much for tuning in.
Thank you so much for listening.
Trace and Ian hope to see you in South Africa, but, yeah, thank you so much for listening.
Take care.
IP: All right, bye bye now.
TM: Thanks for having us.
[Free to Fly song is played]
ENDING
Dear friends and key stakeholders, thank you for joining us on today’s podcast.
Our aim and heart for these podcasts is to raise awareness about human trafficking and to highlight the atrocity this crime is to humanity.
A reminder that human trafficking is a multi billion dollar industry which is sadly the fastest growing worldwide and second biggest crime after drugs.
It is far more organised than many care to believe.
We invite you to join hands in fighting against human trafficking.
Follow us on our social media pages freetofly.org.za on Instagram and on Facebook freefly.org.za.
Do check out our website at www.freetofly.org.za to sign up to be a volunteer or donate towards the building and running of our safe house for children who have come out of human trafficking.
For those of you who do not know, Free to Fly is an organisation that is currently starting up the first safe house in South Africa for children who have been rescued from human trafficking. our heart is to run a holistic trauma informed, survivor informed programme that will facilitate this journey of healing.
Please follow our journey on our website till next time.
Take care and be sure to share and listen out for the next podcast.
Thanks friends.
Free to Fly can’t be held liable about the content of our podcast guests.
