At the centre of this final chapter is The Song We Carry, directed and produced by Emmy Award-winning filmmaker and National Geographic Explorer Tamana Ayazi.
The film follows the Without Borders Youth Band, a group of young musicians from across the globe who now call Manchester home. Filmed between early 2025 and early 2026, it captures rehearsals, interviews and everyday moments with Nour, a 19-year-old Syrian-Iranian singer, her younger brother Sina on Darabuka and Tombak, Kurdish singer Callie, Ukrainian guitarist Nazar, and Congolese drummer Pat.
The Song We Carry documents the creation of an original song; a collaborative work weaving together the performers’ individual and shared migration stories into something collective and deeply moving. It is a film about what people carry when they leave: their music, their memories, their identity. And about what they build when they arrive.
Tamana Ayazi said: “I was drawn to the Without Borders Youth Band because of the honesty and openness the young people brought to their music. Each of them carries a unique story, but through collaboration they created something collective and deeply moving. This film is about resilience, identity and the universal language of music that connects us all.”
At a moment when refugees and migrants face deepening hostility in the UK, across Europe, the US, and beyond, and when the wars and inequality driving displacement show no signs of ending, The Song We Carry cuts through the noise: faces, voices, stories and music. It asks audiences to sit with five young human beings and listen.
This film is a document of our times, made with and for the people at the centre of one of the defining issues of this era.
