You can now hear a fantastic new song called ‘Tears of the Cryosphere’ written by members of our Sing It Out and Vocal Lab group with our music leaders during the summer term. The song was commissioned by Lancaster University for the Three Degrees Festival 2026 and was inspired by the research of academic Diego Moral Pombo about the effect and impacts of climate change on glaciers worldwide. It was recorded by Sing It Out and Vocal Lab with Bay Youth Voices and performed live at the festival on 27 June 2026.

The song has been combined with video of footage and images from research trips to Antartica by Diego’s colleague Katie Miles.  The video also features statements written by Diego which further communicate the messages and findings of his research.

The cryosphere is the frozen part of the world – its glaciers and ice sheets, snow, permafrost, sea ice, lake ice and river ice.

The song was written in response to a session visit by academic Diego Moral Pombo from the university’s Polar and Alpine Science group, where he discussed his work with the young people which then inspired the song’s creation. The young people were able to ask Diego questions about his research and he was able to provide insight which helped inform the lyrics they were writing.

Diego’s research consists of finding lakes beneath the Greenland Ice Sheet using satellite elevation data. By measuring changes in surface elevation, lakes that fill and drain beneath the massive ice sheet covering the island can be detected by satellites orbiting Earth. As the climate gets warmer, the increase in meltwater in the polar regions makes these lakes more active. The liquid water they store also lubricates the interface between the ice and the bedrock, speeding the former toward the coast and accelerating ice loss, thereby contributing to sea level rise.

Diego Moral Pombo is a Senior Research Associate in Ice Sheet Geodesy at Lancaster University. He joined the Polar and Alpine Science research group in 2024 after completing his PhD in Space Physics, also at Lancaster, where he analysed ultraviolet auroras on Jupiter using data from the Hubble Space Telescope.

LYRICS

Intro:

Life Brings us Hope
Life Brings us Home

Rap:

Glaciers melting as it gets warm
Crumbling down losing its form
Look at the snowflakes as they swarm
In the winter no Greenland dawn
The cryosphere shrinking the ice
We can fix it or roll the dice
killing the Earth as the price
In your bubble…..  its a fool’s paradise x2

Verse 1:

This might make you homesick
As your home may be gone
Global warming, defrosting
Lost generations
More or less, life is best
Don’t bury our heads

Chorus:

Tears of the Cryosphere
Don’t you cry, dry your eyes

Verse 2:

The dawn of our actions
The truth comes at last
Drowning in distractions
A landslide moment
Climate refugees
No-one is at ease

Song recorded and produced by Ash Murphy and Charlie Brown.
Written by young people from Vocal Lab and Sing It Out with More Music music leaders Ash Murphy, Bryony Jarman Pinto, Charlie Brown, Maxine Draycott and Becca Kenyon.

With thanks to Jess Shaw, Public Engagement Manager at Lancaster University, for commissioning and supporting this project.