Kāpiti College student Mya Jeram was one of the finalists in the Youthtown Songwriting Competition Aotearoa 2022.

A lot of Year 9, 10, 11 songwriters entered their songs before finalists were chosen to have their song professionally recorded for the Youthtown Songwriting Competition album.

Mya's song was called This Ship.

"I wrote it on my bedroom floor, when I was 14 years old, for fun, after thinking about the Titanic story.

"I thought it would be interesting to see how it would sound if made my own attempt at telling the story.

"The idea to enter the song in a competition was actually suggested to me a year after I wrote the song.

"My friend had heard about the competition, which is annually hosted by the foundation Play It Strange.

"She'd read a few songs I'd written previously, so she thought it would be cool if I submitted something.

"However, I literally had about three days before the competition's final submission date, so I just sort of fished through my notebooks and looked for a song that could become something great if I got the opportunity to work in a studio."

Mya, 15, from Raumati Beach, recorded the song at the Armoury Recording Studio in Wellington with owner and audio engineer Troy Kelly, who has worked with major Kiwi musicians like Kimbra and Drax Project.

"He also taught me a lot about what goes into constructing a song, and how many little details contribute to the track as a whole or change how different components are able to change what vibe a song can give you.

"Troy had listened to the audio of my song that I recorded on my phone for the competition, and he prepared some beat combinations before I arrived that morning.

"Then we pretty much used the beat that fitted [sic] the best, and Troy added different musical components and chords to make it feel like a real song.

"We altered a couple [of] lyrics to make the song flow a little better, and then I went into the recording booth and worked on the vocals, which Troy later put to the track.

"When I wrote the songs I initially wanted someone else to sing, but Troy taught me how to do some cool things with the vocals to give the song a particular energy, and the end result was really great."

Mya, who was in the studio for about six hours, said it was "really awesome" seeing the music for her own song being built from the ground up.

"I will never listen to music the same way.

"So much work gets put into the music when you're in the studio, which is amazing, and I can't even comprehend the fact I have my own song that's been able to evolve from some acoustic jingle I wrote in the middle of the night."

Mya said she enjoyed any creative outlet but had always had a passion for writing.

"I guess I just love the creative process.

"I wrote my first formatted song when I was 10 years old, but I've been creating little random stories in the form of music since I was little.

"I love that writing music is a way to make anything I learn about, whether it's about myself or something totally random, sound interesting, and the fact that songwriting has the ability to make you feel something despite the fact it can be as simple as a few rhymes played to a beat."

- David Haxton, NZ Herald