TORONTO — Grace Turner stood at the top of a grassy park slope with a megaphone in her hand.
"This turnout is insane," she said.
Hundreds were gathered at Trinity Bellwoods Park in Toronto's west end, and it was almost time for the moment they were all eagerly waiting for.
The moment when they would get to scream their lungs out.
The scene resembled an outdoor concert, but Turner, an artist behind the solo music project City Builders, wasn't there to sing. She was the ringleader for a very different sort of performance.
"We're all going through our personal struggles right now," she told the diverse crowd.
They showed up after RSVPing to a free "group scream" event online, a way to come together and let out all their heartbreak, anger and frustration.
"Clearly, it's needed," Turner told them. "We are not alone. And we're just one big community. So make sure to make some friends today."
She kicked off a countdown before the first collective scream was to begin, around 6:30 p.m. on a spring Saturday.
The crowd yelled it out with her: "Three ... two ... one!" And then: pure human noise.
That emotional release was supposed to happen just once. But the crowd started chanting "one more scream" almost right away. Nearly half an hour of intermittent shouting, laughs and loud cheers followed.
Some posed for photos with a "Group Scream!" sign. Others took selfies with new friends. A few passed around ice creams to help the screamers cool down.
Participants described it as "cathartic" and a "state of euphoria."
Everyone had a story to tell and a reason to be there – breakups, unemployment, work stress, chaos happening around the world, and what felt like an especially long winter.
Anastasia Bondarenko graduated from university recently and said she is worried about what might come next for her as she searches for a job.
"I am terrified, and it's like stepping into the unknown," she said.
It's rare to get to attend a free group event in Toronto, she added. "And the fact that like we're all here for one singular reason, which is a ridiculous reason, but very much needed."
Hailey Roden said she lost her job two months ago and she joined the group to get a heavy feeling of frustration out of her chest.
She said being unemployed during a cost-of-living crisis when inflation has brought up prices is a tough challenge to navigate alone.
"It's been a lot of no's, which has been discouraging," she said.
But meeting other people in a similar situation at the event helped lift her spirits, she said, and after a few rounds of screaming she felt "amazing."
"I can relate to a lot of people here," she said. "I was not expecting like a state of euphoria ... and just feeling a really beautiful sense of community."
Participants wrote down why they wanted to scream on stickers and stuck them on their chests. Roden's short message: "Life is hard."
For Turner, the idea to gather people together came from a deeply personal place.
In the lead-up to the event, she described experiencing heartbreak for the first time when she and her ex-boyfriend and band partner broke up around five months ago.
"We broke up, and the band broke up, and I felt like my world was ending because what I love to do the most and the person that I loved the most were gone," she said in an interview.
Some of that emotion went into her first solo song, released on Tuesday. But some of it felt like it needed to come out in another way.
For the first month, all she wanted to do was to scream, Turner said – but there was nowhere to do it. Her apartment didn't seem like a good idea.
Turner said she never expected hundreds of people would sign up to join her for such a public display, or that people in other communities would be reaching out and asking her to lead similar events.
"Seems like something the city really needed," she said.
There's some science to back up the idea that so-called scream therapy can be a tool to improve mental health.
"There is some suggestion that it helps release emotions, and it helps release pent up frustration and energy," said Lynda Mainwaring, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Toronto.
She said while screaming is a complex phenomenon, research shows it increases the flow of oxygen to the brain and subsequently improves blood circulation, which could help reduce stress and anxiety.
The sense of safety and connection that comes from group activities where like-minded people have a shared purpose can release "feel-good hormones," she added.
Saturday's group screaming could also help participants find relief because they believed shouting would help, she said.
"And beliefs are extremely powerful," Mainwaring said. "If you believe that something's gonna happen, something's going to help you, then you probably are gonna get benefit from it."
It wasn't lost on the crowd of loud Torontonians that current events have added collective stress.
One of the most motivated participants was Rebecca Reid, who works for Elections Canada and said she had a busy schedule during the recent federal election.
Less than a week after election day, she said she thought being part of the group scream would be just the thing to get it all out of her system.
"Everyone needs to let out some tension," she said. "And this is like the coolest possible, most Toronto possible way to do so."
This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 6, 2025.
Sharif Hassan, The Canadian Press
