WATCHING heartbreaking stories on televised charity appeals inspired a Darwen youngster to pen a touching tune that has already been dubbed “the next Band Aid song”.

Christina Aspden-Serrao, a pupil at St Stephen’s Tockholes CE Primary School, reached the Song Academy Young Writers final, where she sang in front of the people behind some of the biggest names in showbiz.

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The nine-year-old’s Why Can’t The World Be Friends, beat 750 others to make the seven-12-year-old age group final.

She was moved to pen the words and music after watching television and the lyrics to the chorus ask: “Why can’t the troubles ever end? I want peace, and laughter, and happily ever after. Oh, why can’t the world be friends?”

She told the judges: “The reason I wrote about the world being friends is because I watch Comic Relief and Children in Need and see all the children in poverty and dying.

“You can see on the news loads of fighting and I think, ‘why can’t the world live in peace?’”

The judges included Eg White, a Grammy award-winning songwriter and producer known for his work with successful commercial pop acts such as Adele and Florence and the Machine, and Brit nominee Tom Odell.

And Rowena Atkins, founder and manager of Song Academy, revealed one of the judges described Christina’s performance as uplifting and amazing.

She added: “That’s the next Band Aid song sorted. I’ll call Bob!”

Christina takes her inspiration from her mum Patricia, who is a music teacher at her school.

Now Christina, who goes to what is the smallest school in the Blackburn with Darwen authority area, will perform at one of the country’s biggest shopping malls in West London.

She will sing at the showcase event at Westfield, Shepherds Bush on Sunday, June 21.

It is being billed as the chance to listen to the next generation of songwriters “before they are famous”.