From Chemotherapy to the Recording Studio: Christopher Fleming Turned to Music While Fighting Cancer

Television personality uses music to help beat cancer

CHICAGO, IL, UNITED STATES, September 1, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ — For Christopher Fleming, music became far more than a creative project. It became something to focus on while facing one of the most difficult periods of his life.

In 2024, Fleming was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia, AML, an aggressive blood cancer. His life quickly changed from television appearances, paranormal investigations, speaking engagements and travel to extended hospital stays, chemotherapy treatments, blood tests and uncertainty about the future. He was told they had to stop the spread or in 2 weeks it would spread to 100%. Even if they could stop the spread, he may have 2-6 months at most.

But inside his hospital room at Northwestern Medicine, Fleming began creating.

“I had a tremendous amount of time sitting in a hospital room receiving chemotherapy,” Fleming said. “I couldn’t go out and do the things I normally did, I had no immunse system, so I started writing. I didn’t want to watch TV or allow myself to get depressed. So I wrote lyrics, developed song ideas and began turning things I had experienced throughout my life into music.”

His laptop became part of his daily routine.

“I didn’t want cancer occupying every minute of my mind,” Fleming said. “There were things happening to my body that I couldn’t control. Yes, it was horrible. But I could still think and create. I could write a lyric. I could work on a song. I could take an experience from 20 or 30 years ago and finally tell that story through music.”

Chemotherapy brought exhaustion and difficult physical and emotional periods, but Fleming continued working whenever he was able. Songwriting gave him something
beyond the next blood draw, treatment or medical result to think about.

“It gave me a reason to look forward,” he said. “I could think about finishing a song and imagine eventually getting out of that hospital and doing something with all of it. I had to believe there was a purpose.”

Turning survival and his paranormal experiences Into Music

Fleming has spent decades investigating paranormal phenomena and exploring questions involving ghosts, consciousness and the proof of life after death.

While undergoing treatment, he began revisiting encounters and experiences from throughout his life. Many became inspiration for songs.

The music helped him, Fleming miraculously beat cancer and that creative determination eventually developed into 515 Collective, a musical project combining storytelling, blues, rock and other musical influences with subjects rarely explored together in music.

One of the results was Fleming’s debut album, BOOGIE MAN BLUES, a 21-track collection inspired by paranormal encounters, ghosts, spiritual experiences and questions surrounding the afterlife.

For Fleming, however, the album represents something else.

It represents he refused to surrender to cancer.

Creativity During Cancer Treatment
Fleming is careful not to suggest that music treated his leukemia. His cancer was treated medically through an intensive chemotherapy program. But he believes all the prayers and his creative positive mindset played an important role in helping him mentally and emotionally endure the experience.

“When you’re seriously ill, people naturally focus on your disease,” Fleming said. “Everything becomes blood counts, medications, tests and procedures. That’s understandable. But you’re still a person underneath all of that.”

Creating music allowed Fleming to maintain that part of himself.

“Cancer was something happening to me. I didn’t want it to become everything that I was. So when people would feel sorry for me, I would say, why? I am blessed. I can handle it. When things are tough… make art, make music!”

The hospital also provided something Fleming rarely had before his diagnosis: time.

“I had nowhere to go,” Fleming said. “So instead of saying, ‘Someday I’m going to write that song,’ I started writing it. My cat died while in the hosptial in the first week.

Devastated, I turned it immediately into a loving song. The pain, grief, had somewhere to go.”

He didn’t stop there. Songs accumulated. Ideas expanded. Fleming continued developing the music during his recovery and eventually formed Soul Man Music Group LLC to release and develop his own projects.

Turning a Difficult Chapter Into Something Creative
Fleming hopes his experience encourages other people facing cancer, chronic illness or major personal setbacks to find something meaningful to focus on alongside their medical care.

It doesn’t have to be music. Do something, anything creative! Make something!

It could be painting, writing, photography, learning an instrument, recording family stories or finally beginning something that has been postponed for years.

“You don’t have to create an album,” Fleming said. “The point is to find something that reminds you that your life is still yours. Even when your circumstances become incredibly difficult, there may still be something you can make, learn, share or give to somebody else.”

Today, the songs Fleming began developing during one of the darkest periods of his life exist outside that hospital room.

“When I look at the finished album, I know where a lot of those ideas were born,” Fleming said. “Some came from a hospital room while chemotherapy was going into my body, while others while I was on my couch recovering at home. That’s something I’ll never forget.”

“Cancer took a lot of time from my life, and the recovery does as well. But I decided I was going to create something with this time. Never ever give up, always turn it into something!”

About Christopher Fleming
Christopher Fleming is a spiritual counselor, artist, speaker, television personality, podcast host and now a song writer and music producer whose work exploring paranormal phenomena and consciousness spans decades. His television appearances include Ghost Adventures, Ghost Hunters, Portals to Hell, Psychic Kids, Dead Famous, Help! My House Is Haunted, Spooked Scotland and Haunted Ireland. He is also the son of the late NHL star Reggie Fleming.

Fleming is the creator behind 515 Collective and founder of Soul Man Music Group LLC. His debut album, Boogie Man Blues, is available on Amazon, Ebay, Apple Music and Spotify.

Media Contact:
Christopher Fleming
Soul Man Music Group LLC / 515 Collective
ChristopherFleming.com

Chris Fleming
Soul Man Music Group LLC
email us here

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Written By: EIN Presswire