Priorities

There's something I learned a few years ago, like five or six years ago: set your priorities.

But what are these priorites? How can you decide what's the most important for you at the moment you set them? This morning I've found the ever first interview I gave in my life from 2014, the year when I graduated from my MA studies. At that time artistic development was all I cared for and I was sure that the rest will come by itself. I wanted to develop artistically by growing as a person, figuring out who I really am - just like every young adult does in their 20s.

I remember back then I wanted to make it as a performing artist, a singer, I wanted to be a bright hot star, but not for myself but for others to recongnize my talent, and maybe I wanted badly to grab someone's attention - like it would mattered if that person recognizes my talent. Today I know that my talent is just one little detail of the person who I am. I don't need anyone's recognition anymore. I am fully capable woman, standing on my own, just like I've always been. Ever since I don't care about success, fame, wealth or being able to make a living out of singing and music, I am free. Not caring about these earthly treasures liberated me completely, and now I have time for more valuable priorities, such as family, friends, my garden and above all these: myself.

I look back of my reckless 20s with nostalgy and with a little laughter. It's not that I don't want to face beautiful musical challanges anymore, but I changed my mentality about it. I try to choose my battles and challanges carefully in such way that I am aware that I am the one who takes care of the firm emotional background, I am the one who takes care of Johanna Földesi, and not someone else. I'm almost sure that even if I would be in a relationship, I would still be the only one who would be responsible for this task and I would only have a tiny support and space given to be able to do so. Actually I was a little kid when I had the very strong feeling that I would have to learn to be able to be alone and to be a good companion for my very self. This childhood memories follows me on my path every day, and sometimes life just gets overwhelming and too much - at times like this I just stop, take a good look at myself and I decide whether I could use some help or not.
It doesn't sound too flattering, right? Don't worry, it's not as bad as it might sound like.

But back to priorities! Here are some top priorities of the 33 years old Johanna Földesi.

Quality above quantitiy
I remember when I was in my 20s I could do a thousand stuff in a day and now I am happy if from the 6 tasks I planned for a day I can do the half of it, but then I do them right. It gives me now more satisfaction than the amount of tasks I complete per day.

Reputation
You know, as you age, it's all about dignity. There are certain things I would do at the age of 33 years, what I would have definitly had done when I was 23. Fame and wealth can shine so bright that you don't see the dirt and the wrong under it. You're blinded by their illusion.
Once you get to a certain age, and you don't have to be 50+ to be an example for the younger generation, to become an influence for a youngster. I believe that as an artist you're responsible for those who look up to you and your work and your morals should show that. So stop messing around and grow up! Act like an adult person, even if it seems hard. You can be a kid again when you perform, but accepting adulthood will only help you to develop further as a human being.

Family and friends
Not blindfoldedly and not putting them before yourself, but they are top priority. And sometimes you have friends who make up for some family members - no offense, really. Of course, in the end you're the one that's responsible for yourself, but you also need some support from your family and friends, and sometimes you have to be their support. Whatever happens, just do your best to be there for them: check on them, ask them how they are doing and ask it in such way that you're truly interested in their answer - you know what I'm talking about!

Be lazy sometimes
I have a very dear old friend in Vienna. This friend of mine a bit older than 80, but just as fresh as any young adult. Every once in a while I go and visit her in Vienna and then we talk about what has happened to us since we saw each other for the last time. Even though I spin around much less than I used to, I still do a lot of things and most of the times these "lot of things" happen in paralel with eachother. So there was me telling my friend how many things I am involved with, what amazing projects, and my job, and so on, to which she just told me: but are you also lazy sometimes? I just laughed and said that yes, every once in a while I just do nothing - although at that time I wasn't living up to it that much as I do now.
What I want to say is that you should be lazy sometimes. Just do nothing and enjoy it. And when I say "nothing" I mean literally nothing. Before I fully embraced the dolce far niente (= pleasant idleness) I seriously started to wonder about why am I so busy all the time? Am I busy because I'm really busy and things must get done, or because I think they must get done. Huge difference. Also, are these things coming from my side or is it something that necessary for the everyday life? I came to the conclusion that there are very few obligations in our lives that really are obligations, therefore I decided to be more relaxed about it, and one of the consequences of this decision was that my body let go of a lot of tension and I changed as a singer.
My way of thinking also have changed. For example if someone tells me that I should go to an audition of a talent show, because I'm told that I'm talented and it looks good on my CV and it would get me good connections, doesn't mean that I really should do that. It's rather that I have the freedom to choose to do the audition and even if I choose not to do it, I'm still the same talented singer I've always been.

Settle down
There comes a moment in life when you get more mature and you are not as bouncy-bouncy as you were when you were much younger. There comes a time in your life when you just want to have something to rely on and you just want to have a quite life with working in your garden, taking long walks in a forest and enjoying a glass of wine and cooking together with a good friend on a Friday evening. You start to feel that you need a safe harbour where you can return to for recovery and rejuvination.


It's funny how priorities change in just 5-6 years time. Of course, not everyone's priorities change this early as mine did, and that's also perfectly fine. I think, standing alone throughout my entire life anticipated this change. I had more time to figure things out for myself. I wouldn't call myself wise, I'm improvising through my entire life and there are just a few things I'm sure about, and those are my priorities. And the best thing about it, that your priorities will change as your life changes. Or at least that's how I survive, I believe...

Listen! (Part 1)

I would like to dedicate a few entries to the ears. Ever since I've been busy with digging myself into Lajos Szamosi's Path to Free Singing, I am more and more interested in this curious body part, the ears and especially the process of listening. As a musician and as a singer of course you listen differently and you listen more carefully than anyone else. Before I've got to know the Szamosi Approach I was convinced that there are people who have ears for music and there are those who just simply don't have any musical hearing. There is a difference, of course, but there is nothing to do with the body part itself, it has rather a lot to do with how we use our ears, and what we are used to. Moreover, the ability of listening and our ears can be trained, although you have to be aware that the thin line that seperates professionals from amateurs, in the aspect of listening(!!), is actually very much based on your sensbility, if you dare to feel. We are not the same, not in body and certainly not in personality, and each of us have our own farthest limitations, but whether someone becomes a professional musician and/or singer or not, in the end the success will always depend on one's sensibility, sensitivity and body awareness (this last one can be learned and/or natural).

There are different perspectives of listening, and I would never confuse listening with hearing. Hearing is a passive, while listening is active and supposes that the one who listens also pays attention - hearing not necessarily comes with attention paid. 

I think almost all of us know this quote from The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery (see above), but I'm pretty sure there are just the few among us who actually able to see with their hearts. Actually most of us doesn't even know or can tell how you can see with your heart. Of course, everyone has their interpretation on it, so let me give you mine.

In my opinion, listening is acceptance. It requires an open mind, an open attitude. If someone is truly listening to the other, their heart is open, just as their mind and accepting all the information (emotional, practical, theoretical, etc) that's been said. If listening is acceptance, than it also brings you to let go of the will to control the current situation, and that can be pretty scary. Most of the self-protecting stances begin with cutting the channels to truly listen and the flow of information coming to us. 

Listening is not only essential for musicians and singers, it is very important to every human being. Relationships (any kind of a relationships) are going wrong whenever people stop listening to eachother. You stop listening, because in the process somewhere you got hurt and in order to avoid more wounds and pain, you close yourself - for the sake of survival, purely by instict. And this is where your insticts can bring you to make a wrong decision and instead of releasing the tension, more tension is created. Such a pity. I'm not saying you have to accept everything you listen to. Eventually you'll make a selection (based on different factors) and you'll keep only the most useful information.

When you are seeing with your heart, you listen. You accept what you hear and you pay attention. Without listening, you can only see the surface and that surface is already within the reach of the Eyes. 

As for me, I'm not interested in the surface, I would like to see and feel the depths, the real beauty of existence. The surface will never satisfy me...

An update and random thoughts

Well, long time no see... I haven't been updating my blog for a while and after being asked recently if I'm planning to continue, here you go. Athough I cannot really promise one guiding thought in this entry.

I would like to begin this entry by giving you a little update about what I was doing in the past months. I think I published my last entry sometime around end of March, and ever since I have several things behind my back. Now, as I look back I have a kind of busy period behind me and now that I don't really have any concert booked to give until next year, I am kind of happy. I can use these months (practically from 2nd week of September until the end of the year) for prepare next year's activities with Scherzi Musici and Bartók Rózsái Énekegyüttes, and begin to prepare some more interesting and challenging stuff (don't worry, I'll keep you posted about these new stuff).

Scherzi Musici got the chance to give two fringe concerts at the Utrecht Early Music Festival and we could perform our ars nova programme, Petrarch, a Medieval Poet, and a week after also a long planned and preparred cooperation with Duo Suoni was presented at the season's opening concert of Lidwina in concert  in Best, which was an evening with Italian Early Baroque compositions. Before all these in August we had a fruitful rehearsal and preparation period with Bartók Rózsái Énekegyüttes in Hungary, and we managed to record all the material for a video trailer of our programme - the trailer still needs to be finished, but once it's ready I will post it anywhere I can. Earlier this year we also had a photo shoot, we have programme description ready, so you can say that the portfolio of Bartók Rózsái Énekegyüttes is almost ready.

And recently I've started taking an improv course in Amsterdam at easylaughs, which has seemingly nothing to do with singing, but it does with performing and letting go of control. I have met wonderful people in the past months and I don't think you'll see many similarly emotional posts, like last 4 or 5 entries of this blog, because aside from these music and performing based developments I also took the time to recover and take a closer look at my contant weight-loss. Now that my weight is stabilized along with my thoughts I feel myself strong enough to get on my two beautiful feet and legs and just walk towards my goals.

My goals to be able to let go as much as possible of the control of my intellect, to develop my voice, broaden my repertory, deepen my current knowledge in singing and in music. And just enjoy life while being morally absolutely correct and unquestionable. Because it doesn't matter what the media and everyone else telling you: morals do matter. I won't give any explanation on that, because it is not necessary. Did you do anything in the past that you still regret? Take care of it/them as soon as possible, so you can leave the weary feeling of regret. Take the responsibility for your deeds in the past and vow that you'd never act the same way as you used to if those deeds give you the feeling of regret. Apologize, if you need it and don't hold on to resentment - regardless a few things in life, the choice is always yours: remember, you have the possibility to choose for the good.

At the yoga studio where I go 2 or 3 times a week at least, there are few packs of inspirational and insight cards. Not like I would ever give credit to those, but I liked this one: "Old ways won't open new doors". If I think about it now, I think I've always known this, but reading it on a piece of paper of hearing it aloud reminds me to the truth behind this simple phrase.

And now I am just happy to be alive and  to have no regrets...

The key to inner peace is...

... forgiveness.

For a long time I thought the key to inner peace is to be satisfied with your accomplished goals and being successful, but I had to realise that these things are rather results of the inner peace, than the inner peace itself.

It was about 3 years ago when I went to Finland for the Sastamala Gregoriana masterclass, and my senses awakened (see this entry for more), and that helped me realise how much negativity and resentment I am holding onto instead of letting go of old grudges. Of course, I was shocked seeing how many emotional loose ends I have. The shock was followed by embarrassment and frustration, and then I really decided to take care of my emotional loose ends. One would think these loose ends cannot cause much problems, but the more you have of them, the more they will block your way of getting over old things. And here I would quote here Carrie Fischer again: "... let's say something happens and from a certain slant, maybe it's tragic and even a little bit shocking. And then time passes and you go to the funny slant and now that very same thing can no longer do you any harm."
If you don't go to the "funny slant" as time goes by, and don't understand and accept that tragic and shocking experiences can no longer do you any harm, you'll get stuck in your past.

But how can you actually go to the funny slant? My mother always says: if you cannot laugh about it, you are not over it yet. Even top secret documents have expiration date, not to mention foodstuff. The only thing that certain and eternal in this World is that everything continuously changes. If you prevent this natural flow, there's no way you could come out of it healthy and unhurt.

Even at singing, if you for example grab on your larynx, you'll get eventually vocal problems after a while. The essence of Life is change, therefore for a healthy career you shouldn't be afraid of this natural flow.

How you take care of loose ends? You apply forgiveness. You forgive everyone that has ever intentionally or unintentionally hurt you - including yourself. There's always two sides of the coin and sometimes you just have to accept that whatever happened, it cannot be helped, just forgive without wanting to hear an apology.

I am still working on my loose ends. How about you?

The letting go (Part 2)

I've just read again an earlier entry of mine from this blog, and I've realised that the weather is just the same as about a year ago. It rains a lot and a few weeks ago I could finally let go of something really painful. It was a fear of getting back into a certain situation I had accepted to take for the 'greater good', but it turned out it was only me who hoped for that 'greater good' to come. I could finally make peace with myself, for I have done my best and everything to make that visible and noticed. I'm not saying that I am not hoping still for that 'greater good' to come, but initiating it is not my task anymore. To be honest, I was far from being happy with the situation I was pushed into, and I am glad I don't have to go back in the exact same situation ever again. Well, for the 'greater good' you mustn't be afraid of making certain sacrifices. These sacrifices should always mean giving up yourself a little without hurting or blaming others around you for doing so. 

But back to that earlier entry I've mentioned above. It is funny, how you can learn from your past-self over and over again. It just proves that whenever you get lost and the waves are above your head, remember that the solution always lies within you and only you. Nobody is ever at fault for your problems (in your life, relationships, career, etc.), but you and only you, and for that you'll need to forgive yourself and others for certain things. The origin of true Forgiveness is Love (and this is also the origin of Trust). Love, Trust and Forgiveness are walking hand in hand all the time, and neither of them can exist without the rest. If there's no Love, there's no Forgiveness neither Trust. If there's no Trust, there's no Love neither Forgiveness. And obviously if there's no Forgiveness, there's no Love neither Trust. Holding a grudge against someone will only make your emotional package heavier.

Blaming others (I think I've said this already) for anything that doesn't work in your life is only a projection of your own problems on someone you came across. Blaming others is easy - facing that fact that you were wrong or you've made a bad decision or that you are not perfect is the most confronting thing ever. The solution is of course NOT that you clear out the people you blame from your life, because you cannot do this - accept it. The funny thing is: the more you try to remove them, the more they will remain in your life and thoughts, because a removal like this is always painful for both. The solution (in most cases) is that you have to start cleaning up the mess you've been making so far on your own. Of course you can ask help (a professional's or friends' help) and you should do so, but in the end noone else will clean up your mess for you, and if you keep on running away from cleaning up the mess, you will loose everything that has ever been dear to you one by one. You'll only realize this happening to you when the last one is about to leave your side. The same problems will find you over and over again, unless you finally get your sh*t together.

The grace in all this is that even if that last one left your side, even if you seemingly lost everything that has ever been dear to you, you can still clean everything up and build up everything again - again: you can also ask for and get some help (most probably from those whom you pushed away just earlier or from a professional - I do believe in therapy). There's always hope, remember that.

"This is goodbye." - I am really grateful for these three words you said to me, because they set me free for forever from taking that situation again. It also means that I've topped the bill (paraphrasing from the Queen  lyrics of the song The Show Must Go On - "I'll top the bill, I'll overkill..."), there's a new start, what happened before doesn't have an effect on what's happening next. There were mistakes I've made on the way, I'll atone for them, but whatever happens to you from now on that is really not my fault. Just let it rain, let the rain wash away everything that should be washed away.
Yes, I am still hoping for the 'greater good' to come, and I am looking forward to the initiative - every effort will be rewarded and appreciated.

Wings of an angel

Do you believe in the Angel of Music? Call me sentimental, but there was a time when I believed in it. Or at least I liked the idea, and the image of this angel launched me towards becoming a singer.

I was still attending grammar school and took music lessons at the music school in Békescsaba (piano, choir rehearsals and singing) when I read the The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux (and became a dedicated fan of the musical with the original cast later on as well), and I've got so fascinated by the image of the Angel of Music, and that the Phantom, Erik became this angel for Christine Daaé, that I wanted to meet him as well. My ever first goal that I wanted to achieve was to meet this magic entity somehow. I was amazed of the beautiful lovestory between Erik and Christine (I hated Raoul with a passion for stepping in their way), and I understood Christine's feelings to the utmost. Regardless her fear of Erik's looks, she respected him and loved him in her own gentle way, but she wasn't brave enough to stay by Erik's side - and I didn't like that.

I thought I will be able to find this angel, but instead as soon as I began to be involved with ensemble singing I started to grow my own wings as I was singing with others. Especially when I am singing in a choir and I know I have to pull the people on my part, I imagine that I spread my invisible wings above them and I take them from each phrase to another. I wanted to be able to lead and pull people with my voice and I grew wings to do that, but these wings are not good for flying (unfortunately... I've always wanted to be able to fly - either by having real wings, or without them), but they are good for singing, and that's good enough for me - at least for now...

Am I an angel? I don't think so. Do I behave sometimes as an angel? Maybe. Do I like my wings? If I'm singing or if I would like to protect someone dear to me, I love it. I just have to figure out what to do with those feathers all over around me...

The scary freedom

It doesn't matter how I look at it, most people are afraid of freedom. At first I didn't really understand why, because I was convinced that everybody wants to be free, but I am coming from a post-communist country from the Eastern block of Europe. Though you better know, dear Western people, that neither Poland or my own country, Hungary doesn't like to be considered as being an "Eastern European", we are actually in the middle of Europe, and you know that, but you are too lazy to make a decent distinction. In our ears, being considered to belong to Eastern Europe brings back the memories of belonging to the Soviet Union, and it doesn't matter how exotic you think it was for us, it wasn't that fun. Mainly, because two or three generation grew up in a regime where people were forced to think and act in a certain way, so people were cuirtailed of their personal freedom. They couldn't travel whenever and wherever they wanted to and they were not allowed to say what they think about the regime. For Westerners it is even impossible to imagine what a nightmare of decades they were for the now post-communist countries.

For me it is just amazing to see how people can hold unto captivity, and how they are afraid of reaching out for freedom. I have been thinking about this for a while and now I think I figured what is so scary about freedom for most of us. Being free doesn't only mean that you are doing what you want to do, but that you have to take the responsibility for your words, deeds, decisions, and actually for whatever you are doing. You are basically stand on your own with anything you do and nobody will make decisions for you, neither will take the responsibility for them, and it is a huge risk to take.

And even then, the funniest thing is that everybody was born to be free in any single way. It is just an illusion that you may not have the choice to choose on your own free will. You are free to choose for the good or for the bad. If you are in captivity, you chose to be in captivity - in order to survive, probably... When you realize this, and you try to break free, and you manage to become free, the first period in like a "honeymoon-period", and then for some really weird reason when the "honeymoon-period" is over, and reality snaps you in the face and you have to face the consequences of your own acts, you just would like to go back where you were, because that seems immediately much better than it was back then (your memory sugarcoats the past). Yes, it does take a big courage to take the responsibility and face the consequences. It is not always nice, and you have to face the fact that nobody will make a schedule for you, but you yourself, and if you want to use your time in an effective way, you have to plan smart. It also takes to stick with the people who actually helping you in this and get rid of those who want to tell you what to do - anyway, after you are spending your days in freedom you get annoyed with these kind of people, so in one way or another they will disappear from your daily life. And then you are smiling at the things you don't have to do anymore.

So actually not freedom itself that is scary, but everything that comes with it: the unknown, the challenge and to face your own bad habits every day.

Everything is possible (part 2)

I don't know why's that, but I am fond of paradoxons, just like this motto of mine: Everything is possible.
And now let me explain to you, what this sentence means to me: I believe that everything is possible, that I am able to sing literally anything regardless genre, style, range (obviously within the ambitus of my voice), because from an anatomic point of view, it is possible. Every fear, and limit we draw is actually between our ears, and by that I mean, that if you are open minded enough, there is no such thing as "too low" or "too high", or even "too middle" (some singers are afraid of their middle register - someone has to explain this to me what is the reason behind that).

If you think about it, singing is just muscle work and like every muscle, you can train these muscles, and if it is muscle work, you can think about singing also as a vocal work-out. The more muscle mass you have, the stronger your voice get. On the other hand, by remaining open-minded in every situation results a better access to the resonance, and also the "hidden reserves" of your instrument.

This kind of mindset also requires daring to take risks. Take the risk of failure, because if everything is possible, it is possible that it is impossible.

It is a little bit like Schrödinger's cat, which is just as alive as it is dead in that box, but you will never find out the truth unless you open the box. After all, what can you possibly loose? Will you die or will it do any harm to you if you fail at something in singing? I have never seen a singer making a mistake while making music and got hit by lightning (yes, I am exaggerating it, and I am doing it on purpose).
Of course we would like to choose for the safest and easiest solutions (except for me: there's nothing exciting and challenging about safe and easy...), because we are aftraid of getting hurt in any way, and we were taught to be careful in any circumstances (when we cross the road, ride the bike, etc.). But don't tell me, you have never enjoyed the divine mix of excitement and fear, which causes an adrenalin-rush in your body... It is just fun... So why not taking the risk and saying: everything is possible?

Interestingly enough, all those phrases that leaves a singer's lips regarding range, style and genre, those phrases are rather reflecting on their own fears. When they say - for example - "I'm a soprano, and singing below C' is too low for me", that is not showing something that this particular singer capable of, but her decision that she doesn't want to sing below C' (sad, but true, and truth can be pretty ugly sometimes). Therefore I am not really fond of putting a stamp on my forehead which shouts which voicetype I am. It is true, that I don't like to peep too high, but if I have to, I can do it, because I know my organs and muscles are able to get those high notes. Also it depends on my mood sometimes: sometimes I enjoy going all the way to my chest voice and enjoy the vibration behind my collarbone and eyes, but there are days when I am in the mood of discovering the upper limits of my voice.
This doesn't mean I don't use certain registers from time to time when I practise. I always explore my whole range, it is just how I feel about it at that very moment, and that can change from morning to afternoon.

So just like Mark Twain said: Explore. Dream. Discover. You never know what is waiting for you beyond the limits you drew for yourself. If you keep your mind open and flexible, this mindset will keep your body open and flexible.

Everything is possible (part 1)

It really wouldn't be me, if a sentence as the title says "Everything is possible" wouldn't serve as a motto of my life as a professional musician. As much as a paradox it is, as much as it inspired me in past few years.

Back then when I began my studies at the conservatory I had pretty primitive ideas about singing and music in general. Based on the repertory building beforehand I was convinced, just like everyone else nowadays that there's no free passing between voice types, in other words your preferred register defines the repertory you are able to sing. But the years I spent as an early vocal ensemble music student and also Ildikó Hajnal, my singing teacher's methods and approach pushed me towards new boundaries, and that reminded me to the very essential idea why I've actually decided to be a singer. And that idea was actually that I wanted to see how far I could get with it, to figure out where my limits are as a musician and as a singer.

To be honest, and without being all the way stuck up, I am a multitalented, intelligent and smart woman (which is quite something if you take a look at my beuatiful blond hair...), and as being one I could be anything I wanted to be. I figured this out at some quite early age, so thanks to that I always knew what I wanted to be and that was always something else: architect, lawyer, captain of a ship (sometimes even a space ship), astronaut, teacher, pirate, physician, journalist, writer, historian, restaurator, painter, mob boss, detective, pathologist, secret agent or mad scientist - but hell, never a musician! In grammar school, I was such a bookworm that while my classmates were living their normal puberty lives, I spent my long afternoons and evenings in libraries (no misunderstanding: there was one at school, another one at the dormitory where I was living in those times and the of the central library of the region - this one was actually behind my school). In the year of graduation I had enough, and I was aso allowed to get some extra time for my singing lessons at the music school. This meant a 90 minutes long singing lesson every week, from which 60 minutes was the actual lesson and the remaining 30 minutes rehearsing with a pianist under the supervision of my singing teacher at that time, Erzsébet Feichter). I had to play the piano and though I should have attended music theory lessons, I chose to sing in the choir of the music school instead.
Before I realized I've got more involved in music and with singing than I made up my mind to become a singer. When I told the people around me (my family, my classmates, my friends and my teachers) that I am planning to give the auditions of the conservatory in Miskolc a go, many of them laughed at me or just looked at me as if I were out of my mind. My chosen faculties in grammar school were history, and Hungarian literature and grammar; in the end it turned out I haven't dawdled away my time with those countless hours spent with my faculty subjects, because if you are getting involved with early music, some extra knowledge in history, literature and grammar pays off pretty well.

Well, as you can see I did not become a lawyer, neither a pirate, but I've become a singer which is a way better than all the other professions I've ever imagined to myself. Why? Because music and singing requires a fresh and fit mind all the time, pushing you to learn something new everyday, and also pushing you to extend or even exceed your limits.

Everything is possible... Yes, believe it or not, everything is possible, even for a bookworm to become a singer. For many years I've listened to the discrimination of my kind ("my kind" here stands for people with intelligence, high intellect and strong thirst for knowledge) considering them as people who have barely the ability or they are just simply unable to sense the little nuances of their body, and that thinking and their intelligence is actually in the way of artistic expression. But you know what? That's not true. It is true, that if you keep telling someone, who's happen to be smarter and has a bigger theoretical knowledge than you, that these merits are bad and they are preventing him/her from musical development, he/she will believe you after a while and will curse himself/herself for the gift he/she was given. I wouldn't classify people like thinkers and emotionals. I believe that each of us has the equal ability to feel, sense and understand the world that surrounds us, it is just the matter of personal choice which approach we would like to choose and where do our priorities lie.

After I figured that my intelligence and intellect used in an effective and proper way will help me to develop as a singer and as a muscian, a whole new world opened up for me, and slowly the thought of "everything is possible" took over my mind and I've begun to experiment more and more...

Letting go

Maybe it's the rain we've been having recently
Something about the rain keeps reminding me
But these days I'm sure you would be surprised
I'm a different person you'd hardly recognise
And there's the reasons why I know
But nobody tells you but the letting go.

(Joe Cocker: The letting go)

It is raining now for a while here in the Netherlands. Well, if you live here, sometimes you have the very feeling it is raining all the time, but I'm not complaining, the weather was quite nice in the past year, it was warm spiced up with a lot of sunshine. But to tell the truth, I actually like rain very much. Not the part where I am getting all the way wet to my bones while riding my bike in the rain to the restaurant where I work, or on the way back, but the rain itself. I like to take an umbrella and some waterproof footware and just walk in the rain and enjoy the scent of it. I like the way how it washes away everything and when it stops raining, and the sky clears up you value the sunshine even more. 

No, there's no misunderstanding, I am writing about letting go. There are many things I would like to let go recently: old habits, fears, doubts, painful memories (because during the great and fun time I had in the past years, I had collected some painful ones as well), etc. In a way, I agree with Carrie Fisher saying in the beginning of her HBO stage show Wishful drinking (which I recommend everyone to watch, because it's hilarious): "I have to start by telling you that my entire lifecould be summed up in one phrase, and that is: if my life wasn't funny, it would just be true, and that is completely unacceptable. Now... what that means is (other than what it sounds like): let's say something happens and from a certain slant, maybe it's tragic and even a little bit shocking. And then time passes and you go to the funny slant and now that very same thing can no longer do you any harm. So, what we're really talking about then is location, location, location"

True. Sometimes I am indulging myself in the past, though I know very well that the past is a nice place to visit but never a pleasant place to stay. Recently I am finding myself wondering about things I could have done better in the past and what I could do in the future in a different way, but the only conclusion I get to is that I need change and I need to let go everything: the past, the fears, the doubts, the pain, and everything else that holds me back.

I remember the last time I had enough of being inable to move anywhere. I felt I was stuck and I had the feeling I cannot breath anymore, and these feelings were painfully familiar. At that time I had no idea how to move out from that hesitating state, being afraid of anything that came into my way. That was the time when I had my ever first portfolio shoot and there I could let go (well, I was half naked), and I could do it for three reasons:

1. I wanted to show my instrument in a way that nobody would expect me to do so. After all, you don't put clothes on a piano, or on a violin or on a cello - that would look sooo silly...
2. By the end of the training I've got during the 6 years of Conservatory I felt myself denuded from many of my old habits.
3. I had soooo much fun :)))

 I will never forget when I let go my yearning for freedom, because the moment I surrendered and made friends with the idea of captivity, freedom fell onto my lap and things suddenly began to move, and I didn't care anymore just went with the flow of events. I didn't even have time to realize what I was doing I was just doing it, because that was the easiest thing to do. As a matter of fact I don't like to think too much forward (though I have many longterm plans), I rather prefer to just do my thing. The less you think, the happier you are afterwards.

Letting go is the hardest thing I've ever encountered, because it holds the possibility of radical change and loosing something that we think it is useful for us. Letting go chases us out into the wilderness of the soul where God knows what awaits for us (for some reason the first that would pop one's mind is something dangerous, or even lethal - isn't it interesting?). I am still learning the art of letting go. So far the most succesfull "letting go"-events were when I could forget about the possible consequences in a way that not even the term would have popped up in my mind. Of course there were a whole series of events that put me into that state of mind.

I am looking for that state of mind now: in the rain, hoping it would wash away everything while waiting for the vital ray of sunshine on my skin and on the path I am following. So I let it rain, I let it go...

Cry all your heart out! You pee less...

Yes, you've heard me right: cry all your heart out! you pee less...

Crying, tears, sobbing and such are associated nowadays with something tragic, sad or even horrible. If you would ask anyone on the street where do you have the greatest chance see crying people, one of the first answers will be "at funerals". If you would ask me, the first three locations I'd name would be the following: singing lessons, the solitude of a practise room, and during conversations on the phone.

But why do we cry? Why do the salty water comes out of our eyes when the emotions we feel are so overwhelming that we cannot help but cry, cry, cry and cry? Frankly, I have no idea, I’m just doing it, and... Oh, wait... you haven’t had such an overwhelming rush of emotions before that you couldn’t help but cry, cry, cry and cry? OK, really, wait a minute, I think this needs some explanation before you’d think I am seriously depressed and that I should go and consult with a Viennese specialist about my mental condition (and that conversation would end up him trying to convince me about the non-existent problem I have with my mother...).

So,just to be clear: in my opinion crying is the most natural way of dealing with stress and a natural sign of the melting emotional blockage. In an earlier entry of mine I've already mentioned F. M. Alexander, saying: "You translate everything - whether physical, mental, or spiritual into muscular tension.". Every single muscular tension caused by some emotional impulse that you cannot release stays in your body in different ways, and they become hard as rocks as time passes by. Now, this wouldn't be much of a problem, if these "rocks" wouldn't cause further problems when it comes to singing. I am saying this, because even the smallest "rock" on your diaphragma can cause malfunction and can prevent you to make connection with you own instrument. When these rocks are melting away, one of the most common signs the thaw is warm, salty water pouring from your eyes, or in other words: crying. The intensity of this can be as diverse as you can imagine. In my case it comes with serious mood-swings, severe pain and deep anguish (I think I partly re-live emotionally the contents of these "rocks").

In the very beginning when these mood-swings and intense crying occured, I seriously thought that I have a serious case of depression. I still remember me sitting at the table with my plate of food and my tears were falling in my food, and I had really no idea why I was even crying. The next time it happened in the middle of practise, and by the time I could calm down and continued practising I felt that everything opened up and they remained open. After this I've asked Heent Prins about me crying a lot, and stuff like that and she said: "It's normal. It's just a sign that the problems (one by one) are solved."

And as she told me this suddenly I remembered one of my first Alexander Technique lessons. I had to imagine something I wanted really badly and also imagining it not taking that by force but by imagining it being rewarded with it and take it gently as something that I deserve (and as something that wants to belong to me). The moment I was able to imagine this I started to cry and couldn't stop the tears for several minutes.

Like this I had 3 confirmations of the fact that crying is good and nothing is wrong with the state of my mind and after that I was sure I won't need a Viennese specialist - ever. The only unpleasant feature of this kind of development and problem-solving is that it can happen anytime and anywhere, and the people around you just freak out and they think something bad happened to you, or your are sad. I think, even if you tell them nothing is wrong and everything is perfect, because of the unstoppable flow of tears nobody will ever believe you (maybe if you explain them hundred times and more, they might grasp a little bit of it, but not more). There was a few weeks when I did not want to meet certain people and I was happy not seeing them, because I would have been so happy about seeing them that I would just instantly have started to cry and I couldn't have been able to explain them properly the whole situation (actually it really does sound like an excuse when you state "everything will be all right" with tears in your eyes, so you cannot even blame them...). But now regardless this fear of mine, I don't care about their doubts, I am sure this works for me, and I am sure it works for everyone else as well.

So just go on, cry all your heart out! You pee less...

Breath yourself free - The Szamosi Approach to Freedom in Singing

In an earlier entry I mentioned Lajos Szamosi's name and I even quoted him about how important is the connection between a free mind and a free voice.
Freedom in singing (in my opinion and according to many) comes from the freedom in your breathing. If your breathing is not free, your voice just cannot be free, because singing is basically speaking in slow-motion on different heights in your vocal-range, with or without rhythm but certainly with some kind of pulse, it depends the style and genre of the piece/song in question. Also, without breathing out you cannot speak, you cannot even produce a sound. The fact that changing the "pitch" during this speaking in slow motion becomes a melody is mostly thanks to a composer's idea and/or the performer's musicality, but melodious phrases or not, singing is still breathing out and nothing more than that. Sounds like a piece of cake, right? Well, it's not, but as a matter of fact we are making it difficult for ourselves.

Before I would go on discussing this, here's this quite famous quote by F. M. Alexander:

"You translate everything - whether physical, mental, or spiritual into muscular tension."

But where does this muscular tension comes from? How does it appears in our body? In order to let the muscles in your body function well, they need oxygen, to which the most basic life support gives a helping hand, and this is breathing. You don't need to think about breathing, neither you need to think about let your heart beat, you just do it. Now... whenever something unexpected or even something expected happen to us - whether it's good or bad - our breathing naturally reacts to it, and mostly it stops for a split of a second. Do you remember when you were a kid and you played hide-and-seek? You might remember that you even held your breath a little while you were hiding in your hide-out. The same happens when you are afraid of something or fear starts to take control over your mind: your breathing changes and your body translates your fears into muscular tension.

On top of this, all of us have the urge and the wish to blend in the society, but this wish doesn't come from our nature, it is rather how our parents raised us. People behave in a certain way because they were told or taught (some even tamed) to behave that certain way. I bet everyone knows the mainstream psychology experiment with the monkeys and the ladder, for those who don't know see this link.

We would like to blend in the society because in the ancient times being alone and being seperated from the tribe meant that you're condemned to death. So the same survival instinct that keeps us breathing actually is also to be "blamed" for making us being afraid of standing alone and stick out from the crowd. I'm not saying that teamwork and society is bad, and I also would like to emphasize that nothing is black and white on this matter. Just as I mentioned in my previous entry: the "goodness" of a result (or in this case anything) depends on the current situation, therefore blending into the society in order to survive is a good attempt, but completely useless at obtaining personal freedom.
Also blending in the society demands you to say no to your yearning for freedom, and answer the expactations of the term "normal" and "usual". Why? Because you would like to belong to the tribe, you don't want to stand alone, you would like to survive. Of course as soon as you discover and taste a little bit of inner personal freedom you realize that these terms are just not applying on your life and those are just patterns you can push yourself to hold onto. The terms mentioned above bring a few other terms along like "beauty", "good", "bad", etc. Norms that shouldn't rule your daily life but give you a decent guideline instead.

The Szamosi Approach to Freedom in Singing aims for freeing yourself from these norms and from the urge to judge every single thing you do. According to Lajos Szamosi (see his biography here) there is no beautiful voice, neither an ugly sound: if the voice is free than it naturally delights the listener (I would say:  beauty in itself is boring, but beauty with content is more valuable than anything). Just like Friedrick Matthias Alexander, the developer of the Alexander Technique, Lajos Szamosi also strove to overcome his own vocal problems, and he actually also succeeded to correct these vocal problems (but in the end he got so passionate about teaching that his carreer didn't matter much anymore in the end). Fun fact: Alexander and Szamosi were each other's contemporaries, but they (as far as I know) never met, still they got to the exact same conclusion while working on their own very similar problems: you can solve your vocal problems by freeing your breath.

A free and smooth airflow brings the necessary amount of oxygen to the muscles, helps to keep your mind clear and as a result the muscles become relaxed, and remain in a relaxed and open state. There's a singing excercize I've learnt a while ago that makes you breath out more and more; as a result you feel dizzy at a certain point (because there's too much oxygen in your blood), and if you go on regardless the dizzyness, you will pass out a little. Recently I picked up this excercize at Heent Prins's lessons and at some point I got frustrated that I got dizzy after each round of this excercize, so I've asked her whether it is possible to get used to exhalate this much, to which her answer was accompanied by a huge nod (like it was so obvious, and it was obvious actually): "Can you get used to it? Yes!"
If you would like to get to know this approach, and you happen to live in The Netherlands, two licenenced teachers of the Szamosi Approach will come here and give a workshop on 6 December 2014 in The Hague. For more info, please click here.