The Three-Month Mark

Language.


Language is without doubt one of the most important things for a singer to get their head around. I’m sure that with a great ear you can learn pieces by rote and sound authentic, but there is something to be said for a true understanding of a language. I have sought, at different points over the past few years to deepen my understanding of languages that are relevant and important to singing. This journey has been one of the most amazing aspects of my development as a human being, let alone as a singer. Learning new languages is a complete joy; playing with syntax and re-learning how to express yourself and discovering new things about your ideas and personality as you talk to friends and colleagues in a language that isn’t your own. I’d recommend it to anyone.


 Four years ago (and it still feels like yesterday), I made the mad decision to spend the third year of my undergraduate degree at the Università degli Studi di Milano. I didn’t speak any Italian, but had the growing awareness that if I really wanted to sing, I should at least be able to have a conversation in a second language (slight understatement).


 So here is how it happened… Firstly, I went to the Italian Institute in Edinburgh and enquired about learning Italian in Italy; they have bursaries to the value of six-hundred pounds for any person wishing to study at language school there as a means to promote the language. (Italian is seen as a lesser spoken European language so there are funds to promote it). Thanks to the Italian Institute I took my first steps into Italy to live in Florence and took part in an intensive language course. Secondly, I arranged to spend 6 weeks au-pairing in Sicily immediately after my course finished in Tuscany. The family came from Milan, so I knew that I wouldn’t be learning too much Sicilian dialect! When I arrived in Sicily I was almost completely mute. Whilst in Florence me and the friends I was with had really pushed ourselves to learn as much grammar as possible and I had learnt so many rules and regulations and irregular verbs that I couldn’t really get any words out. Over six weeks with a family who didn’t speak a word of English, I began to make sentences and really converse in the language. Helped (or hindered?) by the fact that all day every day was spent on the beach, as it was too hot to do anything else. Communicating with the family for 6 weeks then prepared me for my third month, which I spent in Siena on a course run by the EU especially to prepare Erasmus students for study in a foreign language. Called an Erasmus Intensive Language Course (EILC). This was great fun as I met amazing students from what felt like every European country (Slovakia, Hungary, Finland, Spain, Portugal, France and Germany to name but a few!) I was fascinated by the differing opinions on everything from the Eurozone, to right-wing politics, to music and art. Following this was the small feat of going to Milan, living there, studying there and singing there. I absolutely loved the year and think it was invaluable.


Having become fluent (less so these days!) in Italian it slowly began to niggle that I couldn’t speak German and I was singing more and more German repertoire that required a better understanding of it. As long as two years ago I was talking to friends about moving to Germany to do a similar course to what I did in Italy.


So finally, in early February this year I got round to it. Luckily for me my lovely young man agreed to learn the language with me! We came here after a singing course called Bel Canto Bella Voce that I did in Vienna and we arrived in Berlin at the beginning of February to the most extended period of FREEZING weather I have ever experienced. -20 degrees for over a month! We enrolled in an intensive language course and spent almost 6 hours a day learning German to begin with, then as our funds slowly dwindled we found work and began learning on the job. I also enrolled in a second course and quickly progressed but was frustrated at how hard I found the grammar.


I have found German harder than Italian. Perhaps I am a bit older and more set in my ways; I am finding it harder to accept all the rules! I’ve also spent less time learning all the irregularities in the grammar. This is my fault. However, over the past few days I have suddenly had one of those wonderful moments where the sun comes out and everything becomes clear. I find, that at a certain point, I have to let go of a language. I remember it happening with Italian. Stop thinking and let it flow without fighting it or thinking of the grammar or the sentence structure. It will happen anyway as you practice. It sounds silly, but it’s like flying. It’s a skill that you have no control over, and it is so fun when you begin to be able to play with it.


It happens accumulatively. We become like babies with no vocabulary and ‘piano, piano’, we absorb more and more and become like a sponge. Three months seems to be the allotted time it takes me before I have a breakthrough. It was towards the end of my time in Siena when I suddenly felt like I had a grip on Italian, and the same is suddenly happening with German. It surprises me, as I thought it wasn’t going to happen!


It’s hard, it’s a challenge, but it’s so fun and so satisfying. Living abroad isn’t easy, and I do admit to spending some of my time craving home comforts, but it is one of the most rewarding and valuable things I have ever done.

Am I Ready?

I’ve been grappling with this question for some time now. Every time I think I am ready – it seems I am not. By ‘ready’, I mean prepared enough to then have the confidence to excel in an audition (or performance – but for the sake of this blogpost I’m discussing auditions).

Perhaps I am simply not good at auditions. STOP. I don’t like that - seems little defeatist…

I find auditions really, really hard. I did one this week. I travelled to a different country to do it and on the day of the audition I completely over-sang. I was nervous, and, as mentioned in my previous blog post, I have just had something of a vocal-technique overhaul in Turin. So, before the audition, I dutifully went to a warm-up room. I was there over three hours before the audition (first error) and I started working on my technique as I would on a day with no audition (second error). Then when I had a run-through with the accompanist I sang through EACH piece as if it were the audition (third error). Then I had a cup of tea (herbal - no error) and a sit down. Then I did the audition.

It is crystal clear to me why I didn’t sing well having done at least two hours of full singing beforehand.

There are technical ideas that I am using that are new, and even though I now sound more ‘ready’ as a young singer because of them, I don’t believe or trust yet that I will be able to do them if I haven’t ‘checked’ first. I don’t think this is uncommon in young singers, but I’m still frustrated at myself for making the mistake. I am pleased with how the actual performance was in the audition, just not with my use of new technical ideas. I feel like I let myself, and my teacher down. But I also know that it is all trial and error and that you’re allowed to not sing brilliantly if you learn from the experience and realize what you’re doing to do to improve and learn from it.

I am coming to the conclusion that auditions will happen best if you are secure in what you’re going to do. I don’t just mean in whether or not you remember the words and the music. I mean ready in every sense – knowing who you are, what you want to say with the music, what you want to say with the drama, what you are want to say as an artist and that you are ready with your VOICE as a technician as well as a musician. By that I mean being ready so that you only need to vocalise briefly on the day and then sing straight to the panel – sounding completely fresh.

I’ve come to this conclusion before (hence the irritation at my approach this week) and am coming to it again. Even if there are new things to incorporate into my singing I should have trusted that

What are auditions for? Well the panel clearly wish to cast singers in something (production, opera studio, music college) so they want you to do well. They want to hear YOU. Your musicianship, your voice, your interpretation of the pieces. Not too hard? I think nerves come from not being sure. They’re also important as they show that you care (everyone needs some good adrenaline), but they needn’t be debilitating. The way to stop them from becoming so is by being prepared. Maybe I will be ready next time, or maybe I need more time to really let my technique settle so that I have confidence in it before putting myself in front of a panel of people again. I’m not sure.

I’ll only find out by trying!

Cygnet into a Swan

Last week I travelled to Turin for an intensive week of singing lessons. I don’t think I am exaggerating when I say that it was the most important week in my singing journey so far. I stepped away from what I am currently doing, went to a new city which I’d never been to before, in a country that I love. I opened up to new ideas and my voice opened up with me. I was working with a singer who I admire and look up to and I found it to be one of the most inspiring times I have experienced.

After this week I feel like I have found the voice I will be singing with for the rest of my future. I sound like I have grown up, and it is actually very moving to sing repertoire that I had previously found scary. I used to feel like the bottom of my voice would ‘drop out’, or that I would have no power in my lower-middle register. I didn’t know how to address this and simply thought that I would have a lighter, higher sitting voice.

I did not sing with my vocal folds closed. I began every phrase, and probably every note with the folds slightly apart, which meant I used too much breath to make the voice sound and then I would tire easily. I think I did this as good student thinking of keeping the throat open, when in fact the throat does need to feel spacious, but not to the detriment of the folds meeting. Having the folds apart to begin with meant that in the lower middle of my voice it made it really, really difficult to find focus and I used to think of placement only using head resonance.

In the past week I have begun retraining my body to really feel the connection to the pelvic floor muscles for tenacity and support. My vocal folds touch very gently, so that I get a very clean onset. Once I began to get the feeling of the folds gently touching, I found that I don’t have any problems at the bottom of my voice like I thought I had! For the first time I let go of the voice (only trusting it because I could feel the folds together and I had enough body underneath the sound) and I began – miraculously – to allow chest and lower resonance colour to come into the sound.

The difference is quite stark. And I will be eternally grateful to, and in awe of this wonderful teacher. I feel like I am emerging as a singer who trusts their body and their technique. Cygnet into a swan.