I am maria!

Author: Marina

  • Breaking barriers, from Flamenco to the Future

    @just.iammaria

    She/her

    As I continue my academic and creative journey, I find myself increasingly drawn to exploring greater freedom and authenticity through my singing voice.

    I often wonder how I might access my natural, untrained voice , as distinct from my trained, classical one. To do so, I must consciously undo certain habits and expectations instilled through years of classical training, and learn to accept sounds that, to me, once seemed ugly or foreign. Yet these sounds are undeniably me , part of my vocal identity. My voice, my sounds, they carry my energy, my soul, and my story.

    This process of creative and vocal exploration feels thrilling, yet I’ve long sensed that such experimentation seems more permissible for contemporary singers than for classical ones. When a classically trained singer ventures beyond the expected boundaries, it often seems to “not work” sonically or at least, that’s what we’ve been told.

    Then, something exciting happened. A contemporary singer whose career I’ve followed for the past eight years, Rosalía, an artist with flamenco roots released a new album that beautifully merges classical and contemporary sound worlds. On it, she explores her own classical tone and technique, and it is utterly captivating.

    In her New York Times interview, Rosalía says:

    “Everything is in constant movement… why shouldn’t my sound change with me?”

    Isn’t that the truth? Why shouldn’t our voices evolve as we do? Why are we so attached to definition, to labels, to the boxes we build around ourselves?

    Throughout my life as a classical singer, I’ve heard the same cautions repeated:

    “Don’t sing contemporary music, you’ll damage your voice.”
    “You’ll undo your classical technique.”

    Has anyone else heard these reasonings?

    Now, I feel even more determined to continue down this path of vocal and creative exploration to find out what else lives inside my voice, my body, my imagination.

    More colours, more possibility, more storytelling await when I open myself to the next chapter of my sound.

    , , , , , , , @rosalia.vt #flamenco #breakingbarriers #style #genre

    This reflection is part of my ongoing creative research journey, I am Maria! An exploration of voice, identity, and transformation. Through song, story, and self-inquiry, I continue to listen for the voice that remembers, heals, and creates – Marina

  • revealing the essence of I am Maria

    @just.iammaria

    She/her

    Trained vs. natural

    @just.iammaria

    When did the training I received for so many years become a cage, a limit to my own expressiveness? My artistic identity had become so entrenched in the idea of “Classical Singing” and “Opera” that I could see nothing else within me. I felt that I had nothing more to offer.

    My artistic identity had beome so entrenched in the idea of “Classical Singing” and “Opera” that I could see nothing else within me. I felt that I had nothing more to offer.

    Of course, this perception was false. As human beings, we are made of many layers of being; complex, shifting. When we begin to see ourselves in limited ways, those limits begin to spill into our lives and self-perceptions. We neatly categorise ourselves into little boxes, believing that safety lies in definition.

    For me, this categorisation continued for many years. I tried to fit into the expectations of what “the voice” should be what I was taught it must be. My sense of self, intellect, and creativity became entangled and distorted along with my voice. Eventually, I reached a point where this could no longer be sustained.

    Returning to an institution where I once experienced trauma and devastation has, years later, become an unexpected source of healing. Through the process of research and reflection, new questions continue to emerge, questions about identity, voice, and what it truly means to be free as an artist.

    I share these reflections in the hope that they may help someone else on their own journey toward rediscovery.d voice meet to reveal what it means to be human, to heal, and to be heard.

    #creative #awakening #artistic #research

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    the voice I lost | the one I'm finding

    @just.iammaria

    Our voice, the singing voice, the speaking voice is instantly recognisable. It is unique.

    I’ve always been fascinated by it, by its mystery and power. The voice can trigger memory, awaken emotion, reveal truth. It can betray who is lying and who is sincere. The singing voice, in particular, bypasses all the layer, it is the most human and direct way of communicating, of telling a story, of feeling and being felt.

    Over the years, I’ve studied my voice and traveled the world in pursuit of the dream to sing. Along the way, there were disappointments and detours. I missed cues, trusted the wrong mentors, and held on too long out of loyalty and the desire to please. I believed that if I were the “good student,” things would eventually fall into place. But the truth is, that unquestioning need to please was the very thing that held me back.

    When I finally found a mentor who truly understood me who helped me reclaim my voice, it was too late for an opera career. But slowly, I began to realise that I could do more. I didn’t have to fit into the conventional mould. I could communicate through theatre, music, and voice in my own way, through my own truth.

    I started writing, inventing, reconnecting with the part of myself I had lost the creative being, the storyteller.

    In doing so, I discovered that to move forward, I would first have to face my past disappointments and vocal barriers to heal them rather than hide them. Little did I know that this journey would lead me to a Master of Philosophy in the very place once associated with my deepest vocal trauma.

    Now, the Conservatorium has become a place of healing, reflection, and transformation. Through my studies, and through I am Maria! I continue to explore how the voice wounded and reborn can become a vessel of truth and change.

    These insights, these reflections, I share here as markers of the path I’ve walked and as a gesture of hope for others who have experienced their own disappointments, silences, and transformations.

    Because the world needs art. It needs song. It needs stories and it needs love.
    In the act of singing, of making music, we offer nourishment of another kind; food for the human heart.

    So join me, as I use my performance work I am Maria! as a living site of investigation and transformation

    a place where art, story, and voice meet to reveal what it means to be human, to heal, and to be heard.

    #performance #research

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  • Finding my voice through the noise of life.

    Author’s reflection

    @just.iammaria

    She/her

    As I continue developing I am Maria! as both a performance and a site of research, these questions about voice, identity, and transformation become increasingly vital. What happens when the classically trained voice unlearns its boundaries and rediscovers its natural expression?

    Our voice, the singing voice, the speaking voice is instantly recognisable. It is unique.

    I’ve always been fascinated by it, by its mystery and power. The voice can trigger memory, awaken emotion, reveal truth. It can betray who is lying and who is sincere. The singing voice, in particular, bypasses all the layer, it is the most human and direct way of communicating, of telling a story, of feeling and being felt.

    Over the years, I’ve studied my voice and traveled the world in pursuit of the dream to sing. Along the way, there were disappointments and detours. I missed cues, trusted the wrong mentors, and held on too long out of loyalty and the desire to please. I believed that if I were the “good student,” things would eventually fall into place. But the truth is, that unquestioning need to please was the very thing that held me back.

    When I finally found a mentor who truly understood me who helped me reclaim my voice, it was too late for an opera career. But slowly, I began to realise that I could do more. I didn’t have to fit into the conventional mould. I could communicate through theatre, music, and voice in my own way, through my own truth.

    I started writing, inventing, reconnecting with the part of myself I had lost the creative being, the storyteller.

    In doing so, I discovered that to move forward, I would first have to face my past disappointments and vocal barriers to heal them rather than hide them. Little did I know that this journey would lead me to a Master of Philosophy in the very place once associated with my deepest vocal trauma.

    Now, the Conservatorium has become a place of healing, reflection, and transformation. Through my studies, and through I am Maria! I continue to explore how the voice wounded and reborn can become a vessel of truth and change.

    These insights, these reflections, I share here as markers of the path I’ve walked and as a gesture of hope for others who have experienced their own disappointments, silences, and transformations.

    Because the world needs art. It needs song. It needs stories and it needs love.
    In the act of singing, of making music, we offer nourishment of another kind; food for the human heart.