Tag: education

@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

1. […] Link to Study I Love is a Bird […]

2. 

   Thank you for your kind comment. I’m so pleased you enjoyed it 🙏

3. 

   what a lovely poem and sentiment, thanks for sharing

4. 

   Thank you so much 🙂

5. 

   I’m so glad that you are finding your own voice and what an amazing voice it is

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@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

1. […] Link to Study I Love is a Bird […]

2. 

   Thank you for your kind comment. I’m so pleased you enjoyed it 🙏

3. 

   what a lovely poem and sentiment, thanks for sharing

4. 

   Thank you so much :)

5. 

   I’m so glad that you are finding your own voice and what an amazing voice it is