Liz and I invited Kaylee Ann to practice with us on Saturday. We started out by trying out Ristad's interpretive dancing exercises! We danced to a few classical orchestral pieces, and then to a vocal piece. I always enjoy dancing so much. It was different having people there though. A little bit more self-conscious, but also more fun, because you can interact with what they're doing too. It was really a blast. Then Liz put on some funk (Chameleon) and things got crazay! So much fun. I really do believe that dancing to your music helps your free up your body and mind and experience the music, but mostly I do it because I enjoy it so much.
After our dancing session, we each performed an excerpt of a piece for each other. It's amazing how hard it is to sing in front of your friends. Kaylee went first, and sang a portion of a french art song. She was having trouble over thinking her singing. We had her change the words of her song, replacing them with her memories of a favorite coffee shop. Her piece had so much more character and energy when she used her own words. She also sounded more free! When she switched back to the text, she was still focusing on the french and the words really hard, but there was definitely more emotion going on.
Liz sang next. Her piece started on a high note and she was frustrated with her sound. We could all hear that it became more full as she continued the phrase, but tended to start a little pressed and timid. I also noticed that she had a lot of upper body tension and her breathing was not free. Releasing her body tension was really hard. We noticed that when she played the melody on the piano, her tension went away and she played with incredible sensitivity and movement. We tried to transfer that to her song with some success. Kaylee suggested Liz sit and slump over on a chair to find release for the first note which worked remarkably well! When Liz focused on the meaning of the text, her singing improved tons. That seams to be a trend these days.
I sang some of Nasce al Bosco. Liz helped me breathe better by using Cindy's grunt method. Kaylee helped me stay energetic by suggesting some body movement. Liz helped me make a great discovery! As I moved up by step from middle C to C5, I lost a lot of vibrancy and started sounding pressed (too much TAD). Liz had me use the n at the beginning of the highest note to bring the sound forward and up and it worked so well that we all started jumping up and down and yelling. I really felt great about the progress we all made! I love doing this.
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