Hey all!
I apologize for being off my game these past couple weeks- I attended the Missouri State Thespian Conference and culminated a year's worth of work with Tenessee Williams' "A Streetcar Named Desire", and this past weekend attended MMEA with the Missouri All-State Choir. Needless to say, I've been recovering from that madness. I'm excited to get back to writing for you all and working on my practice.
Lately, my mind has been very embedded in college and college applications. With my senior year right around the corner, the daunting "where will you go?" question warrants some nerves and excitement. As I've been researching colleges, I've found that many classical voice and musical theater collegiate programs include a "yoga for singers" class integrated into the regular conservatory curriculum. In fact, during a recent college visit, I noticed that every single BFA MT/Acting student carried yoga mats. This piqued my curiosity- why yoga? How does this relate to music and performance?
Backtracking a bit, in mid-December, I started following some yoga tutorials on youtube. I practiced once a day for a while and ended up going to a hot yoga class with my sister Emily and her boyfriend Grant. I was pretty nervous about the heated aspect (the rooms are kept at an average of 92 degrees) but I accepted the challenge and ended up loving it. They start with some breath-work, called pranayama deep breathing, and it escalates to four sections of vinyasa flow (Fast/Slow alternating exercises). In the particular class I attended, you were allowed to modify any pose or exercise to suit your abilities or lay down if you felt lightheaded. In this way, the class is challenging to all ability levels but also suitable for beginners. That's what I really appreciate about yoga- it's do-able, rewarding, and fun to practice.
I ended up finding that yoga is very good for breath work and phrasing. I've touched on this in an earlier post, but I've genuinely noticed a difference in my phrasing abilities since I've started doing yoga. One of the main goals is to increase awareness of breath in relation to movement. Your yoga instructor will constantly remind you to "stay aware of your breath", as does any vocal coach. There are quite a few parallels like this one, as I've found. Both music and yoga demand a certain level of harmony within your body; it is your instrument and greatest asset. In order to practice both, you must understand your body's needs and capabilities while reflecting all of that into a song or exercise.
All in all, I think vocalists should give yoga a try. My favorite YouTuber for at-home practice is Yoga with Adriene. Check her page out and see what happens!
This week's #songforthesoul is "Lost in Japan", a cover by BisCaydence. BisCaydence is the a capella group of the University of Miami that won ICCA this past year. I've been really loving their work lately.
Thanks and happy reading,
Arden