Making Music Personal

If you’re an artist, you may often find yourself at a crossroads. You may feel like you have to choose between working tirelessly on your technique and expressing your emotions. You may feel mortified about trying to put everything together. Or maybe you’ve put everything together, but you don’t seem to be connecting to the music you’re making. 

We have to find ways to make our music personal if we want to continue to grow as artists and connect with people through our art. Here are my tips for finding that connection and making music reflect your story. 

DO WHAT YOU LOVE AND LOVE WHAT YOU DO

If it’s up to you, find and perform pieces that you really love. I know this is easier said than done, and oftentimes we have to sing pieces that are requirements for school or for a job that pays the bills. So again, if it is up to you, choose the pieces that you connect with because chances are, somebody else will too.

If there is something that you HAVE to sing that you don’t like, there will be at least one component in that music that you can relate to. Look for the imagery, general theme, character strengths/flaws, etc. 

The audience wants the truth from you, so you have to know exactly what you’re doing and feeling in every moment. Get to know the text, the composer, and the story on an intimate level. 

That being said, you must perform for your OWN enjoyment, not for others' expectations.

Everybody has their own opinion on your sound and performance. There are always critics and judges. If you don’t perform for yourself, then why are you performing in the first place? When you aren’t on stage, the feeling that you crave is the act of singing and making music, not the audience applauding you (although that is nice too). 

If you need help sorting through the criticisms you might receive throughout your career, read my blog on dealing with criticism!

BE A SINGING ACTOR

When it comes to acting and expressing the meaning behind the music, acting for opera, musical theatre, or contemporary songs is not different from other types of acting. It’s just telling a story. One of my favorite “tricks” is to pretend I’m telling a story to a group of 5th graders. It makes it more engaging, fun, and can help with performance anxiety. 

Make whatever character you can from any part of the score. If you do a deep score study of the piece you’re singing, you will find that even if you are alone in the scene, you are not alone in the music. Music can imitate wildlife, friends, enemies, and any other type of character you might imagine. Some composers use the same motif (musical idea or phrase) to represent a character that is “off-screen” at any given moment. 

When you’re performing, your dramatic choices must be very large and very specific. It’s easy to assume that the audience is “getting it” when we are vague about our choices. But how can they catch a tiny smirk when you look like an ant on the stage? It might work if you are a movie actor, but they have film crews doing close-ups so you can see an eyebrow twitch or a tiny glance. 

Having a scene partner (even an imagined one) helps to make your choices clearer. You need CLEAR emotions and a CLEAR direction of what you intend to communicate. Simplicity is key, even though humans are complicated and have complex emotions and motivations. Find your “why”. What is your goal? 

Anything you may want to communicate with your body, you can also communicate with your voice. There is a difference between acting and gesturing. 

SING FOR YOURSELF, SING WITH AWARENESS

Like I said before, we must sing for our own enjoyment. If we focus on pleasing others, we lose our own ideas about our musicality. We lose our sense of expression. Celebrate your success, but don’t get stuck in your vocal victories or losses. We are constantly working on ourselves, even if we may be perceived as a complete package. 

Throw away your idea of perfection. You are never 100%. You might get to 99.9% (Shameless Plug: if you work with me), but seldom 100%. If you get to your idea of perfection once, the next time you might not. Vocal victories come and go. It is your job to show up to every performance, create something new every time, and have fun!

BEAUTY OF SOUND > PERFECT MUSICIANSHIP

Your team consists of teachers and coaches that you trust and that WANT to support you and help you grow your career. Make sure that you are musically compatible. You have to speak the same language. There are so many different ways of describing one idea, so you want to find people who speak the same musical language that you do. Once you find them, don’t be bound by bar lines, rhythms, and pitches. You don’t want to sound like a robot, and most people don’t go to live performances to hear robots sing(...Although with the rise of AI, they might..) Our art has become run by coaches and pianists who focus on the perfection of rhythms and diction. That’s not what makes the art and beauty of singing so moving. Never sacrifice the beauty of voice and sound for anything. That’s why we do what we do. That is why music is so powerful. 

You have the tools to express. You have the tools to make music personal. All you have to do is trust yourself and fly. As always, my darlings, Happy Singing!