I know, I know. I’m a day late on this one.
Apologies.
I, of late, have found myself bumping into limitation. Whether it’s limitation around the current state of the industry/the world, limitation around the things I think I are feasible, or limitation around when I feel talented or have a free flow of creativity; I keep finding myself hitting walls.
Now I’m quite certain a lot of these are limitations self imposed by my own mind, by my own subconscious because I had the man in the mirror telling me I wasn't enough. He would say that I wasn't rich enough, wasn’t connected enough, wasn’t related to the right people or that I couldn’t write good enough songs, couldn’t sing well enough, didn’t have the right charisma to find success in the music industry. And quite frankly that’s all a load of horse shit.
I began going into writes & going into studio sessions putting immense pressure on myself to “perform.” I thought I had to come up with the most cleaver lyrics, the greatest hooks, but every time I went to write I felt like the song I wanted to write was locked away from me on the other side of an invisible barrier. I felt I couldn’t access the parts of my brain I wanted & it became so insanely frustrating.
I will admit that part of my issue, specifically when it came to the pressure I was putting on myself around vocal performance came from being on the flip side of several months therapy for vocal cord dysfunction. I felt like I’d lost my voice, like every noise that came out of my throat was pure, stinking garbage because once again, comparison was the thief of my joy…a common theme in my life. So, much like Irma S. Rombauer had to do for cooking, I had to rediscover the joy of singing.
What had once been a liberating platform for which I could openly express emotion & passion had become the thing I dreaded most. I hated the sound of my voice on recording, I hate the way I thought I sounded in a mic, so I barely sang for about a year because doing so filled me with nothing but shame, defeat, & terror.
I honestly have two things to thank for my vocal recovery, outside of therapy. Greg Breal, a dear friend of mine who became my vocal coach & musical theater. It’s odd, rediscovering something, especially when that something has been such a pivotal point in your life but it’s really a lot like having coffee with an old friend; the foundation, love, & admiration are there but you’re seeing it all in a new light, through a different lens, & with new, completely separate life experiences under your belt.
I started singing because of music theater. I started my music career on a stage telling stories through music. That’s what led me to country music, a genre that, used to at least, be about telling stories through music. The reason music theater became my beacon once again was due to COVID. I found myself, as many of us did, trying to fill the time we had while trapped inside, so I began rewatching musicals. (You can probably thank Hamilton for that desire.) Rewatching naturally shifted to going back to soundtracks which led me naturally to Wicked.
…I actually think it was Tik Tok that led me back to Wicked thanks to illegal recordings of Jessica Vosk belting her face off during her tenure as Elphaba on Broadway. At any rate Defying Gravity, as it always does, got stuck in my head. The line I found myself repeating over & over & over was:
Something has changed within me
Something is not the same
I'm through with playing by the rules
Of someone else's game
Too late for second-guessing
Too late to go back to sleep
It's time to trust my instincts
Close my eyes and leap!
It's time to try defying gravity
I think I'll try defying gravity
And you can't pull me down!
I couldn’t escape it. I couldn’t get it out of my head for the life of me, I think there was a reason behind that. I took the song to Greg in the summer, where I’d been singing pop, country, & originals with him, I decided to try music theater one week. I decided to sing Defying Gravity. Greg loved it. He told me it was the freest, most passionate he’d heard me sing in a long time so I ran with it. I began playing piano singing it, singing it in the shower, while washing my hands, in the car, but I strangely never listened to it, I let it become my own living with the lyrics & feeling its energy.
From there it went from “On My Own” & “I Dreamed A Dream” from Les Mis (a show I actually loathe) to “Go The Distance” from Hercules to “Out There” from Hunchback of Notre Dame (a seriously underrated Disney movie.) Then Folklore came out.
I am unabashedly a Swiftie, I think Taylor is one of the greatest songwriters out there & I think she has navigated the music industry magnificently. Folklore was an album that at its core was minimalist. It was often piano, vocal, guitar, & drums with a tiny bit of production & that made it extremely accessibly to me, the quarantined singer-songwriter. I could probably sit at my piano & play you the entirety of Folklore in my own keys.
I was sitting there plunking on the keys one day when I realized something. I was humming. I was audibly making music with my voice subconsciously, something I hadn’t done in months. I had done it. I had reclaimed my voice, I had grown accustomed to its new way of opportunity, to its new life. I began recording again, I began releasing music again, I began posting videos again. The progress was slow & I am still learning & adapting but I’m finally back to loving my gifts & the music I can make with them.
I want to backtrack a wee bit to talk about writing. Yes, I am still writing & yes, a lot of the songs I’ve written recently are songs I’m very proud of because I’ve realized the only thing limiting me was myself. The only thing restricting the ideas I had & the words I wrote was myself. Much like my journey with my voice, I am reclaiming my creativity, becoming more comfortable in the unknown, & becoming reinvigorated knowing I can write kickass songs. I started journaling daily, creative writing, free writing, whatever. Just getting ideas out. I started to write out the restrictions in my life; what I was afraid of, who I was angry at, what I was holding onto that it was okay to acknowledge & let go of. I found peace & granted myself forgiveness & grace & almost immediately the ideas started pouring back into my brain.
I’m still grappling with my fears especially when it comes to solo writing but I’ve decided it’s time to move on. It’s time to be a confident human who deserves success, who deserves a flourishing career in this industry. I’ve decided I am an amazing vocalist, an incredible songwriter, & a worthy artist. I am worthy of my dreams, of my talents, now I just have to get out of my own way & let them shine. I am limitless, & strong, & more than capable. Yes, something has changed within me & something is truly not the same. I’m so over playing by the rules of what someone else or what I say should limit me.
It’s time I try defying gravity.