Beyond the Fear of Singing
When one's voice has been locked up for a lifetime and the freedom to sing has become a distant memory, to come out of hiding can be a doorway to joy. The story unfolds through four sequential sectio…
Beyond the Fear of Singing
When one's voice has been locked up for a lifetime and the freedom to sing has become a distant memory, to come out of hiding can be a doorway to joy. The story unfolds through four sequential sections, titled Silenced, Emerging, Reclaiming, and Opening. Over fifty people are interviewed in the course of the film, several with recurring roles. Highlighted voices are voice educators offering their insights and perspective on overcoming fear and expressing one's own voice, regardless of what others may say. The film opens to a sequence of rushing mountain streams followed by a guitar duo playing in the forest, with a short voice-over introduction leading into opening titles. In the first chapter, Silenced, a variety of people in America and Europe express a common theme of shutting down their voices at an early age, or believing they could sing until hearing their voice recorded, or being so humiliated about their voice they wished they could die. Voices include Bay Area author, Jerry Jampolsky, describing his trauma of being told to 'mouth the words' in a children's choir, an Austrian event producer being told by her musically trained parents that she couldn't sing until she trained and was 'the best', and an artist/cinematographer couple from Los Angeles offering several glimpses of their relationship, both to their voice and each other. Primary educators in this section include Mark Fox, an American opera singer living in Germany, author and developer of True Voice method; Bruce Bough, an Irish neurosurgeon who presents a detailed analysis of what happens when we're asked to sing with an unhealed traumatic experience in the past, and Susie Ro Prater, a singer and voice educator from United Kingdom. The second chapter, Emerging, begins with Steve Quinn, a Scottish business consultant convinced he couldn't sing, who decided to take a seminar in Italy on discovering your voice, followed by a Nick Woolsey, a fire-dancer from Canada who reflects how he got into dancing because he couldn't sing- and even though he thinks he's bad at it, maybe he'd like to begin singing anyway. Actress Whoopi Goldberg offers an insight when she describes that for her, every time you breathe you are singing your song. Australian economist and filmmaker Helena Norbert-Hodge describes indigenous cultures, where everyone sang all the time- yet how even there, young people have become so enamored by the music of the West they begin to look askance at their traditional music. Chris James, an Australian vocal coach, expresses that even people who believe they can't sing, if they take the time to get quiet and listen, can actually sing in tune- immediately. Lennart Franke, a German healing arts practitioner, recalls his childhood as filled with singing as a natural experience, and how earth-centered festivals provide many opportunities for freely singing. Susanne Goebel, a singer and voice educator from Regensburg, Germany, offers that singing isn't about giving something, but receiving the sound of your own voice. Several people describe how singing helped them in major healing processes; Katrin Kohlbecher, a psycho-social worker with former child soldiers in Uganda, conveys how singing was one of the few places where they could come into themselves again. The third chapter, Reclaiming, begins with Susie Ro Prater narrating the path of emergence from our 'cave', coming into singing with others in songs which are easily joined, such as African songs, Gospel songs, Kirtan- and then coming into sharing our unique 'soul song'- whereupon Sabrina, a woman from Seattle who doesn't consider herself a performer, sings a song she wrote and describes the experience of singing it. Christian Bollmann, a German recording artist and educator, offers a description of overtone singing as a way of gaining more knowledge of one's voice. Sarah Thule, a Finnish woman, sings a spontaneous chant in the forest; a man with throat cancer describes how he was searching for his old voice, but now realizes this is his new voice; an Italian physicist joyfully expresses how you can hear a song in your head, but when you express it, so often it comes out wrong! Benjamin van Haeff, an Australian singer living in Germany describes his experience of being with children, teaching music and English to kindergartners- and how richly this has impacted his own acceptance of his musical life. Roberto Nadine, a Venetian gondolier, offers that music begins when we are born, that our first cry is a song. His segment ends with him taking a group out on the water while he sings to them, with voice-over by Stephen Clift, editor of a British journal on music and health, musing how humans may have gathered together and sang 100,000 years ago in ways not so different from how we gather today. Christian Ehrmann, leader of the Swedish Royal Marching Band, leads their group in a song on their tour bus while in the background a synchronized military fast march segues into a flock of birds running on the beach. Kay Pollak, a Swedish film director, suggests that the song in everyone is 'the song to belong'. The fourth chapter, Opening, begins with the founder of the Klangheilzentrum in Munich, Wolfgang Friederich, a medical doctor who discovered for himself that bringing people into singing was a more effective method of helping them than prescribing medicine. A European movement of singing in large groups is introduced with scenes from these gatherings, followed by scenes of choral rehearsals in America, Canada and Iceland, narrated by Canadian voice educator Siobhan Robinsong. A concert vignette with Deva Premal and Miten follows, interspersed with an interview of her process of coming out of shyness to have her voice heard alone, rather than always singing together with her husband. A Finnish yoga teacher sings lullabies to her baby while describing her experience of singing lullabies, while the camera brings us very close into the experience. In a light inter-species moment, Bernd Seifried, a German psychologist specializing in donkey-assisted therapy, describes how he encourages his donkeys to sing as a choir; a second segment with Benjamin van Haeff focuses on his music as his refuge, and how his son's relaxed approach to learning to walk helped him to come to peace with making mistakes in the learning process. The film then revisits several people from earlier, as they describe how they overcame their fears and began expressing their voice more freely. Bruce Bough, the neurosurgeon, returns with a reminder that no matter what experience our brain remembers, we can always choose in the moment to leave an old pattern behind. Northwest composer Alex Shapiro exclaims how it's not about being perfect, but simply about the joy of expressing. Austrian monk and author Brother David Steindl-Rast recounts his childhood singing experiences and suggests for us to drop our questions, trust in life and simply let the song come out. Shuddha Anami, a physician and educator from Gujarat, India, sings a chant on a sun-drenched rooftop while narrating the idea that there's no need to fear if we recognize our voice isn't ours anyway, it's a gift. The last speaker of the film is National Medal of Arts recipient, composer Morten Lauridsen, featured in our first film, Shining Night, recounting being told by his third-grade art teacher that he had no talent- and so he tried music instead. And, he muses, though his singing voice is not outstanding, he found such joy in singing in choirs. In the background he is singing a new composition, 'Ya Eres Mia', with text by Pablo Neruda, while playing piano- the piece which then appears in full choral splendor with a close up of a budding flower and the text- 'And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom- Anais Nin,' leading to a closing dedication and credits. Following the credits is a scene of the Finnish winter coast and text from Leonard Cohen's iconic song- 'Ring the bells that still can ring, forget your perfect offering, there's a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in'.
Beyond the Fear of Singing
Documentary,Music
Film Details
When one's voice has been locked up for a lifetime and the freedom to sing has become a distant memory, to come out of hiding can be a doorway to joy. The story unfolds through four sequential sections, titled Silenced, Emerging, Reclaiming, and Opening. Over fifty people are interviewed in the course of the film, several with recurring roles.
Highlighted voices are voice educators offering their insights and perspective on overcoming fear and expressing one's own voice, regardless of what others may say. The film opens to a sequence of rushing mountain streams followed by a guitar duo playing in the forest, with a short voice-over introduction leading into opening titles. In the first chapter, Silenced, a variety of people in America and Europe express a common theme of shutting down their voices at an early age, or believing they could sing until hearing their voice recorded, or being so humiliated about their voice they wished they could die.
Voices include Bay Area author, Jerry Jampolsky, describing his trauma of being told to 'mouth the words' in a children's choir, an Austrian event producer being told by her musically trained parents that she couldn't sing until she trained and was 'the best', and an artist/cinematographer couple from Los Angeles offering several glimpses of their relationship, both to their voice and each other. Primary educators in this section include Mark Fox, an American opera singer living in Germany, author and developer of True Voice method; Bruce Bough, an Irish neurosurgeon who presents a detailed analysis of what happens when we're asked to sing with an unhealed traumatic experience in the past, and Susie Ro Prater, a singer and voice educator from United Kingdom. The second chapter, Emerging, begins with Steve Quinn, a Scottish business consultant convinced he couldn't sing, who decided to take a seminar in Italy on discovering your voice, followed by a Nick Woolsey, a fire-dancer from Canada who reflects how he got into dancing because he couldn't sing- and even though he thinks he's bad at it, maybe he'd like to begin singing anyway.
Actress Whoopi Goldberg offers an insight when she describes that for her, every time you breathe you are singing your song. Australian economist and filmmaker Helena Norbert-Hodge describes indigenous cultures, where everyone sang all the time- yet how even there, young people have become so enamored by the music of the West they begin to look askance at their traditional music. Chris James, an Australian vocal coach, expresses that even people who believe they can't sing, if they take the time to get quiet and listen, can actually sing in tune- immediately.
Lennart Franke, a German healing arts practitioner, recalls his childhood as filled with singing as a natural experience, and how earth-centered festivals provide many opportunities for freely singing. Susanne Goebel, a singer and voice educator from Regensburg, Germany, offers that singing isn't about giving something, but receiving the sound of your own voice. Several people describe how singing helped them in major healing processes; Katrin Kohlbecher, a psycho-social worker with former child soldiers in Uganda, conveys how singing was one of the few places where they could come into themselves again.
The third chapter, Reclaiming, begins with Susie Ro Prater narrating the path of emergence from our 'cave', coming into singing with others in songs which are easily joined, such as African songs, Gospel songs, Kirtan- and then coming into sharing our unique 'soul song'- whereupon Sabrina, a woman from Seattle who doesn't consider herself a performer, sings a song she wrote and describes the experience of singing it. Christian Bollmann, a German recording artist and educator, offers a description of overtone singing as a way of gaining more knowledge of one's voice. Sarah Thule, a Finnish woman, sings a spontaneous chant in the forest; a man with throat cancer describes how he was searching for his old voice, but now realizes this is his new voice; an Italian physicist joyfully expresses how you can hear a song in your head, but when you express it, so often it comes out wrong! Benjamin van Haeff, an Australian singer living in Germany describes his experience of being with children, teaching music and English to kindergartners- and how richly this has impacted his own acceptance of his musical life.
Roberto Nadine, a Venetian gondolier, offers that music begins when we are born, that our first cry is a song. His segment ends with him taking a group out on the water while he sings to them, with voice-over by Stephen Clift, editor of a British journal on music and health, musing how humans may have gathered together and sang 100,000 years ago in ways not so different from how we gather today. Christian Ehrmann, leader of the Swedish Royal Marching Band, leads their group in a song on their tour bus while in the background a synchronized military fast march segues into a flock of birds running on the beach.
Kay Pollak, a Swedish film director, suggests that the song in everyone is 'the song to belong'. The fourth chapter, Opening, begins with the founder of the Klangheilzentrum in Munich, Wolfgang Friederich, a medical doctor who discovered for himself that bringing people into singing was a more effective method of helping them than prescribing medicine. A European movement of singing in large groups is introduced with scenes from these gatherings, followed by scenes of choral rehearsals in America, Canada and Iceland, narrated by Canadian voice educator Siobhan Robinsong.
A concert vignette with Deva Premal and Miten follows, interspersed with an interview of her process of coming out of shyness to have her voice heard alone, rather than always singing together with her husband. A Finnish yoga teacher sings lullabies to her baby while describing her experience of singing lullabies, while the camera brings us very close into the experience. In a light inter-species moment, Bernd Seifried, a German psychologist specializing in donkey-assisted therapy, describes how he encourages his donkeys to sing as a choir; a second segment with Benjamin van Haeff focuses on his music as his refuge, and how his son's relaxed approach to learning to walk helped him to come to peace with making mistakes in the learning process.
The film then revisits several people from earlier, as they describe how they overcame their fears and began expressing their voice more freely. Bruce Bough, the neurosurgeon, returns with a reminder that no matter what experience our brain remembers, we can always choose in the moment to leave an old pattern behind. Northwest composer Alex Shapiro exclaims how it's not about being perfect, but simply about the joy of expressing.
Austrian monk and author Brother David Steindl-Rast recounts his childhood singing experiences and suggests for us to drop our questions, trust in life and simply let the song come out. Shuddha Anami, a physician and educator from Gujarat, India, sings a chant on a sun-drenched rooftop while narrating the idea that there's no need to fear if we recognize our voice isn't ours anyway, it's a gift. The last speaker of the film is National Medal of Arts recipient, composer Morten Lauridsen, featured in our first film, Shining Night, recounting being told by his third-grade art teacher that he had no talent- and so he tried music instead.
And, he muses, though his singing voice is not outstanding, he found such joy in singing in choirs. In the background he is singing a new composition, 'Ya Eres Mia', with text by Pablo Neruda, while playing piano- the piece which then appears in full choral splendor with a close up of a budding flower and the text- 'And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom- Anais Nin,' leading to a closing dedication and credits. Following the credits is a scene of the Finnish winter coast and text from Leonard Cohen's iconic song- 'Ring the bells that still can ring, forget your perfect offering, there's a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in'..