The pressure of having to always be right, whether we are setting the rules or doing our best to follow them, is simply too suffocating for the delicate and complicated art of singing.
| There’s been talk of Saturn Returning in our world lately, and it’s gotten me thinking about expectations in the voice studio. I’ve been through this experience with a good many close relationships, not to mention my own. The recent conversations have me thinking that one of the key ingredients during this time of people’s lives has to do with the way that we process expectation, and create a sense of personal ownership over our own actions. To understand the transition, we have to begin with where we come from. |  Saturn Returns is a perceived celestial event that is supposed to occur during people’s late twenties that is marked by soul searching, emotional challenges, life upheaval, and seeming randomness. |
Children, by design, can typically only appreciate their own needs, and as such, are more self-centered. Most tend to be aware of others through budding strands of empathy (if they are taught to), and regular expectations placed upon them by adults.
As people enter young adulthood, their brains develop the capacity for deeper, more regular empathy, yet, the world around them maintains a steady regimen of expectations (school, new job, dating, new relationships, children, etc.) that keep them mired in feeling like they have to live life by other people’s rules.
After 5-10 years of this process, matched with a growing sense of self within the whole, people tend to long for a change. As they begin to ask themselves why they respond so often to the expectations of others, the same patterns that have built their sense of stability in their community, major upheavals occur, leading to a sense that the entire universe is realigning, if only for them.
A meaningful Saturn Return potentially carries the following traits:
1) individuals understand that they have the power and authority to create their own expectations for themselves
2) they understand that others will create expectations for themselves as well that may not align with their own expectations
3) they develop measures of empathy that allow for them to hear other people’s desires as separate from their own, allowing them to respond with less judgement and more compassion, because they grow to understand that. . .
4) living in close community requires us to balance our own desires with the desires of those around us
The trick here, again, tends to be that young adults are less practiced at articulating their own desires, because they never knew that they were allowed to, and didn’t know the difference.
1) individuals understand that they have the power and authority to create their own expectations for themselves
2) they understand that others will create expectations for themselves as well that may not align with their own expectations
3) they develop measures of empathy that allow for them to hear other people’s desires as separate from their own, allowing them to respond with less judgement and more compassion, because they grow to understand that. . .
4) living in close community requires us to balance our own desires with the desires of those around us
The trick here, again, tends to be that young adults are less practiced at articulating their own desires, because they never knew that they were allowed to, and didn’t know the difference.
Back to the studio. . .the voice studio (and vocal ensemble room) may represent one of the most pronounced dens of expectation in our society, second only to Congress and night clubs. Generally speaking, vocalists enter into these environments while still young, and they learn that their opinions don’t matter in comparison to their instructor. They learn to respond unquestioningly to the expectations of their leader, swallowing their own sense of self for the sake of the experience. Then, students tend to become instructors early in their careers (often before they are twenty-one), leading them to turn the table, and become the progenitor of expectation, taking up the mantle of dictator prior to that magical time in life when they begin to realize that dictatorial regime may not have a place in close community. Yet, for some reason, even as we develop agency during our late twenties, the voice community remains staunchly, and one-sidedly, expectation driven.
Imagine if the opposite were true. Imagine if, as instructors, we used the voice studio as a place wherein young people were taught that not only did their opinion matter, but that it is critical to the positive outcome of their experience.
What if we taught them to begin to develop a sense of self, one that hungered for knowledge for the sake of being able to set personal goals and measure the outcomes? What if we showed our students what it means to state personal desires and hear the desires of others stated as well, and they were able to participate in the ensuing dialogue that leads to the compromise so essential to close community engagement? What would that do for their sense of empathy, their growth as artists, and their confidence in themselves? More importantly, perhaps. . .What would it do for the instructors?
What if we taught them to begin to develop a sense of self, one that hungered for knowledge for the sake of being able to set personal goals and measure the outcomes? What if we showed our students what it means to state personal desires and hear the desires of others stated as well, and they were able to participate in the ensuing dialogue that leads to the compromise so essential to close community engagement? What would that do for their sense of empathy, their growth as artists, and their confidence in themselves? More importantly, perhaps. . .What would it do for the instructors?
The pressure of having to always be right, whether we are setting the rules or doing our best to follow them, is simply too suffocating for the delicate and complicated art of singing. Until we find a way to create paradigms wherein our singers and ourselves can feel that we all have an equal emotional footing, we will continue to frustrate our process, regardless of how much we know about the larynx. On the contrary, when we do find this place, perhaps Saturn’s appearance on our celestial calendar will be but a reminder of our sovereign authority over ourselves, our capacity to hear and appreciate other opinions, and the inevitable generosity toward others that follows.
~David
~David
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