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Far 2 Fabulous
Join Catherine & Julie, your feisty hosts at Far 2 Fabulous, as they lead you on a wellness revolution to embrace your fabulousness.
Julie, a Registered Nutritional Therapist with over 20 years of expertise, and Catherine, a former nurse turned Pilates Instructor and Vitality Coach, blend wisdom and laughter seamlessly.
Off the air, catch them harmonising in their local choir and dancing to 80's hits in superhero attire. Catherine braves the sea for year-round swims, while Julie flips and tumbles in ongoing gymnastics escapades.
With a shared passion for women's health and well-being, they bring you an engaging exploration of health, life, and laughter. Join us on this adventure toward a more fabulous and empowered you!
Far 2 Fabulous
Joy, Community and Breath: Uncovering the Magic Behind Singing
Episode 81:
Joy, Community and Breath: Uncovering the Magic Behind Singing
What brings genuine joy to your life, and when did you last allow yourself to fully experience it?
In this soul-stirring episode, we're joined by Abi Gilchrist, founder of UK Soul Choirs, who reveals how the seemingly simple act of singing together creates profound transformation. Far beyond hitting the right notes, community singing builds connection, resets your nervous system, and opens pathways to joy that many of us have forgotten how to access.
"The singing is what brings people in, but the community is what keeps them there," Abi shares, explaining how choir membership creates unexpected friendships and belonging that ripple into every area of life. You'll discover why joining a choir means never walking through town without recognising a friendly face, and how these casual connections ground us to our communities in ways we desperately need.
Dive deep into the physiological magic of singing as Abi unpacks the "accent breath method" and why proper breathing technique creates a full-body reset. Learn why the out-breath, not the in-breath, is key to vocal power and nervous system regulation. If you've ever thought "I can't sing" (as most of us have!), Abi explains why this is rarely true – and how developing your ear, not your voice, is the real secret to finding your musical confidence.
Whether you're curious about choir, struggling with stress, or simply searching for more joy and connection, this conversation illuminates how singing with others might be the wellness practice you never knew you needed. As Abi says, "If you find singing, you're going to be fine." Ready to discover why?
You can find out more about UK Soul Choirs HERE and follow them on Insta and FB and you can follow the fabulous and talented Abi Gilchrist HERE.
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Thank you for listening.
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For more information about Julie Clark Nutrition, click HERE
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We look forward to you joining us on the next episode.
Welcome to Far Too Fabulous hosted by Julie and Catherine.
Speaker 2:Join us on a mission to embrace your fabulousness and redefine wellness. Get ready for some feistiness, inspiration, candid chats and humour as we journey together towards empowered wellbeing. Let's dive in. Hello, hello and welcome to this week's episode of the Far Too Fabulous podcast. There she goes again. I'm singing. It's the microphone. I think it makes this like an old-fashioned microphone. It makes me feel like we should be doing like those adverts, or I don't know.
Speaker 1:Anyway, we should give you a hairbrush. She told a hairbrush the intro, and then you'd go for it, wouldn't you?
Speaker 2:Right then, we've not even attempted to behave. Today we have a far too fabulous guest with us today. We have abby gilchrist, who is the, the owner, the creator, the I don't know, the inspiration, the founder, the oomph behind UK Soul Choirs, amongst like. I'm not even going to list the many other things that you do. I'm going to let you tell everybody about yourself, but we, obviously we know you and talk about you on the podcast, about choir all of the time.
Speaker 2:So listeners already know who you are so tell us, abby, who are you and where'd you come from?
Speaker 3:yes, I'm the founder of the choirs that these two crazy, uh women are part of as well, which is a joy. And yeah, I'm a professional singer and have been a self-employed freelance singer always, which is not something that a lot of people can say, because you know it's pretty hard being a freelance musician fully self-employed in in everything that I do, and it's been quite the journey of discovery and kind of, you know, making my life into what I've wanted it to be and and choir has become a major, major part of that, perhaps the most big, the biggest part of it really, which was never really something that it was I set out to do. It kind of happened organically. I started with the idea of it and 15 years ago and well, let's just say it has, it has blossomed. It has blossomed, it's a beast, it's created, it's bigger than me.
Speaker 3:In fact, the other day I was like Ross. My husband said if we died, what would happen with choir? I was like I don't know. He was like you know, we can't just, we can't just stop because, like all these memberships, like what would happen to the memberships? I was like I don't know, we need to think about that. Yeah, like we need to have a exit plan.
Speaker 2:Yeah, anyway, I think it's an entity on its own. I think it would now just keep going.
Speaker 3:I think it would. I think it would. Yeah, I mean it's. It's an amazing thing, it's an amazing community, it's an amazing source of um friendship and um energy and growth and challenge and all things that I never realized 15 years ago that would be so important to me and to other people have become so obviously the most important thing in life. Actually, and, as I always say, the singing is really quite a low priority in the choir, because it's not. The singing is obviously what brings people in, but it's it's not what keeps them there people in but it's. It's not what keeps them there, um, what keeps them there is is the community, and you know, being part of this thing, this beast is what bring, it was what keeps them there, um, so, yeah, it's, it's a, it's a wonderful, it's a wonderful life.
Speaker 2:I'm very, I'm very lucky the community was one of the things I wanted to pick up on, because I was talking to one of my coaches the other day. I was talking about choir and how can I replicate something that makes people get in their car on a Saturday afternoon, drive 15 miles into the middle of nowhere and we're talking about, like a couple of weekends ago, like a village fair or something we're talking about like a couple of weekends ago? Who like a village fair or something to sing their hearts out, to sit around and take part in this country fair, of which none of us lived in the area, and then maybe make an entire day of it, maybe go home again. We're in full merch and we do this for free and utterly, utterly willingly, and I was like it's genius.
Speaker 3:It is genius, it is, it's bonkers. When you put it like that, it's actually bonkers, isn't it? Yeah, and yeah, and I do see that and I am amazed. And when people say to me oh, do you think you'll get a choir? And I, I just, I don't even need to think about it, I just go. Yeah, of course I will. Like, it's not even a second thought for me. Will I get a choir? Yes, because I know that people will turn up and I won't have everybody, but I've got enough people now that there is always enough.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know, um, and we've done, haven't we? We've done things with, with 10 people before, and it's still fine, like it's fine, it doesn't matter, it really doesn't matter. And I don't ever panic about that, and that is one of the greatest things, because it's social. It's a social life, really, isn't it? It's people saying, oh well, I'm going to go, I'll go to that. I don't know who's even going to be there, but I know I'll have some people that I can sit and have a cup of tea with and have a natter for an hour, and then I'll go home and I will have done something with my day that otherwise perhaps I'd probably just go to Sainsbury's and that'll be that.
Speaker 3:You know, that's just that in itself is enough to keep people coming back.
Speaker 1:One of the things I noticed was, when I moved to Whitstable, my lovely neighbour, helen, who's moved away now. I'm still gutted about it, but as a lovely neighbor, helen, she suggested that I come and sing in the choir and I just remember my initial response being, uh, no, she went. No, you would love it. You would love it, and it was very small at that point. I remember doing the oil festival and there was about 10 of us on the stage and it was terrifying. But you know, we did it. But I joined the choir.
Speaker 1:But the thing that I noticed the most was because I was new to the area. Whenever I then walked anywhere or went anywhere, I would just know someone, and then he and my husband would say well, how do you know that person? I'll be like oh, it's a choir person. I never knew their names because I'm rubbish at people's names. I just know it's a choir person. It's a choir person. You're going to shop. Oh, I didn't know. You worked here. You're from choir, aren't you? And that's the thing you, I mean, you can't, you literally can't go anywhere because you've got lots of communities yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Claire doesn't want to run with me anymore because we'll be running down the beach and she'll be. What was that? Swimming or choir? Who is that like?
Speaker 3:there's just everywhere yeah, and my children say, if we go into town, can you please put sunglasses on and a hat, don't talk to anyone, you promise. And I said no, I can't promise that I can't. But at mummy, you just spend hours talking to everybody. I'm like, well, yeah, they're all you know. And I say they're my friends yeah, they're my friends.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you wouldn't ignore your friends, would you? Happens that you've got a lot. I've just got a lot, yeah, yeah, and actually my friends that I got from moving to whitstable, most of them have come via the choir, it's that lovely.
Speaker 3:And I mean yesterday or no dead before yesterday, I stopped at a petrol station on the outskirts of broadstairs, margate somewhere, like that, I don't even know where I was. I stopped at the petrol station anyway and I went in. It was late and so you couldn't go into the shop, so you had to just go up to the window. And um, and I went up and I was like I had to get some. Sorry, sorry, julie, I had to get some Haribo for the children for school but yeah.
Speaker 3:I mean I don't and I actually said I'm they're not for me. I need to get some Haribo. And she went are you from Soul Choir? And I said yeah, and she was like, oh, I thought you were. I recognised you. I used to be in the Margate Choir for one term. Oh, I just wanted to tell you I loved it, I loved it, I loved it, I'm coming back. And you know, I just had this whole other conversation. And she was like, oh, I'm.
Speaker 1:Sarah just had, you know, a whole conversation with someone totally random and I just thought how amazing is that and these little interactions that we have are so important. Me and Ian were talking about this just yesterday, about the fact that because we've got a dog and we walk the dog and we were looking at he, he would love to be self-sufficient, so he's looking at various things, mostly in Wales because that's where you get the space. But he said we couldn't do it because you, you would miss those social interactions that you have and that's what it gives you as well.
Speaker 3:I think absolutely yeah, I think you would, because often I think about moving somewhere and I know that I could just do a choir and then I'd start it all again, so it's fine. But equally, you know, when you have made such an important connection in your local area, then you know you feel absolutely grounded to it, don't you? And I think, yeah, it's one of the, it's one of the most amazing things. And communities, singing has become one of the best ways of finding a community, and that's why I always say to people find a choir. I, you know, don't, I don't care if it's my choir, just find a choir. Particularly when people are having mental health issues. And I just think you know, the best thing you can do for yourself is find a community, in whatever way that is. And I know that singing is just like a you're just gonna, you're just gonna be fine. If you find singing, you're gonna be fine. Um, so I always say to people that and and they say I can't sing, I can't sing, who cares about?
Speaker 2:it is almost like it comes second. It's a bit it's reminded me of um. I remember when I was pregnant and I joined the nct classes. It wasn't because I needed to know I'd like or needed to be guilted into not having a cesarean section or not and being told the perfect way of having this baby. It was that I wanted to create a community like around myself of like-minded people, and and I did.
Speaker 3:They all visited me this weekend, 18 plus years on, and that's and that's so amazing and the support is, you know, a support network in whatever way it is. You know, through pregnancy, I had the same thing through pregnancy, through singing, through just living in an area. You need a support network, so, yeah, you absolutely do.
Speaker 1:When you were coming up with the idea for the choir, did you consider because our podcast is obviously about well-being and health did you consider that aspect of bringing people together, or was it not even at that point? And it's come on as as the yeah, it's grown and developed it was honestly for me at the beginning.
Speaker 3:I'm a musician, I'm a singer. It's just always been about the singing and and for me it was like just purely selfish. I love choral music, I love the, the being part of singing in a group. I love creating, you know, arrangements for for group singing. I love, I love music, I love songs, I love soul music so much and I. For me it was absolutely selfish and I just was like I want to do more of this and I think that I've got something to offer musically and and I can and I want to do it of this, and I think that I've got something to offer musically and and I can and I want to do it. So I'm going to do it and see if anyone wants to come and do it with me.
Speaker 3:And that was literally it from from day one and then, very quickly, I started realizing that the people that came came for the singing but they were looking for something else. Really, you know, even if they don't realize it at the time, because everybody's looking for connection, that's the human, that's the human thing is, you know, we are all looking for connection. We don't realize it and you know, and I'm definitely one of those people that has always been like I've got enough friends. You know, yeah, I've got enough friends. I feel I haven't got. I've got very limited time. So I've got enough friends for that limited time, because I don't even see my friends as it is the one that you want to see. No, I've got my best friends from school since we were 11 and they're all around the country and I just constantly feel like I don't see them enough, and so I just I remember saying to my children I've got enough friends, don't worry. And then it's like, oh, no, actually, no, actually I can have hundreds, there's room for more, there's definitely room for more. And and then your friendships start changing, you know, as as you grow older and you know, and you just have different interests and things. And now, and I think about the friends that I've got from choir particularly, and I've got in all my choirs in London and in Kent.
Speaker 3:I've definitely got my, my friendship group within choir and I have to be really careful because, you know, my boundaries have to be really quite set with choir because, you know, I get Facebook requested to protect a little bit of my myself and my energy, of my personal energy, because everybody gets me in a room and that's wonderful and I'm very happy to do that, but you know actually who I am I have to be really careful with and um, so I'm really select with my friends and and it did take me a little while to be that person that to be able to say actually I'm going to let my guard down to you and really actually be, have a friendship with you, um, and I'm really glad I've done that and and it's it's interesting because I've got lots of leaders now seven leaders in choir that, um, they're starting to have this as well and they're sort of saying, well, I've, you know, I've got people who want to kind of hang out and I feel a bit strained, not really sure what to do. So I've had to have this conversation with leaders and talk about my experience of it and my boundaries. And actually I had a drink with some choir people years ago, actually right at the beginning, and one of them we were talking about what their characteristics, really, what their strong qualities, and they came to me me, I don't know why we had this conversation anyway and this choir person who wasn't a particularly good friend of mine, but you know, we were amicable, friendly he said one of your greatest qualities is your boundaries and I was like whoa, that's a really interesting thing for someone to say about some of it. And I said, wow, I've never even thought about that.
Speaker 3:And he was like your boundaries are so good. He was like you make people feel that they're part of what you're doing, but you're not close enough that they are infiltrating your energy and you're not having to kind of hoik people up all the time. And I said, oh, wow, okay, that's really amazing, what an amazing thing to say and that's really wonderful and I hope that is case. And now I'm really going to go and think about that and try and work out what I do and what I can do better or how I'm doing it, and so now that's become a real part of what I do actually is my protection of my boundaries no-transcript.
Speaker 3:And I think it's nothing I've ever thought about until he said it. Actually, this guy probably about seven years ago he said it and I was like, oh, wow. And then since then I've done a lot of my own work on myself and I've done a lot of therapy. I've done a lot of my own work on myself and I've done a lot of therapy. I've done a year of inner child therapy and things, and it's and it's really shown me how important boundaries are for me and I think actually for everybody. And I, yeah, I try and tell my children about it, but I think it's really hard when you're young to understand, really hard. Yeah, it's really.
Speaker 3:It's something that you just kind of suddenly start factoring into your life and you know, some people are just are really good at it, naturally, and some people are not really good at it, and when you meet them you're like whoa, and you can really tell instantly.
Speaker 3:And now, because I'm so, I think I'm so aware of it, because I'm so aware for myself, I really feel it with other people very much and I go okay, you're quite closed, it's okay, you're quite open. Do I want to be open with you? What am I? Where am I going to go with this. You know, um, I think you know, and I think I think I'm ADHD as well and I think it's part of an ADHD ability to have that navigation tool. Um, because, uh, both me and Ross definitely have it and he's been terrible with boundaries and he's had to had to get better at boundaries, because if you're someone who you're a people pleaser and I'm not a people pleaser, but he is it's really hard to have boundaries so hard and that's what we covered on the episode didn't you so?
Speaker 1:if you're listening to this now and you're thinking I need to address this, go back and listen to that, because it was really, really interesting I'm going to listen to it because I'm all about it, yeah that's really interesting that it appears to have come really naturally to you, yeah and then it's.
Speaker 2:It's actually later on that you've kind of consciously applied it yeah, consciously tuned into it.
Speaker 3:I would say, yeah, definitely, and I think you know to be a choir leader, you have to be someone like that, actually, who knew I didn't know that was part of it, part of the job. But it definitely is part of the job and and now I have to help my leaders to navigate it because, as you say, some people, it doesn't come naturally for you're gonna have to start choir leader academy.
Speaker 1:Oh my word, no more shiny objects, no, please we must talk about the benefits of singing, because there's a lot involved here and we often talk about the vagus nerve and that impact on your nervous system and the breath and all of these kind of things. But before we go into that, I must talk about joy, because a lot of people who's she? A lot of people, she should be with us all the time. She's often missing for a lot of people. I will have this conversation with clients where you know it's quite a detailed consultation. We have to go through everything. But I'll ask somebody a question what brings you joy? The amount of people that can't answer that question is quite disturbing. But singing is definitely joyful. Right, you can't not be joyful when you're singing, even when you're singing a sad song. It made me laugh when we were having our Friday session with Ross and we were singing the missing song, yeah, and he said can you listen, guys? Can you listen to the words?
Speaker 2:because it's not a jolly song, you know just, you know, doing our thing and I miss you slightly tone it in a different way but it made me laugh because even when we're singing a sad song, we're properly joyful, aren't we?
Speaker 3:yeah, because the joy, the singing comes from the, you know, the oxytocin and all of the stuff that comes with it. Just the physical um power of singing in the body, the connection to breath, the connection to spirit, um is what makes it joy. So it doesn't actually matter what you're singing, because I get, and you know, when you sing something really sad, or not even that it's sad, or just something that really touches you doesn't have to be sad because it can be anything that touches you actually, but there's some songs I just cannot get through without, you know, a lump coming and and that in itself is a joy, you know. And when people say to me, oh, I can't, you know I'm feeling really low and I don't think I can sing because, um, you know it will set me off and I'll be really upset, I, I always say, sing when you're happy, sing when you're sad, because singing is it, is that it's a release of anything that you need to release.
Speaker 3:I, I actively go to those songs that I know will get me just a lump in my throat or I will struggle to sing through them, and it's the same ones every single time, and so sometimes I'll be like, and I won't even consciously do it.
Speaker 3:I think I'm just going to sing that and then I know, as soon as I start, there's some reason that you feel like you know Abby needs to sing this right at this moment and it's going to cause me to have a little moment to myself. But that is the joy, yeah, not running away from those emotions, not saying I can't be, I can't touch that, because that makes me so sad, I can't do it, go. It makes me sad. I'm going to embrace it because I need that, because that's the yin and yang of life. You know, that's my heart, that's. I need that. To have that joy, I've got to go through that pain and the pain is the joy, and the joy and the pain it's all together joy and pain and rain see, it's all the same and that's why songs are so brilliant, because it's like their life.
Speaker 3:They're just telling you it all. Well, some of them are some of the words you're like.
Speaker 2:Some of them are a load of rubbish some of them are a load of or I was, I've never been singing that. They're um, oh, missing, there's oh, and I miss you like. Oh, what is it? It's the out of space.
Speaker 1:You, you thought they'd found, they'd found some better place.
Speaker 2:Oh, apparently they're out of space out of space. Yeah, and sometimes if I am not really really concentrating, I just immediately blast back into back into your own, some better place back into your habit yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, like my friend professional singer who still has to sing disco in Burnham because he really thought about a disco in Burnham. Yeah, so he off, he goes disco in Burnham.
Speaker 2:I can vouch that there are very little discos in Burnham. I lived there for a little while.
Speaker 3:No discos going on. Yeah, I think you know, I think that the singing, the joy of the singing, is wherever you can find your joy. As you say, julie, it's people who haven't had that or just don't know how to tap into joy. I really feel for them and I really would love them to find something, and it doesn't have to be singing, it can be swimming, it can be reading, it can be walking, it can be anything. But you know, something has got to bring you joy.
Speaker 1:All of them please, yeah, all of them. A lot of the time it'll be things that people liked when they're a child, yeah, that they've forgotten about and let go, yeah. And I say to them you know, what did you like? And it will be just random things. I say go do that thing. Go be free, go do that thing?
Speaker 3:yeah, absolutely. I think we get so caught up, don't we? By work and you know everything else family that we forget about. Well, I mean, I'm all about the inner child. We should do another whole podcast about inner child, if you want, because I'm all about that, about finding do you know, I've gone the other way.
Speaker 2:I think, like through school I wanted I definitely wanted to be part of the choir and there was this whole I don't know that it wasn't, it wasn't cool, or I just never let myself go there and uh, and well, I mean I've clearly let go of that. Now you've gone the other way, I've gone you've really gone the other way and I think there's.
Speaker 2:You were talking about joy and I think there's an allowing of it. I think that we, like you've said about friends and and like, can I have too many friends? Like love, can you know, have I got that ability to expand, to love that many people? Have I got that ability to just allow myself as much joy? Because, even like, when somebody has a little bit of joy now and I watch this in in like, even like breath work and saunering and all these sorts of things like somebody will have a little bit of joy and they go, that's enough for me now and then they'll kind of they'll pull it back.
Speaker 2:I'm not allowed any more joy and to just, I don't know, just to fully, fully embrace it.
Speaker 3:I get people like that, we get that from with choir and I can, I can tell the people that saying, oh, I felt it was just too much for me, you know, and that is that they're not ready to open themselves to that and let it in. That's, that's all that is. You know. And now you know, and you have to be ready, and who knows why that is, you know, that's obviously some something that's happening with them, um, that they're just not in a place that they can receive joy in that way. You know, because because singing is like a, it comes from within, but it is also particularly in a choir is that it's all around you. You can't help but be swept up in it, and if you're not feeling that you can receive, then there's no, there's no way you can do it, and that's desperately sad. And I, and I try my best with people to say give it another go. You know, just come and do it. Don't put any pressure on yourself. Just just come and just experience. Don't panic about anything.
Speaker 3:You know, everyone wants to be good. I'm not good enough, I'm not good enough, I'm not good enough. I hear that all the time, or I feel like I'm not good enough singer for this, you know it's. It's never about being a good good enough. Good enough, you are good enough. You're good enough in anything. Everyone's good enough.
Speaker 2:I often quote you that you said that you've only ever come across one person you've never been able to actually help sing 100%, yeah, only one person.
Speaker 3:And in all these years, and how many thousands of people have I come across? And I have had some challenges, don't get me wrong. I have had some people I've thought, wow, what am I going to do here? And it's interesting because I've had come through so many challenges now with people that now when I get one, I go, oh, I love it. Now I'm like it's fine, don't even panic about it, because I know we'll get there.
Speaker 3:I know and I'd love to actually to go back to that person, because that was before I even started choir that that person you were talking about, and I would love to get her again and maybe see whether maybe now I could, maybe I'd have a different way of doing it. But she was trying to do GCSE music and singing as her instrument. That was quite hard. Oh yeah, that is difficult. That was quite hard. Yeah, yeah, because she just couldn't hear pitch.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I bet with all of your skills, since I bet, yeah, I'm sure you'd have been able to.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think there are ways around it, and a lot of the time, when people say to me, now I can't sing, actually what they can't do is hear and Ross and I talk about this a lot, and it's so when people say to me, I think I need a singing lesson with you, they don't need a singing lesson, they need an ear lesson, they need a listening lesson, a hearing lesson, because they just haven't come from and I'll be honest, it is often men because they just haven't come from this freedom of listening and singing along to music like that. Women, just by who they are, who we are as women, we just seem to feel a lot freer to just sing the hell out of something in the car and not care, right, and I think that's been the case since we were kids. Um, whereas I think there comes to a point with with men, probably when their voice change, changes and they go through puberty, that they lose the confidence to just sing and and so they have this kind of block time when and and either they go, oh, I'm gonna carry on, I'm gonna do it again, or they just continue the block and then that's, I don't sing, I can't sing, but it's not, they just haven't been there, they haven't gone there yet. So how do they know? And that for me is so sad when someone says that to me and I want to shake them and go.
Speaker 3:Just please, just come with me, we can do this, I know you're going to be able to do this. Just let yourself. Let yourself, don't tell me that. I mean, I had at that community day last weekend. I had about three people who said to me oh no, you wouldn't want to hear me. I said, oh no, I would, yeah, would bring it on.
Speaker 3:I'd love to hear you. Oh no, you wouldn't. Oh no, you know, get that and and they're so embarrassed and I go. No, I don't feel that at all and I really say it so genuinely to them because I I genuinely feel it that I do want to hear them. Their voice is as important to me as anybody else is those people who think they can't yeah, you teach now.
Speaker 2:Yes, just I'm. You can see that you love it and it looks really, really exciting. I would, I would love to be in amongst all those enthusiastic people that want to do musical theatre for their entire lives.
Speaker 3:That looks like so much fun, so much fun and that's a joy for me because I'm really dealing with the other end of singing. You know I'm dealing with people who really are fantastically talented. You know, and I've had some incredible people that have never had a singing lesson and just opened their mouths and can just make this insane quality of sound and we don't dislike them for that at all do we, no we don't?
Speaker 2:I mean, I'm truly we're really happy for them.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we're really happy for them, I mean, and it's just that in itself for me is a real joy. And then going to see them, you know, going seeing them move on to to have these wonderful careers, or or just just to know what they're doing with their voice and me to be a part of that is brilliant. I love it. So, yeah, I'm really lucky that I get to do all ends of the singing spectrum is what I call it, and it's, it's all. Just for me, it's just wonderful. It's just all part of the same journey. Just everyone's on their journey at a different place.
Speaker 2:That's what it is what's interesting, actually thinking about it, is your, the way that you are with them and the way that you are with us. Actually, there is there's no difference. It's the same enthusiasm and yeah, just 100 and they, they're a community.
Speaker 3:You know, students, when people are learning to sing at a high level, they're in their own community. They've still got all the same insecurities that that people are. You know, amateur singers in a choir have got everyone's got the same insecurities and it all comes down to our own insecurities about who we are and what not being good enough. You know, and it doesn't matter where you are on the singing scale. That's still the human position, isn't it? You know?
Speaker 2:yeah, yeah, so doesn't matter where you are on the singing scale.
Speaker 3:That's still the human position, isn't it? You know, yeah, yeah, so, yeah, I'm very lucky, I get to do a real mixed bag of stuff and sing myself, and and I still love singing myself as well.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, you've got. So you've got. How many bands do you have actually?
Speaker 3:Well, I have Miss Kitty, which is my kind of show band, you know, festivals and things like that and that's just brilliant because it's a real um, it's a real act, you know it's. It's everything I love about music it's funny, fun, it's dressing up yes, you know it. It's being a different character completely. You know it's taking on a different persona. It's singing exactly how I love singing. No one can tell me it's right or wrong and I love that because I created it and I get to sing again all my favourite songs and we get to change them up and do what we want to do with them. So it's just full freedom. It's like being a kid in a sweet shop, really, in terms of music. Doing Miss Kitty, so that's lovely. And and then getting the nice sort of response of people who think it's really fun and people dancing and loving it and, you know, going around the world with it, which I've done and I'm doing, and that's, you know, it's just. It's really lovely validation for something which we did just for the sheer joy of that. Really, that was just a joy project. Definitely it's really lovely validation for something which we did just for the sheer joy of that. Really, that was just for a joy project. Definitely that's done well.
Speaker 3:And then my other band is like a function band for weddings and things. I don't do that so much now because the young ones are coming up and you haven't got time, I haven't got time, I haven't got time and I haven't got the energy, because you have to really give a lot of energy for that and my energy is kind of elsewhere now. So, um, which is it's fine. You know we're moving on. We're moving on, it's all good. I'm very happy when I do it. I'm thrilled. I did one last weekend. It was brilliant. I loved singing blame it on the boogie wonderful that is fun.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's great for anybody that's listening if you have never seen anything to do with miss kitty. Miss kitty and the cats, and I mean everyone's having joy, other than the um, other than the bass player who, yeah, well, he's terrified. Yeah he is terrifying and he really is just like that no, no, he is very serious. But yeah, go and go and look it up, go and find them on youtube, or yeah, somewhere come to a gig.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah yeah, miss kitty, and the pads needs needs a bigger stage. I I mean, I I envision you on the, on the pyramid stage at glastonbury one day oh, imagine.
Speaker 3:well, I've always said I'll do glastonbury if they uh, if they helicopter me in and helicopter me out. So we shall see yeah exactly.
Speaker 2:I mean, if it's OK for Shirley Bassey in a sparkly dress and her wellies, it's good enough for Miss Kitty.
Speaker 3:I'm not camping there, so they'll have to do that. So I'm ready for you. Glastonbury.
Speaker 1:I know we need to finish up because we're a bit short on time now. Um, I just wanted to bring it just briefly back to the breath, because we are going to be recording, uh, an episode and we were talking about the breath and how it can be an indicator for longevity. So your ability to hold your breath comfortably for more than 10 seconds is an indicator for longevity and, of course, when we're singing, you know we're using the breath. So there must be health benefits other than that joy and the things we've spoken about, the mental health. There must be physical benefits to how your diaphragms work, in your lung capacity, etc absolutely there is yeah, and I'm and you know I I vote.
Speaker 3:I saw that most keenly kind of during Covid. Actually I got sent a few people with long Covid to come and have breath, some breath lessons, as it were, with me. It started off with a singing a lady who was a bit of a singer, kind of amateur singer in a choir, um, and but she was really really struggling because she'd had Covid and she had long Covid and she her lungs had been really wrecked by it. Her physio, I think yeah, her physio suggested that she did some some singing because she said I love singing. Oh, she said, oh, go go back and do some singing.
Speaker 3:Try and find someone who knows about breathing with singing and I think that would be good. And um, wow, it made such a difference when I just did so we initially I kind of did a good few weeks we were just on zoom because she wasn't able to go out because of her covid, sort of she was really having to be careful. And um, we did, we did good four or five weeks on just breathing and um, she said the difference was just enormous because the breathing for singing, you know breath, singing is breath. I always say it's the power, the power is the core. The power is is your tummy, is everything you're making there, um, the, the vocal folds and the, the voice apparatus itself, the larynx is is literally it's like picking up the guitar. You know you've the body that plays. The guitar is the thing that's doing it. This is literally just like having strings that you're plucking right, so it doesn't really matter what you're doing with this if the body is doing the right thing.
Speaker 3:So learning to you know harness your breath, and learning about how to control and manage your breath out, and my favorite book about this if you want to look up about breathing for singing and it's not just for singing, because they actually use it for, um, speech therapy as well it's where it came from. It's called the accent breath method. Accent breath method, um, and you can look it up on on google and find lots about it and that you'll see a lot of speech therapists doing sort of exercises, and it's what I do with choir, so you guys will know about it. It's these sounds of you know, all of those sounds that I do through choir, um, in our warm-ups, and basically what they're doing is getting your lung capacity to be open and free so that you're always having freedom when you take a breath.
Speaker 3:And the book is called when in Doubt, breathe Out, because it's not about your breath in, it's about breath out. So it's about how you manage breath out, not how you manage breath in. As I always say to people, the lungs are the lungs right, we're not getting bigger lungs. Singers don't have bigger lungs. They have the same size lungs. They're just better at managing what's coming in and what's coming out. So you can't take a bigger breath, you can take a better breath.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And, and that's so. I don't tend to say big breath, I say good breath. You know, when I'm working with my, my, my, my, my singing pro singers, because it's not about trying to get more, because you end up just getting really tense if you're trying to take loads and loads of breath in, but it's about getting the breath being free in between. So every time you take a breath, you're taking from fresh zero, you're getting rid of all of the carbon monoxide and you're taking in the fresh oxygen at the same time. So that's, that's the problem that a lot of singers have, or people that sing have um is that they basically don't completely get rid of all their air. So they're just taking fresh air on stale air all the time. So they're just sort of topping up, and topping up is fine to a certain degree, but you never feel like you've got full breath basically. So if you're trying to do your 10 seconds or more, you won't be able to do it because you will have just taken fresh on top of stale. That won't help you.
Speaker 3:You've got to, as I call it, the splatting Splat. Yeah, you've got to splat your airflow, which is all part of accent. It's where it comes from. So if you manage to learn how to splat, which is to totally relax and release, then you let go of all stale air and you take 100% fresh in and that means then you can do whatever you need to do with it. And then it's about how you manage it. It's about how you've managed to get to the 10 seconds or whatever else you need to do. Um, because there is a finite amount. There's no, you know, there's no. You can't, you can't keep going forever. There is a finite amount, although you can kind of circular breathe in singing.
Speaker 2:That's another thing I was just about to say. Can we remind you of that she?
Speaker 3:just said, we can't keep going forever, can?
Speaker 2:we remind you of that when we're doing something, because I was saying just one you won't, you didn't take it well enough.
Speaker 3:Well enough, you've got to manage it better.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it's understanding about the splatting and being able to splat fast, really fast, so that you're always just fresh each time, no matter what you're doing yeah the out breath is so key, I think people don't tend to think about the out-breath and you know we've both Catherine and I have both done breathwork practitioner courses and the out-breath is again goes back to the nervous system. What it does to the nervous system is completely different. A lot of people that are anxious are doing that air on stale air all the time. Like you've said, so many people shallow breathe just right at the top, yeah, so yeah, that out breath.
Speaker 1:I remember when I was a child I had severe asthma and the doctor recommended that I go learn to play the clarinet. I mean, that was an amazing piece of advice. Wow, they would never say that. No, no yeah, in asthma, it's not the breath in, it's the breath out. That's the problem and a lot of people don't realize that. So I'm really glad you raised that, because it is so important that breath out the breath out is so important, yeah, and it feels like it's opposite.
Speaker 3:So because you want to, like, do a big breath out, you feel like you have to be doing when actually you have to be relaxing, letting go, relaxing and letting go and people really struggle with that and I think women particularly struggle, because the relaxing is letting your tummy go. You know you can't do it while you're holding everything in and trying to feel like you're holding your tummy and having a flat tummy. That doesn't, no, you've got to just sorry, that doesn't happen we can't we go.
Speaker 3:We got to let that go and, um, that's, that's always been a struggle. My mum had pneumonia and, um, I went to see her in hospital and, uh, they, she said to me, they keep telling me that I'm not breathing very well, that my breathing's really shallow, and I was like, oh, my mother, how can you be embarrassing right, embarrassing what are you doing? And um, and that was the problem. So she was saying I can't catch my breath. And I was like, show me how you're breathing. And it was just when I breathe, like I breathe like this, and she was just breathing from her chest and so, well, of course, there's no breath there. That's just stale out, stale air, just being, you know, just planting extra tiny little shallow breaths. There's not. You're not going to feel at all that you've got any kind of breath in there and you're going to have no control over it doing that.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, I really recommend, if you're interested in understanding about breath and I love the breath work stuff I've done with Catherine, totally, I'm on board with it because it's all the same thing. It's all the same thing, it all comes from the same world and the breath you know, the, the accent breath method is absolutely incredible and I it's what I start with with all singing, no matter where you are, no matter your level of singing. I start with that because if you can't, if you can get your breath right, then you, then you're, you know you're, you're 90% there well, it's life at the end of the day, isn't it?
Speaker 1:you said, like you know, singing is breathing, breathing is living. We can't do anything without breathing. So let's get that right, and then we can live with it.
Speaker 3:And then and then, and, as you say about the, the parasympathetic nervous system, you know the vagus nerve is so important to have this relaxed breath and to be able to feel this splat is all part of that. So the larynx lifts up as you start singing. When you take a splat breath, when you release everything, then actually the larynx drops as well. Everything relaxes in the body each time you take a splat breath. So you're actually just allowing yourself this tiny that could be a tiny, tiny, milli, millisecond of relaxation. But if you imagine you're singing, all the time you're singing your song, you're just going to be getting constantly more and more sort of tense as you go through. If you just allow that splat, you're just resetting yourself every time. Got to have the reset, got to have the reset?
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I mean I do a lot of yin yoga now and yin yoga is all about this just switching off the mindset into. You know, go back to breath, back to breath, back to breath. Yeah, and I love it Because it all just for me, it's like everything weirdly has come full circle about breath and singing, about breath and singing, um, and now I surround myself with everything that is to do with breath weirdly, um, because it is, it is the core of, of everything to me, you know we're gonna have to get matching tattoos, abby.
Speaker 3:I know I love your one, apart from I'm too scared of a tattoo, but yeah.
Speaker 2:I promise you it didn't hurt what, what was, and again you're talking about full circle, allowing yourself to let go, and the yin yoga is that we don't allow ourselves that time, that reset. We feel like there is the like, the reward is for us to keep going, going yeah, and that we don't allow ourselves, like when I'm doing Pilates online and we just. The one of the first stretches we go into is child's pose and and I will leave them there for an uncomfortable amount of time and you can see them start to turn and like look at the screen as if to say yeah, I can't stay still for this long.
Speaker 2:What you know, what's next, what's next, what's next and just allowing yourself that that reset that time yeah, it's, it's amazing.
Speaker 3:And yin is incredible thing because it it really switches your brain off and I had no idea about what the power of it. And I started doing it sort of weekly and I was like, oh, this is nice, it's relaxing, you know, didn't think really anything of it and then about I guess about five, six weeks into it, um, I went in the room and I remember just feeling like everything in my body went before I'd even started. It was like as soon as she started, said, right, we're gonna go first into this. It was like my body went oh, I know what's happening now and it just, yeah, does its own reset. Actually, I love that it's. It's an incredible feeling and I never thought, I've never experienced it before and I've never. I didn't have a clue that this was what, what happens. And I said to her I was like, oh my god, this thing happened that I just suddenly felt like I went into, I zoned into this zone without even thinking about it, and she went yes, that's what happens. She went, that's when your parasympathetic nervous system comes in and it's like, ok, know where I am now? And it's like you know, your body wants it, you want it, your spirit needs it, but you want it. Your spirit needs it, but most of the time we don't, we haven't got the space to find it. So when you allow yourself to be somewhere.
Speaker 3:And someone said to me after choir, the on on monday night that, um, they said that they just suddenly felt like completely different from how they'd felt throughout the rest of the day, um, and they weren't particularly going to, particularly didn't particularly want to come to choir, but they thought it better come because they need. It was the last week and they need to do some of the songs or whatever. You know, being conscientious as my singers are. But they said, you know, we started singing and it was like I don't, I don't even really remember what happened because I just something had happened. And I said that's your parasympathetic kicking in your, your vagus nerve just went oh, I'm singing, I can calm down at this moment, and um, and so she said I don't even really remember the session. I said no, that's all good, that's great it's amazing, isn't it?
Speaker 2:you're just simply running as you.
Speaker 3:There's just no other bullshit going on, yeah yeah and um, I mean I have to go and do yin because I don't have that in singing, because singing for me is uh, you know it's, it's a, it's a job, it's a. I'm on it all the time I have. Yeah, um, and I miss that for myself when I'm doing choir and I and I love it that everybody else has it to an extent.
Speaker 3:And this, this lady really did have it that night and I was, like I said to said to her this is so brilliant. This is exactly why you come and you know, hold that and understand how powerful that was that moment. She was like I don't know what happened. I was like that's what happened and so that's why I have to find it elsewhere for myself. But I really feel the importance of it and I really hope people can have that moment because it's wow, it's great of it, and I really hope people can have that moment because it's it's wow, it's great, and I think a lot of people have that from meditation.
Speaker 3:I don't get that from meditation, sadly. I do meditate because I'm always thinking it is helping, but I don't and I but I just don't have that real shutdown in my system that I do from yin. It's just something in yin really triggers it beautifully for me, um, and sometimes I just yeah, I just like tears coming out of my. Something in yin really triggers it beautifully for me and sometimes I just yeah, I just like tears coming out of my eyes in yin. I'm not feeling sad, but just tears. You know, who knows Something that's like something's going. Something needs to come out.
Speaker 2:It's releasing again, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I'm like here we go, I release, you know, and my yoga teacher's always I always I said sorry, just a bit crying.
Speaker 2:Today she's like lovely, there it goes yeah, yeah, yeah, the yawns, the farts, anything just let it all go.
Speaker 3:It's like this is the body resetting. That's that for me is my little reset on a friday, so that just reset for the week and I need it actually I really do need it now. So, yeah, yeah, everybody find your reset, everybody. Is there a song in there as well?
Speaker 2:always song. I just laughed at that. You were talking about. You talking about the yin and um and and your yang is ploxing absolutely is, absolutely.
Speaker 3:Is we go mental at the boxing? Yeah, and I love that as well, but that's a completely that's another reset, isn't it anything? That sort of high energy as well, and that's. I think boxing is like singing for me as well, because I'm like on, like on, I'm switched on um for singing and and I love that, but I have to have that little afterwards like complete fall down and you know, you've just, I think you've got to understand your own balance and whatever you need and and be okay with it. Yeah, you need to keep going, you don't?
Speaker 2:need to keep going. I'm having a.
Speaker 3:I'm having a week of not keeping going at the moment because we've just finished choir and, um, I'm just allowing myself to to sit in front of the tv and and watch couples therapy and drink tea, yeah enjoy I love it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, if you've got any more.
Speaker 3:Uh, dodgy channel four recommendations I'm the one to come to you and see, it's all about.
Speaker 2:It's all about balance, it's all about balance. Oh, it's just fantastic. I mean, we could literally there are so many, so many threads. I could pull on through this conversation. We could just keep going, but perhaps we should let our listeners do something else with their day today, and we will. We will have you back with. Yeah I, we could talk about the breath forever. I think we'll have to start with inner child stuff next time, as well, yeah, I mean it's, it's really interesting.
Speaker 3:I think singing has um, I think singing has brought me to um, a place of growth that I really wasn't expecting it to do through my life.
Speaker 3:And I, you know, I compare myself with, like my sister and my family and sort of, you know and I'm so different from them I mean, I always was but I'm so different from their mentality about what's important. You know, I've tried to get my mom to do it and she just looks at me like I'm mental, you know, because they, they just I find some people are so sort of closed off to these. These ideas just seem, I don't know, very openly, sort of too spiritual or whatever. I don't even feel like I'm that spiritual, I don't know. I just feel like I'm getting to understand myself more and more and this is all part of it, and definitely the inner child work was a huge part of that and being able to accept that you need to grow all the time and if you're not growing, you're declining. That's a big thing for me. I'm all about, you know, and if you're not growing, you're declining.
Speaker 3:That's a big thing for me. I'm all about. You know, if you're not growing, then as a person in some way, then you are actually going backwards, and I don't ever want to be in that situation. Um, I've definitely been in that situation. I don't want to do that.
Speaker 3:So for me, it's like singing brought me to this and then this has become probably bigger than the singing. I think you're probably quite surprised about a conversation with me. I think it's just going to be about singing, singing, singing, but it and it never ends up being that because, um, singing has become part of this bigger picture for me of of finding it's just the beginning, as you say, absolutely, absolutely, and I, my and my personal journey of growth and luckily my husband is, we're on the same thing together, at our own paces and doing our own thing, but we absolutely are in a place of growth all the time because we've made it part of who we are, absolutely made it part of who we are, and you find that your friendships then change quite a lot and you end up yeah, they do, yeah, you really do. You end up finding people. You kind of lose the people that are not part of that because you just have don't have that same thing in common.
Speaker 3:It's so, it's so important, it's such a part of who I am now that if I don't have that sort of clicking with somebody, I know I just can't really have a deeper level friendship with them anymore. Um, which is quite sad in some ways, because I have had some friends I've had to sort of go, you're still my friend, but I know that I can't be part of it in the same way. Um, but it's, it's exciting and it's it's all really. Um, yeah, I recommend everybody tries a bit, tries a bit of growth whatever yes try some reset, try some singing oh, there was so much there.
Speaker 2:Thank you, so so much. I don't know if you are in our um facebook group, but if you are not, I will yes, I will drag you into it yeah, yeah so if anyone's got any any questions or comments from this episode, then they can continue this conversation on in there. Thank you for keeping us company today. If you enjoyed the podcast, don't forget to subscribe and leave a review.
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