Jaya

I have been singing on stages for more than ten years, in hotel lounges across China, in jazz clubs in Shanghai, once at a festival in South Africa. Rooms full of people, most nights of the week.

For a long time I sang the way I had been taught, bracing for every phrase and driving the sound out. It worked. It also took something from me every night, and by the last set I had very little left to give.

Then, slowly, the singing changed. I stopped doing so much. The breath began to come in without my asking, the voice followed, and one evening I noticed that the thing I had been forcing for years was simply happening. It felt like setting down something heavy. I freed myself through singing, and just through singing, I am happy.

That is why I teach, and why I teach the way I do. I welcome the students other teachers turn away: the ones who go quiet the moment anyone listens, and the ones who were trained hard and never let go. I know where the effort hides, because I hid it myself. It should not take my students as long to find as it took me.

What I want for my students is a low, easy breath and a voice that is not afraid, and both of them still there long after the lesson ends. The high notes come too.