Sweet is the sound of my newborn wings, I stretch them open and let them dry

Hello again! I've had the most amazing weekend in a long time - but not the usual kind of an amazing weekend. Paul Phoenix, a world-famous singer, who has sang in The King's Singers a long time, came to Kuopio to train the Kuopio Youth Choir, which I belong to. It was absolutely great. Even though we didn't train as individuals, but together, I learned a lot. I had the privilege to sing Butterfly in a small group. I am a soprano, and we sing the melody in that piece. With Paul's guidance I was able to reach my potential level in singing and it felt sooo good. I've had a lot of doubts about where I should apply for school and if I am good enough to go study music. I felt that even if I'm not now that good, I can practice and be that good in May or at least in the future. It felt so good to hear Paul say that I sing beautifully. Even my choir's conductor said that the change that I made in the practice was huge. I felt like I was flying and still do.

A pic from our choir's Twitter page, I look so flattering on rehearsals...

It has been a long time since I've felt this good about singing. I'm not so confident when it comes to singing, even though I love it and I know that's the thing I want to do for the rest of my life. Maybe it's because I train with very good singers in choir and I compare myself to them even when it's not fair. There are much older singers than me and you sound very different when you sing a solo and when you sing those backing vocals. I've had a rough year thinking about who I am and what I think about myself. I've made progress with my self-esteem but sometimes and with some things I am very insecure. This weekend showed me that it's important to be confident and believe in yourself. And I have every reason to be that way, but it's a thing where my Finnish nationality comes in. We are not proud of ourselves as individuals in Finland comparing with Americans or such. But as a singer and as a performer I must at least act like I'm confident. Musicians are actors also. And storytellers also, I learned that too.

Kuopio Youth Choir has been a part of my life for two and a half years now. I joined the choir the same time I started Muslu, Kuopio Senior High of Music and Dance or what it is that we call it. My school anyway. I sing soprano and I love it. We have gigs all over the year, sometimes bigger and sometimes smaller. One and a half year ago we performed in a festival Ruisrock. It's the biggest music festival in Finland, and in the day we performed there were 29K people. That's much in our scale. Choir is a great way to get practice in singing and learn a lot of music and different music styles. We don't sing just classical music or something boring stuff, we sing also pop music like Queen and songs from Disney movies. You get also a lot of experience in performing and you get to see a lot of different sides of music business. We have been in a recording studio and at the backstage of Tavastia Club (one of the must cult-like pop music clubs in Finland). If you are interested in singing and you can't efford private lessons or they are not available where you live, go ahead and join a choir! It really pays off.

 

Our performance in Ruisrock with Kerkko Koskinen Kollektiivi