Read

September/October 2002 Spirituality
Singing Therapy

by Alina Jensen

Imagine that a high beautiful sound effortlessly comes out of you, which fills your body and fills the room. Imagine that after this sound is released, your whole body tingles, feels energetic and alive. Imagine that you finally release the tension that has been locked in your body for years. This is an experience of Singing Therapy.

Singing Therapy is not about singing songs, although a singers’ performance can transform. It’s about allowing your voice to become free. When your voice becomes free, your mind relaxes, your suppressed emotions start to thaw, and your spirit has a direct vehicle for expression.

Singing Therapy accesses the spiritual potential of sound, common to all the world’s spiritual traditions. It accesses the same emotional and physical power that professional opera singers use. It also borrows from the integrative power of such disciplines as Qigong, Bioenergetics, Person-centered therapy, Somatic Respiratory integration, Body-mind awareness, and Creative movement.

For those who want to sing, Singing Therapy is the ultimate voice lesson. Experience shows that a true holistic voice lesson always involves releasing suppressed emotions held by the body. Focusing on the mechanics of voice production, while ignoring emotional body tension will only lead to a mechanistic performance. Emotions that are expressed in the music then become inaccessible; the breath becomes shallow, and the whole experience eventually becomes frustrating. Look at how many frustrated singers there are in the world. Singing Therapy allows the musical voice to become free.

The voice is also a direct expression of power. If you can breathe easily, deeply, and have your voice emerge from your core, you become a different person in the world. Your energy transforms. You feel it, and everyone else around you feels it also. It’s a deep, loving, confidence, which everyone has somewhere inside, and most people block.

Many who have histories of trauma and/or abuse have lost their voices. Singing Therapy has helped many in this situation gently reclaim their power. The feedback is immediate. As the voice and emotions release, people can experience healing, and transform wounds into powerful gifts.

Singing Therapy is not a panacea. It’s a powerful approach for people who want to experience the richness of their voices, and the freeing of their body/mind/spirit. It is not a new age, out-of-this-world approach. It is very grounded and practical. At the same time, Singing Therapy is exciting and transformational.