How can I find my own voice through my instrument

Julia Casañas Cast

Many classical musicians can suffer from tension and nervousness during solo performance. This research looks at how practicing improvisation and creative body movement, as well as creating one’s own performance together with a dancer, can affect the feeling of freedom and enjoyment on stage. The researcher explored a way to find her own voice. By practicing free improvisation she explored new possibilities of her playing and expression as she searched for freedom and development of creativity. This resulted in a generally more free and involved feeling on stage. In addition, body movement courses helped her to be more aware of her body on stage, resulting in a better sound quality. A project was created to address the question of how to create one’s own performance that comes from the performers own voice. The project created was based on the poem Woman Inhabited by Words by Guisela Lopez – a poem that was very meaningful to the researcher. In the performance she improvised on the viola; the sound is modified by a computer, and at the same time a contemporary dancer improvised on the music. In this way, the researcher combined her love of dance and of playing music to find a new depth in her performance and performance experience.

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3.1 Design of the artistic project

3.2 Documentation of my artistic project

3.3 Electronics and poem effects

3.4 My movements practice

3.5 Meeting with the dancer

3.6 Meeting all together and create the performance

3.7 Concert of the artistic project

Participants

Patricia Gomes rodrigues as a dancer

Marcela Andrea León reciting the poem

Willem Van Erven Dorens in the Electronics

Julia Casañas Castellvi viola improvising

3. DESIGNING MY OWN PROJECT

Contemporary dance1, which emerged in the second half of the 20th century, is an art form and way of expressiveness that has always attracted me and awoken my curiosity. Indeed, the reason why I chose this topic is because as a classical musician, and to curiosity of exploring different fields of performances and involving other kind of methods of expression, I decided to create my own project. It is a good opportunity of knowing better this “high” art of emotional expression involving the body, where the movements of the dancer, guided by the music, and this one for the poem recited, will express the feeling of the three of us and a deeper understanding of the poem.

I always wanted to combine dance and music. The project involved the creation of a performance combining improvisation, contemporary dance, contemporary music, and electronic music. The performance was based on a poem by Guisela Lopez called Woman Inhabit by Words, in which a narrator recited the poem the dancer was dancing and I was improvising on my viola connecting with the dancer. We were constantly reacting one to the other, interpreting the feelings and ideas embedded in Guisela Lopez’s poem. In addition, another person added electronics.

The poem was at the centre of the improvised work. This project was designed to explore the effects of performing a piece which I (co-)created myself and involving improvised elements, has on my performance experience – especially my confidence and performance anxiety. I designed a concert in which I played both a traditional recital piece and also this piece, which I created myself.

Content

I prepared and performed a traditional piece as well as my composed and improvised piece in order to compare my feelings and anxiety on stage.

The repertoire: The traditional piece I played was the Capriccio for viola solo by Henry Vieuxtemps. I chose this work because it demanded the timber and the textures I enjoy the most on the viola. In this research I documented the differences I experience playing from a written score with one where I am improvising with awareness of my feelings as well as reacting to the dancer. This concert was recorded for the purposes of this research.

I chose this poem because I feel a strong connection with the feelings the poet is expressing. It confronts us with how society responds to women. Although things are slowly changing, this message still seems an important one. I decided to express the feelings and thoughts of this poem with music, voice and dance.

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