Last night (this morning?), my husband and I could not fall asleep until after 6am, our minds overactive with thoughts of moving somewhere neither of us has ever been and the long to-do list of things to accomplish before then. The alarm began to sound at 10am, and after pressing the snooze button far more times than a “smart”phone should even ALLOW, we managed to drag ourselves us and begin tackling the things we planned to get done today. Eventually, we sat down in front of Netflix to have dinner together (avocado and egg sandwiches with a side of caesar salad with sunflower seeds), with plans to each do our own thing after that. …We woke up two or three hours later, our empty plates carelessly abandoned in front of us.

Falling asleep fully dressed, after a meal, under a heavy blanket, in Florida, with the air conditioner turned off = bad voice day. I felt like a raisin when I woke up, with every drop of moisture pulled from my body. My husband sweetly and with just the right amount of push, reminded me that I still wanted to do some kind of recording for this blog today, even if I now didn’t have as much time. Which meant me trying to eradicate the raspy, dehydrated, throat-full-of-dust-in-the-middle of a desert sound from my voice first.

I did a few extra vocal warm-ups, downed some watered-down PowerAid, gargled some warm water and it got, well…better. Not sounding my best is all well and good while I am in this phase of playing around and sketching things out, but I realize than when I am ready to record final and professional tracks, I am going to have to spend all day and every day that I intend to record taking extra good care of my voice. I won’t be able to have accidental vocal disasters like I did today, at least not if I care about putting the very best into my work (which I do).

Anyways, I decided to pick an old, favorite poem that I wrote some time ago. Many of the poems I wrote around them have a very empowering tone to them, which is why I like them so much. I was undergoing a lot of violence in my relationship (if you could call it that) and I felt trapped and that it would be wrong of me to try and leave, was sometimes so broke that my dog was eating more than me, and had also just started to fully admit to myself what a huge pull I felt toward vocal art and wanting to accomplish something in my life. To keep my spirits uplifted and strong, I focused all the intense emotions into poetry and the fantasies that I wished to someday build into reality. The result is a passionate collection of words.

The poem I chose to work with this evening is entitled She Spoke of Riches. I’ll give you the lyrics here first:

My poverty has ended

And this soul has ascended

The next time we meet

I’ll see your eyes

And find the time to stop

And keep it sweet

There’ll be something different

You’ll see it in my glow

And every secret you will spill

For your desire

That my heart deserves to know

Everything I want

Can flow into me now

I’m a free woman

Always was, anyhow

Oh, my riches are beginning…

The world keeps on spinning

And every time you hear me

You really start to wonder

Can’t help but say, yourself

“The woman she brings thunder”

But it don’t make you shiver

No, it kind of makes you warm

Those who hear

Beg to stay lost…in the storm

I find myself wanting to maintain the integrity of this and some of my other old poetry by avoiding adding a chorus, throwing in repetitions, or reformatting in order to fit the traditional idea of what a song “should be”. I suppose you could say that what I am working to create here is really a song-poem hybrid. Different — but, I like it.

Not having a real space to record in is still a problem. Unfortunately, it may still be some time before that is resolved, but by then I will have further honed my talents in order to truly maximize the benefits of a studio, be it inside or outside of my home. The following track is riddled with background noise, mostly from our wall-mounted air conditioning unit ( a beast which my Sweet Husband and I have dubbed “the arctic dragon”). I tried to record a cleaner version for you, Beloved Audience, but in that one my dogs decided they needed to try and sing along. …What’s a raw, aspiring vocal artist to do?

This track is very rough — a first attempt in order to get a feel for what I want to do with these lyrics. Despite all it needs in order to sound polished and powerful, I am pleased with where it is going and feel motivated to do the same with more poetry until I have the resources to really clean them all up and make a valuable collection. And so, here it is — She Spoke of Riches:

I appreciate your time, Darling Audience! You still have my love!

“Think of the imagination as a giant stone from which we carve out new ideas. As we chip away, our new ideas become more polished and refined. But if you start by editing your imagination, you start with a tiny stone.” –Brian Chesky

P.S. I apologize for the weird formatting of this post. I toyed around trying to fix it, but I couldn’t figure out what happened. Thank you for understanding!