Journey - A Breath of Song

Published on: August 9, 2023

113. Borrow Trouble with singer Seth Norton

Song: Borrow Trouble
Music: Patricia Norton

Lyrics
Let me not borrow this trouble
ahead of time.
Let me not carry this sorrow
before it's mine.
It will come when it comes, and go when it goes.
I will know; I will know.
It will come when it comes and go when it goes,
I will know.

My trust and love are banks on the river
where grief and praise can find a flow.
My tender heart, it floats on the ocean.
The waves come. The waves go.

Notes: Sometimes I get so overwhelmed with the thought of death, I think I'm going to precipitate it by forgetting to breathe! And then somehow, something will help me back into the present, alive moment... and this song appeared just after one of those moments. I was absolutely delighted to record it with my son, Seth, who was visiting from Boston (you'll hear a little fangirl excitement in my voice)... and also surprised by how different it was for me to sing it with someone else rather than just my own voice on the looper! This voice music thing... it's always surprising me, delighting me, stretching me. And this particular song keeps coming back, insisting I sing it again.

Songwriter Info: In addition to hosting this podcast and an online singing program, Pocket Songs, Patricia is excited to be developing an in-person community singing program in Burlington, Vermont. You can find more details about that at the Juneberry Music site. Patricia believes in singing as a part of vibrant well-being, experiencing wholeness, courage, connection and joy along with brokenness, fear, loneliness, and despair... trusting the whole messy catastrophe! She lives with her long-time beloved, Tom, in a single bedroom apartment close to their daughter's family (the better to play with their grand.) Patricia reads widely, and also spends time exploring the natural world on these Abenaki lands, knitting, and reluctantly strength-training.

Sharing Info: You are welcome to share this song; please contact Patricia directly for sheet music or permission to record or perform. She always appreciates hearing about how the song travels.

Links:
Patricia's Website: https://www.juneberrymusic.com

Song Learning Time Stamps:
Start time of teaching: 00:03:25
Start time of reprise: 00:15:15

Nuts & Bolts: 4:4 Minor & Major, unison or 2-part layer

Join the A Breath of Song mailing list to receive a heads up as a new episode is released, plus a large version of the artwork, brief thoughts from my slightly peculiar brain... and occasional extras when they seem vitally important! No junk -- I will never sell your address. I read out all your names into my living room when I send new mailings... I appreciate the connection to you who are listening and singing these songs with me.

Exchange energy with A Breath of Song with dollars at the Gratitude Jar (whoo-hoo!!!!), or by making comments, leaving reviews, suggesting songs or songwriters (including yourself) ..... your participation matters!

Published on: June 21, 2023

107. As A Seal Upon Thy Heart

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Song: As a Seal Upon Thy Heart
Music: Alison Burns
Text: from Song of Songs (Shir Hashirim) 8:6
שִׁיר הַשִּׁירִים

Lyrics

Set me as a seal upon thy heart, as a seal upon thy arm.
For love is strong, as strong as death

שִׂימֵ֨נִי כַֽחוֹתָ֜ם עַל־לִבֶּ֗ךָ כַּֽחוֹתָם֙ עַל־זְרוֹעֶ֔ךָ כִּֽי־עַזָּ֤ה כַמָּ֨וֶת֙ אַֽהֲבָ֔ה קָשָׁ֥ה כִשְׁא֖וֹל

Notes: Ali Burns gives us a beautiful two-part song that can also be a round... it feels like very exposed singing to me, and there's a way in which committing to what feels vulnerable in my voice, both high and low, also feels powerful and affirming. The ancient words resonate with longing for connection beyond death with those whom we love... and to me, are a reminder that can't force anyone into accepting love -- we can only offer.

Songwriter Info: Ali has built her reputation over the past 30 years as one of the UK’s prominent workshop leaders for community choirs. Many of her songs have found their way into the repertoire and hearts of singers across the UK, and increasingly, Canada, the USA and Australia. Her work is published by Faber, Sing Up! and Oxford University Press.

Sharing Info: You can hear and buy a copy of the song for £5 from www.aliburns.co.uk
Please visit her online shop for information about permissions: https://aliburns.co.uk/shop/licensing/song-licence/

Links:
Ali's Website: www.aliburns.co.uk

Song Learning Time Stamps:
Start time of teaching: 00:03:08
Start time of reprise: 00:14:38

Nuts & Bolts: 4:4 major, 2-part layer, round optional

Join the A Breath of Song mailing list to receive a heads up as a new episode is released, plus a large version of the artwork, brief thoughts from my slightly peculiar brain... and occasional extras when they seem vitally important! No junk -- I will never sell your address. I read out all your names into my living room when I send new mailings... I appreciate the connection to you who are listening and singing these songs with me.

Exchange energy with A Breath of Song with dollars at the Gratitude Jar (whoo-hoo!!!!), or by making comments, leaving reviews, suggesting songs or songwriters (including yourself) ..... your participation matters!

Published on: May 24, 2023

104. Take My Hand

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Song: Take My Hand
Music: VoiceExchange

Lyrics

Doomba doomba deh deh doomba
Deh-deh doomba beh beh doomba
Deh-deh doomba beh beh doomba
Deh-deh deh doomba
Doomba doobeh doombah

Are you lost?
Do you feel lost and broken?
Let us walk and find a way together, find a way home.

Take my hand. Take my hand.
Take my hand. Let us walk.

Take my hand. Take my hand.
Take my hand.

Notes: What does it mean to hold out a hand to someone, to offer to accompany them? How does it feel to find a way home, through the lost and brokenness? How do five people living in different places manage to write a song together in a pandemic? All important questions for this episode! This is maybe one of the most intricate songs, where you'll be challenged to tease out a part... and it's also a very sweet song, with a superbly satisfying bass line, a lovely, harmonized invitation, a haunting, harmonized question, and a beautiful reassuring affirmation. Next episode is a first for A Breath of Song -- a six-way conversation about collaboration and bringing one's individual voice to a group -- hope you can join us all!

Songwriter Info: VoiceExchange initially formed as a practice group following a 2012 Bobby McFerrin Circlesongs workshop. As singers from disparate musical influences, they came together, connecting through a shared passion for vocal improvisation, and formed a unique a cappella group that blends diverse vocal styles into spontaneous harmonious arrangements. During the challenges of the pandemic VoiceExchange began a series of sequentially recorded collaborations for leading online circles. This resulted in a library of recordings, among them, Touch the Sky and Take My Hand. VoiceExchange members are Amado Ohland, Beth Lyons, Dina Torok, Joy Truskowski and Paris Kern. They can be found leading Circlesinging events in Maryland, Virginia, Massachusetts & Vermont as well as offering online and in-person workshops and providing spontaneous music to churches, temples and other community gatherings.

Amado Ohland began his semi-professional career as a jazz and blues vocalist shortly after graduating University of Maryland at College Park with a bachelor's in music composition and theory. He attended his first Circlesongs workshop in 2011, and has been leading circlesinging events since 2013 in Washington DC, Pittsburgh, and western Virginia. He has recently received a master's degree in music from Radford University. For his doctoral dissertation he is working on a participatory ethnography of circlesinging worldwide and a song cycle of pieces based on circlesinging techniques.

Born into a musical family, Beth Lyons actually can’t remember a ‘before’ time when singing-in-community wasn’t a part of her life. She currently performs improvised musicals with iMusical, the house musical improv team for Washington Improv Theater, performs and leads Circles with VoiceExchange, and leads online immersive Song Dive workshops and a Monday morning online choir named Coffee Choir. You can learn more about her offerings and sign up for her “Heads Up” notification/invite list at www.RiverChoir.org.

Dina Torok has sung in and been musical director for various a cappella groups from college through adulthood. She was a professional film and television session singer, performed in various pop/rock bands in Los Angeles, and recorded an original solo album and a piano/vocal album of show tunes. Dina found VoiceExchange and circle singing in 2015 and has been a grateful member ever since.

Joy Truskowski is a singer-songwriter and community songleader. She has performed as a solo artist in the Roanoke, VA area for 13 years. You can find her original songs on Bandcamp under the name “Joy Tru”. She started Star City Circlesinging in 2019 and has been leading circles with other co-leaders in Roanoke ever since. During the beginning of the pandemic she started contributing to VoiceExchange’s online circles. She fell in love with all of them, and they all asked her to marry them. She said, “I can’t marry you, but I’ll join your group!” And that was a fair compromise. So she officially joined in the summer of 2021.

Paris Kern started performing traditional folk music at coffeehouses and concerts when she was 16 years old. She studied classical vocal performance in college, but her heart was always in the world of pure traditional folk traditions. In 2011, for reasons unknown to her, she was internally compelled to attend Bobby McFerrin’s CIrclesongs workshop. Feeling like a fish out of water, surrounded by mostly Jazz musicians, she nonetheless was hooked by the magic of Circlesongs and the sensation that her heart was being sung back to her. She has been leading circles in Washington DC, and Baltimore and is now starting circles in Southern Vermont.

Sharing Info: VoiceExchange would love to know if you plan to teach or perform Touch the Sky or another of their songs; drop them a line at info@VoiceExchange.org. And if teaching/performing their song is a profitable business for you, please share a bit of the profit with them via their donation link at https://voiceexchange.org.

Links:
VoiceExchange's Email: info@voiceexchange.org
VoiceExchange's Website: https://voiceexchange.org
VoiceExchange on Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/circlesinging-dc/

Song Learning Time Stamps:
Start time of teaching: 00:03:08
Start time of reprise: 00:15:50

Nuts & Bolts: 4:4, Major, 4-layers with 2 layers harmonized

Join the A Breath of Song mailing list to receive a heads up as a new episode is released, plus a large version of the artwork, brief thoughts from my slightly peculiar brain... and occasional extras when they seem vitally important! No junk -- I will never sell your address. I read out all your names into my living room when I send new mailings... I appreciate the connection to you who are listening and singing these songs with me.

Exchange energy with A Breath of Song with dollars at the Gratitude Jar (whoo-hoo!!!!), or by making comments, leaving reviews, suggesting songs or songwriters (including yourself) ..... your participation matters!

Published on: May 17, 2023

103. Return

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Song: Return
Music: Patricia Norton

Lyrics

Return. Come back. Return. Come inward. Return, return to now.
Return (4x) Return and trust. Return. Return.
Float through. Let it go. You are one and many; this is now.
Float through. Let it go. You can tend and trust. Return. Return.

Notes: A breakthrough in mindfulness practice for me was realizing that it's not about spending hours in blissed-out presence... it's about noticing that I'm not present and coming back, returning, again and again. I started to sing this when my mind was doing a particularly good imitation of a squirrel on amphetamines, and I needed to strengthen my ability to return! I particularly like that this song can be sung very simply, as a call & response, or have added layers of complexity -- I'm loving a bit of adaptability in my life right now.

Songwriter Info: In addition to hosting this podcast and an online singing program, Pocket Songs, Patricia is excited to be developing an in-person community singing program in Burlington, Vermont. You can find more details about that at the Juneberry Music site. Patricia believes in singing as a part of vibrant well-being, experiencing wholeness, courage, connection and joy along with brokenness, fear, loneliness, and despair... trusting the whole messy catastrophe! She lives with her long-time beloved, Tom, in a single bedroom apartment close to their daughter's family (the better to play with their grand.) Patricia reads widely, and also spends time exploring the natural world on these Abenaki lands, knitting, and reluctantly strength-training.

Sharing Info: You are welcome to share this song; please contact Patricia directly for sheet music or permission to record or perform. She always appreciates hearing about how the song travels.

Links:
Full Program Website: juneberrymusic.com
Patricia'sFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/juneberrymusic
Patricia's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/juneberry.music/

Song Learning Time Stamps:
Start time of teaching: 00:03:06
Start time of reprise: 00:15:59

Nuts & Bolts: 4:4, Major & Mixolydian, Call & Response or 4-layer song

Join the A Breath of Song mailing list to receive a heads up as a new episode is released, plus a large version of the artwork, brief thoughts from my slightly peculiar brain... and occasional extras when they seem vitally important! No junk -- I will never sell your address. I read out all your names into my living room when I send new mailings... I appreciate the connection to you who are listening and singing these songs with me.

Exchange energy with A Breath of Song with dollars at the Gratitude Jar (whoo-hoo!!!!), or by making comments, leaving reviews, suggesting songs or songwriters (including yourself) ..... your participation matters!

Published on: April 12, 2023

98. Between Nothing and Everything

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Song: Between Nothing and Everything
Music: Angela Gabriel
Words: based on text by Nisahrgadatta Maharaj

Lyrics:

Wisdom is knowing, knowing I am nothing.
Love is knowing I am everything, everything, everything, and be-
tween the two, between the two, between the two my life moves.

Notes: Angela Gabriel has given us a brilliant setting based on words by Nisargadatta Maharaj, “Wisdom is knowing I am nothing, Love is knowing I am everything, and between the two my life moves.” The first line twists around on itself disappears into nothingness. The second line starts an octave away and drops into the security of "everything." Then, on a note in the middle of the two starting pitches, and in 6:8 instead of 3:4, the song begins to dance and flow, and ends on a slightly surprised major third. You don't have to know any of that for it to work its magic, though -- simply let it wind into your body as a beautiful melodic invitation to release. I'll be singing this one to myself long after this podcast is wrapped up, reminding me of both-and, flow, fluidity.

Songwriter Info: Angela is a professional percussionist & pianist and community music/community singing facilitator. She lived in Santa Fe NM for the last 20 years, where she played with the opera, symphony, chamber music festival, as well as in African, Haitian, and samba gatherings, funk and ragtime bands. She just moved to Bloomington, Indiana in the end of 2022.
Angela's mission in life is to facilitate expressive creative, musical, and vocal experiences and to encourage folks to replace judgement with curiosity and open themselves to their unique, creative flow. Part of how Angela does this is by singing and drumming online weekly with people living with Parkinson’s and other movement disorders.

Sharing Info: This song is free to share but Angela always welcomes financial and/or networking support if/when folks are so moved.

Links:
Angela's website: www.AngelaGabriel.me
Support Angela's work: find songs, rhythmic activities, and more at patreon.com/AngelaGabriel
Check out Hidden Whale, Angela's old band (she's the drummer): https://youtube.com/channel/UCpxdVqwSxzEBhgUilN3qQLg
Nisargadatta Maharaj: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nisargadatta_Maharaj

Nuts & Bolts: 3:4, Aeolian with major final third, round

Join the A Breath of Song mailing list to receive a heads up as a new episode is released, plus a large version of the artwork, brief thoughts from my slightly peculiar brain... and occasional extras when they seem vitally important! No junk -- I will never sell your address. I read out all your names into my living room when I send new mailings... I appreciate the connection to you who are listening and singing these songs with me.

Exchange energy with A Breath of Song with dollars at the Gratitude Jar (whoo-hoo!!!!), or by making comments, leaving reviews, suggesting songs or songwriters (including yourself) ..... your participation matters!

Published on: March 8, 2023

93. Breathe Along With Life

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Song: Breathe Along With Life
Music & Words: Chloë Rose Vispap-Rich

Lyrics

Mark out your golden lines
Create your golden times
Breathe along with life
Away you go.
Away you go,
Away you go,
Breathe along with life
Away you go.

Notes: Chloë Rose Vispap-Rich has uncovered such a glorious both/and song for me. The golden beauty of clear boundaries and choice-making -- how we can delineate our lives in response to our deepest inner voice and knowing of what we need and want -- and at the same time, life is full and rich and complex, and we can release into the flow of it swirling around and through us, let ourselves be swept into the dance. Whee!!! The sweetness and gentleness of both clarity and acceptance, in a song that has light and movement. I feel so completely spoiled by getting to spend my time making this podcast.

Songwriter Info: Chloë is a music therapist from London, England. She is part of the Natural Voice Network and leads a community singing group. Chloë likes to write and share easily accessible but moving songs. In 2020 (during the national lockdown) she wrote and produced a song book called Songs In Harmony , a collection of 10 songs in 2 and 3 part harmony. They are short songs with themes such as connection, going with the flow, absence, love and dreams. Breathe Along With Life is about simultaneously taking control of the path of your life whilst also going with the flow.

Sharing Info: Yes -- The song is free to share in oral tradition groups, but please contact Chloë for recording and/or performing permission at thesingingheartchoir@gmail.com

Nuts & Bolts: 4:4, major, 2-part -- melody and harmony

Join the A Breath of Song mailing list to receive a heads up as a new episode is released, plus a large version of the artwork, brief thoughts from my slightly peculiar brain... and occasional extras when they seem vitally important! No junk -- I will never sell your address. I read out all your names into my living room when I send new mailings... I appreciate the connection to you who are listening and singing these songs with me.

Exchange energy with A Breath of Song with dollars at the Gratitude Jar (whoo-hoo!!!!), or by making comments, leaving reviews, suggesting songs or songwriters (including yourself) ..... your participation matters!

Tags

113. Borrow Trouble with singer Seth Norton

107. As A Seal Upon Thy Heart

104. Take My Hand

103. Return

98. Between Nothing and Everything

93. Breathe Along With Life