What matters to you? Putting what you love into your career

Today we're asking the question "What matters to you?" Do you already know, or do you need time to think about it?
As singing teacher and vocal coach we can direct our careers to include doing what we love and what matters to us.
In this episode we share the important things in our lives, what we MUST do for our own peace of mind. The parts of our individual careers that bring us joy.
What brings you joy? Answers on a postcard...

0:00 Aiming your career
1:47 What matters to Jeremy - piano playing
3:10 NOT playing piano in the masterclass
5:05 What Jeremy listens for in new singers
8:43 Confidence as a teacher
11:30 What matters to Gillyanne - working with voices
14:01 What is curiosity?
18:24 Working with students over several years
19:23 Our Teacher Pathway
20:29 The joy of collaboration
24:04 Gillyanne and the academic brain
27:15 Values and the Accreditation Programme

Transcript

What Matters To You? Putting what you love into your career

[00:00:00] Jeremy: This is A Voice, a podcast with Dr. Gillyanne Kayes and Jeremy Fisher.

Hello and welcome to This is a Voice season 8 episode 4. 

[00:00:26] Gillyanne: The podcast where we get vocal about voice. 

[00:00:28] Jeremy: I'm Jeremy Fisher. 

[00:00:29] Gillyanne: And I'm Dr. Gillyanne Kayes. He's laughing already everybody. 

[00:00:34] Jeremy: I love the pregnant pause name. 

[00:00:36] Gillyanne: So our topic today is what matters to you. And there's a particular reason why we want to talk about this and bear with us because actually what we want to talk about is what matters to us at this stage in our development of, you know, as a business and also, um, having 

[00:00:55] Jeremy: us as people. 

[00:00:55] Gillyanne: Us as people. Yeah, absolutely. And the whole portfolio career thing. 

[00:00:59] Jeremy: So the reason that this has come up is that we've just enrolled in a very, very intensive business development program for ourselves. Yeah. And for Vocal Process. And this question's come up and it's a really fascinating question because the idea is what you want to do is to aim your career at the things that you love doing because that makes life a whole lot easier.

[00:01:21] Gillyanne: And one of the challenges, and I know that all entrepreneurs, solopreneurs will identify with this, and small businesses, is that when you're wanting to build or, you know, make a flight correction, that suddenly there's a whole load of admin and other stuff and background stuff you have to do and you can lose sight of what it is that you love.

[00:01:43] Jeremy: Absolutely. Okay, so what do we love? 

[00:01:47] Gillyanne: Okay, Jeremy, why don't you start? You, I know, love working with performers. 

[00:01:54] Jeremy: Absolutely. I've been doing it for more than 40 years now, which makes me sound horribly old. Uh, more than 40 years I've been working with performers and I absolutely love it. I trained as... a collaborative pianist.

Um, and in fact, I was collaborative pianist by nature as well as by training. And I basically had a portfolio career working all the way around collaborative piano in various forms and various guises. And I've always loved working with other people. I love working with performers. I love working with energy.

I like helping people find the best in themselves while I'm playing. And it's one of the things that I do when I'm performing, is I actually use the piano part that I'm playing to support, to guide, to lead, to follow, to do all sorts of things. 

[00:02:41] Gillyanne: And don't you use it as well, because I mean, obviously you play for me sometimes, um, to clarify what it is that the performer wants.

[00:02:50] Jeremy: Oh, absolutely. 

[00:02:51] Gillyanne: And also, what the music wants. It's kind of a combination of the two, isn't it? And this thing of clarity is really important to you, isn't it, as a coach? 

[00:03:00] Jeremy: I love clarification. I love helping people work out what it is that they want to do or to be. It's one of my favorite things. I have a load of favourite things, but that's one of my favourite.

[00:03:11] Gillyanne: Do you want to tell people a bit about what you did recently in an in person masterclass? 

[00:03:18] Jeremy: Yes, I haven't done one of these for ages. I did an in person masterclass, not on Zoom, but actually in the room. And I went to LCCM, the London College of Contemporary Music, and did a masterclass with five of their students there.

And that was so much fun. I mean, partly because the repertoire was so varied. So we had musical theatre, we had jazz, we had contemporary commercial pop, we had indie. we had a sort of swing pop crossover, there was all sorts of things. And also the ages of the students, really different, sort of early 20s up to quite a lot older than early 20s.

[00:03:54] Gillyanne: And unusually for you, uh, there was a pianist there, so someone, a collaborative pianist was there. And you chose not. 

[00:04:05] Jeremy: I chose not to play. 

[00:04:06] Gillyanne: Not to play, which is very unusual for Jeremy. 

[00:04:08] Jeremy: Very, very unusual because for years I felt that I would understand the music by playing it and I'd understand the performance by being part of it.

And this was really the first time that I sat. in the audience or walked on the stage or whatever for the whole masterclass. I actually didn't normally, you know, if we have another pianist there, they will play and then I'll, I'll coach in some way and I'll often pull the, push the pianist off the stool and go, ah, let me just play this bit.

[00:04:36] Gillyanne: Gently. It's gently done people. 

[00:04:38] Jeremy: Maybe it depends how excited I am. And I'll do that in order to sort of pick something up or make something work or move something forwards, and then the pianist will come back on and carry on playing. Um, this pianist was so right for the venue, right for the period, right for the styles, that I didn't once feel the need to sit at the piano and play.

And so this was Almost the first time that I've spent an entire masterclass on my feet. Really fascinating. 

[00:05:06] Gillyanne: So, something I want to ask you, you mentioned a whole load of genres and sub genres. Yes. And you hadn't listened to the singers in advance.

[00:05:15] Jeremy: No, no, these are all new. 

[00:05:16] Gillyanne: Or the songs in advance. I mean, somebody turned up with a song that... 

[00:05:20] Jeremy: Which I'd never heard, didn't know, never heard of the song, let alone heard it, had never worked with the singer. That's, that's... When you're doing a masterclass like that, it's quite a challenge. You want to do as much preparation as you can.

So if you know what the songs are in advance, I will usually just go and listen to them, and it's literally just to pick up the style, the feel, the tempo, the original performance, you know, what people are working from, that sort of thing. But occasionally, you do get a situation where you don't know the song, you don't know the singer, you've never heard the piece, you've never even heard of it.

[00:05:54] Gillyanne: And this person came out of the blue, didn't they, right at the end of the masterclass, and I'm wondering. 

[00:05:59] Jeremy: she was a last minute replacement, yes. 

[00:06:00] Gillyanne: If they, you know, if they were sitting there listening, thinking... Oh gosh, I really want to sing too. So let me, let me pull you back in terms of working with this multiplicity of genres, different types of singer, different ages, and probably at different skills levels.

Different skill levels, yes. What is it that draws everything together for you that allows you to make a difference because I mean the feedback was phenomenal, wasn't it? Yeah. Students were very excited about it afterwards.

[00:06:30] Jeremy: I think ultimately, and I'm going to harp on quite a lot about this, it's the ability to diagnose, but it's the ability to diagnose across a whole range of things.

[00:06:40] Gillyanne: You're not talking just about the voice, are you? 

[00:06:43] Jeremy: Absolutely not. So I'm listening to the voice. So I'm going, where am I heading? Where, which, which thing am I going to choose to work with each person? And the moment they open their mouths, in fact, the moment they walk on stage and start talking, I'm already analysing.

But the moment they start singing, I'm going, how is the voice working? Is there any technical thing that will actually make a big difference? Um, so I'm listening for that. I'm listening to the music. How do they, how do they interpret the music? Does that work for the music? Does it work for the performer?

Is there a clash in there somewhere? Can we make more of the clash or do we need to rest the clash and get them online with music? Um, and also just as a performer, are they working? in a way with the energetic use of what they have and what's going on also with the pianist, the partnership. Is, is all of that working as well?

And I can drop into any one of those and go, which one is the most important? And I have this whole knot image where I have a whole load of threads. I'm actually writing articles about this right now. 

[00:07:45] Gillyanne: This is actually a great blog that's coming up people. 

[00:07:48] Jeremy: In fact, it's a set of five. Um, I have this thing about you, you, you have all these threads and your first job, if you like, is to listen, your second job is to diagnose, and then the third job is to choose.

There are two more jobs, by the way, um, all in the articles. And you're, what you're doing is you're choosing a single thread that you think is going to undo some of the others as well, as improve that particular thread. Um, and it's a, that's, for me is part of the skill of diagnosis, which is you decide what you're going to choose.

And it was absolutely fascinating because for all five singers, I chose something entirely different, really interesting when you're faced with five people in a row and you go, well, you know, it really isn't "Oh, today is breathing day". It really isn't that you are dealing absolutely on your feet on the spot with people.

And I love doing that. There's something about, um, there's something about confidence as well. And we talked about this too. 

[00:08:49] Gillyanne: Do you mean your confidence or their confidence?

[00:08:51] Jeremy: Actually mine. Mm hmm. Um, because you never know what you're going to get in a masterclass. You never know what level, you don't know all of that stuff.

You don't know what repertoire, how it's going to go. You don't know what the audience is going to be like. 

[00:09:02] Gillyanne: Nothing. Oh, we've, I mean, you know, we have quite a few stories to tell about surprises in masterclasses. We certainly do. But we're not 

[00:09:09] Jeremy: going there yet. But not today. Um, and so what you have to have as a masterclass presenter is a sense of confidence in your own ability.

And this is not arrogance. This is, there are many aspects of this job that I know I can do, and therefore I'm comfortable walking onto the stage and doing stuff. And the, the fear, if you like, is I have no idea what I'm going to do until that person opens their mouth. That is. in a way quite a frightening place to be, but it's also the tip of the roller coaster excitement, you're right on the top, and you're about to go down, and that's an exciting thing, and excitement and panic are actually very close together in feel.

[00:09:53] Gillyanne: It probably, you know, that moment of sort of being, being on the roller coaster, just right on the peak, it probably, um, garners, you know, your performance energy and all the skills that you've got. 

[00:10:07] Jeremy: We've actually done webinars on performance energy and Gillyanne and I have very different performance energies.

We have different peaks, we have different troughs, we have different timings and one of the things that I notice about the way my performance energy works is that at the beginning of the day I am a slug. I don't move, I don't get up out of bed, I will eat something, but I'm a slug. And as we get closer to the, the moment where I'm going to step on stage and do something, then that energy rises and it rises massively.

I mean, the roller coaster image is so accurate because I am climbing that first hill and then I'm, I'm hovering on the top and then I walk on stage and that's it. Off we go. 

[00:10:49] Gillyanne: That's interesting. And as, as you know, My energy is very, very different. I actually get to a point where I need to slow right down.

If I don't slow right down and go into my calm place, I don't do well. And then when I am ready to go, everything rolls along nicely. So it's different, but it works, doesn't it? 

[00:11:10] Jeremy: What's a calm place? 

[00:11:14] Gillyanne: Um, can we talk about that in a different podcast? You know, I could be there doing, you know, little energy exercises or doing a yoga pose or something like that.

That's what works for me. Yeah. 

[00:11:26] Jeremy: Um, okay. So, uh, enough about that. What? 

[00:11:29] Gillyanne: And enough about you? Yes. Okay. 

[00:11:31] Jeremy: What matters to you? 

[00:11:34] Gillyanne: This is quite interesting and it's more than one thing as I know it is for you too. .

[00:11:38] Jeremy: I think that's fair and I think it's also really interesting we have come to know each other's things that matter and we support each other in those things and I've known for a very long time that Gillyanne needs to work one to one with voices whether it's all the time or occasionally it doesn't matter. And there's something very important about this, which is the difference between knowledge and experience.

We have a lot of knowledge. We have a lot of knowledge. Sometimes we don't even know what we know until somebody asks us a question and then we go, Oh, that. And occasionally you don't even know what's coming out of your mouth until it does. But that is in a way in, it's a, it's a sort of a history of experience and it's an intellect.

The thing about doing a lesson is that you are experiencing it in the moment and you pick up so much from working with somebody. And you, you specifically pick up so much from working with somebody. 

[00:12:32] Gillyanne: I love that sense of connection, connection, connecting with an individual and finding out what um, that voice likes to do and what that singer likes to do.

And I'm, I'm just thinking of. a lesson that I gave recently to someone who I hadn't seen for over 13, 14 years because we moved and I don't think they'd been singing much in that time. Yeah. And they came back to me and we had our first lesson by Zoom and then we had a second lesson by Zoom and something that I realized is that the way I work with someone now is very different.

Yes. So it's less that, you know, I have this plan, these things that I need to do. It's more about this, this curiosity, this investigation. And, um, then being able to work with that towards what it is that, um, the singer wants to do that day and what their goals might be in the future. And actually we had some lovely feedback from that person saying that the lesson was exhilarating.

Um, and I have to say, you know, I come out of a lesson where I feel that connection has been made. I will feel exhilarated. I will feel good. And, um, Yeah, it kind of, maybe it's a bit selfish, but it feeds me too. 

[00:13:55] Jeremy: I don't think that's selfish at all. I think, you know, put your oxygen mask on first.

There's something I really want to dig into it and that's curiosity. Can we talk about curiosity? What does it mean to you? 

[00:14:10] Gillyanne: Um, it means being open to what happens in the lesson. It means being, you know, because I'm, I'm a person who plans. So if I do a plan, then I have to be ready for plan B and plan B really comes from the interaction in the session and what that person wants.

So that's part of the curiosity and the curiosity is they're using that language. I watched something physical bodily going on. Um, and then maybe they'll give some feedback after something that they did and I will ask them about it. Oh, okay. And that informs me as to where I might go next. And it doesn't mean I don't have a plan.

I mean, you know, I have a, uh, an absolute, could we say a cornucopia of knowledge and strategies and tools, um, available to me, but it's a little bit like you sort of unraveling that ball of wool. He is a knitter, by the way. Yes, I am. Um, it's a little bit like that, that by me being curious, I will find out how those things connect with each other that maybe I've noticed and they've noticed, and then finding a path.

Does that answer your question? Absolutely 

[00:15:32] Jeremy: does. Yeah. I want to talk about curiosity because I really want to share what it feels like because for me it's quite specific. Curiosity can be, oh that's interesting, which is a little stab, oh that's interesting, and on. The sort of curiosity that I think we both use in our sessions is a sustained, calm, but still highly energised curiosity.

It's active listening. And that means that in a way, we don't particularly have an agenda, but we are highly focused on what that person is telling us, whether it's visual, auditory, whether we're watching body language, whether we're feeling energy, whatever it is. I'm talking a lot about energy today, and I do, I do use it a lot.

There's something about that level of curiosity, which also means It enables the person to explore themselves as well to open up in a different way. It's really that curiosity for me creates a space in which that person can be. 

[00:16:36] Gillyanne: That's a very good point. And you know, Jeremy, it seems to me that this is one of the reasons why if It works for the individual and the teacher that often a very strong bond of trust is created between the guide and the singer.

And, uh, I talked about that, didn't I, at UEP? And I mean, I have clients who come back to me across a period of 20 years. I'm not talking about they come back every week or even every month, but they know... 

[00:17:09] Jeremy: Have you not fixed them yet? 

[00:17:11] Gillyanne: No, no, I haven't sorted. No, I've got to keep them coming. Um, it's more about they know that I know their voice.

And even if their voice is changed, they will come back because of that trust. And actually, I feel quite honoured by that. 

[00:17:27] Jeremy: There's something I do want to say about, about curiosity. And I think it's very easy for a singer to, a singing teacher, or a vocal coach, to get excited about something that they hear and to cut that curiosity short.

And then dive into whatever the fix is. Um, and I think that is... The moment you spot yourself doing that, you go, is it actually, am I ready to diagnose yet, or is there more? And it's a, it's a step, because what you're doing, essentially, it can almost feel like you're not doing anything, and therefore you're not earning your pay.

But what you're doing is creating such a, uh, an arena. in which something can be discovered, that you can actually end up finding something that you hadn't suspected and working on that. And people having really powerful singing lessons, really powerful moments of discovery. And so I'm, I love that. I think that that type of active listening curiosity is incredibly powerful.

[00:18:25] Gillyanne: I think this is very interesting what you've said just now, because I sort of had a throwback to, um, because as you know, we've been working together for 25 years, um, that, you know, sometimes we've shared the same students, um, or, you know, the same, the same clients. 

[00:18:41] Jeremy: It's actually 27. 

[00:18:42] Gillyanne: Is it? Okay. All right. We'll talk about it later. I know how long we've been married, which is at least something. Um, and I can remember maybe passing a student over to Jeremy, um, because I thought perhaps maybe I'd got stuck with them or they needed some performance coaching. And, you know, he'd come bouncing in and saying, well, I did so and so with them. And I'd say, but I've been doing that with them, and I've been telling them that. And here's the key, the word is tell. Teaching isn't telling. 

[00:19:16] Jeremy: Teaching isn't telling. 

[00:19:17] Gillyanne: Or, I wasn't communicating it in a way that they could understand, or the way that could make the difference. And this is taking me, actually, to something I've realized, which is the, um, the interaction between the fact that we are training teachers right now on our Accreditation Programme and the way that we're working with them and seeing how they work.

And that has changed the way that I work with individuals. So thank you for that, all of our lovely cohorts. And it's amazing to see your development. 

[00:19:49] Jeremy: I think that's really interesting. What, what we're doing, and I just want to pick up on this, what we're doing in the Teacher Pathway, the first three courses of the Teacher Pathway, the 12 Hours To Better Singing Teacher, 12 MORE Hours To Better Singing Teaching and the Accreditation Gateway, is that we are essentially looking at the teachers going, what are you doing?

Is that where you want to be? Did you get the results that you wanted? Is there anything else that you could do? Here's a whole load of ideas. When you get onto the Accreditation, we are actually training people to do what we do. Mm hmm. And it's a whole other level, just putting that out there. 

[00:20:27] Gillyanne: Yeah, absolutely.

[00:20:30] Jeremy: So, where should we go now? 

[00:20:31] Gillyanne: Well, I want to ask you about... Your need to play the piano. 

[00:20:36] Jeremy: Oh, okay. Yes. Need to play the piano. I have been playing the piano since I was six. Um, and I'm a national prize winning collaborative pianist. So, high level. By the way, I was thinking about this this morning, when we were sort of talking about doing this podcast.

I have worked at national and international levels since I was 20. Mm hmm. Uh, and, you know, won my first competition at, 21, I think it was. Um, but worked all over the place since then. And it's really interesting because piano has been my identity for a very, very long time. It's like everything I did was geared around I am a pianist. I play the piano. I work with other people. And I am going to say this, oh, 20 years ago, 15 years ago, whatever it was, I snapped a tendon in one of my fingers. And at that time, I didn't know what was going to happen. I didn't know if it would heal at all. So in an instant, I was looking at the end of my piano career.

And that made me go, who am I? And actually, it's been quite a journey since then to work out who I am still, still on it. But it's really interesting. The finger did heal. I then snapped a different finger tendon and that healed as well. So I am still playing and I'm actually playing better than I was in those periods.

There's something about piano playing, which is, I now have two, at least two. Modes of expression which are very, very comfortable for me. Piano playing is one of them. Weirdly, singing isn't. I don't think of myself as a singer. I think of myself as a pianist who sings. So piano playing is, is my very, very powerful mode of communication.

I can do all sorts with that. And the other one is words. I write. And to me, the way I write is that's an expression of who I am, and it's, I love helping people find what their mode of expression is, and obviously polishing it, but it's like, who are you, and what do you do, and how do you express yourself? And those two things for me, are the way I express myself.

So it means that I still need to play the piano. I still need to perform and I still need to work with other people. Nowadays, I don't need to do it that much. I'd like quite like to do it more, but I don't need to do it that much. But I love playing and working with people who are on a similar wavelength musically.

And I'm very lucky. I have a couple of people who are actually local who we just gel. 

[00:23:04] Gillyanne: Yeah, you can so see that you all gel. 

[00:23:07] Jeremy: We don't even need to discuss it. We sit down, we play, we pick up things from people, we pick up phrasing, we do speeds. We hardly ever discuss how to play a piece. We just sit and play it and it works.

And that is just so powerful. So, hi Ruth. 

[00:23:25] Gillyanne: And there's a concert coming up. 

[00:23:26] Jeremy: There is, there is in, uh, I think 10 days time, which we are hoping to video, so I'm hoping to put some little clips on YouTube, because there is a clip of me at the moment playing the solo piano stuff, because so many people that I've worked with now that we're on Zoom have never heard me play.

It's like that was my life for 50 something years. Um, and so I just decided to put a clip up of me playing some flashy Victorian, lots of runs and cadenzas piece, just to show I could. 

[00:23:55] Gillyanne: Will you put it in the show notes? I'm sure people would find it fun. 

[00:24:00] Jeremy: Just little snippets of a piece which is variations on Welsh themes.

[00:24:05] Gillyanne: Oh, can I talk about the other thing that at the moment I still feel the need to do? What's that? Well, I have the word doctor in front of my name, which means that I have a PhD. And I worked really hard for my PhD, as everybody does, and I actually started it late in life. I didn't start it till I was 50.

So it was a really big journey. There's something about my academic brain that is still important to me. I think it's part of how I dig into the understanding of things. And if I'm going to communicate that understanding of things, I just need to exercise that academic brain every so often. Even though sometimes in a training you give me a, an elbow and say, PhD speak, stop it. 

[00:24:54] Jeremy: Cut the, cut the PhD speak. Yeah.

[00:24:56] Gillyanne: And I think it's about making connections and I talked earlier about the importance of making connections with people and with their voice, but I also really like to make connections with ideas. you know, when you, you think about voice and music and performance, um, and energy and individuality, we're, what we're looking at is a whole series of things that need to be connected.

Yes. And I love doing that, joining up the dots of stuff, sort of scientific concepts and so forth, and making them understandable for people, and, and sharing it in formal and informal ways. 

[00:25:36] Jeremy: That last bit specifically I wanted to go to. I'm so pleased you put that in. 

[00:25:39] Gillyanne: Go on then. 

[00:25:39] Jeremy: Because one of the things that you also do is you're taking very complex concepts and you're breaking it down to share with people who are not in that PhD brain land.

And therefore, they're not used to academic language. Academic language is an entire world of its own. Um, and if you don't know what that stuff means, it is like a foreign language. So one of the things that we both do is we take academic papers and we break them down to what does this actually mean in reality?

What does it mean in ordinary language? How can we apply it? Can we apply it? Is there anything in there that we can apply? Or is it theoretical? And it's understanding that level of scientific paper and I think that's really important. 

[00:26:23] Gillyanne: Hmm. And actually, just something specific has come to mind that, and I don't even remember this because it's several years ago now, on one of the Facebook groups that I ran, I did a post about resonance because people were asking about formants and I explained what they were and how our voices arrived at them.

I just did a little live, and I can't tell you how many people, and these are quite experienced singing teachers as well as people who were less experienced, I can't tell you how many people messaged me and said, Thank God you did that. It's the first time I've ever understood it. And as a matter of fact, it was something I found very difficult to understand myself.

So maybe that's why eventually when I got there, it was easier to make it tangible for other people. 

[00:27:15] Jeremy: So I suppose I want to bring it full circle really, which is, um, what matters to us is reflected in Vocal Process, but it's actually going to be reflected even more. So Vocal Process is making just a few little changes so that we can fit in all the things that we do and love.

The Accreditation Programme has already changed. We're now on Cohort23, who started a couple of weeks ago. Very excited by that. They're a completely different group to Cohort22. It's so much fun. 

[00:27:47] Gillyanne: Yeah. And what's good about that is, first of all, we are making connections with people. They are making connections with each other.

And as we go through the training, we will get to a point where we talk about values and what matters to people and how they play those values out in their own practices. And that's something that's really precious to us, isn't it? 

[00:28:10] Jeremy: Honestly, the Values Unit that we do, which is normally month 10, is so powerful. It really changes the way that people see themselves and also how they want other people to see them.

Incredibly powerful work. So, the question is, what matters to you? So, I think it's a really fascinating question. What actually matters to you? It's, I mean, as long as you're not driving, take a piece of paper and a pen and write it down. Go on your phone and make a note. Work out what matters to you and then work out do you have enough of it in your life.

And then the next bit is, can you change your life to have more of it?

That's it. We'll see you next time. Thanks very much. Bye

bye. This is A Voice, a podcast with Dr. Gillyanne Kayes and Jeremy Fisher.