Podcast: Play in new window
When I look back over the past few decades, it feels as though I have spent a huge portion of my life as a professional musician dealing with tension, pain, stiff shoulders, tendinitis, and all kinds of bodily aches. Most of my colleagues would say the same, I expect. It never occurred to me to wonder if they were optional; I thought that was just part of being a musician.
I had heard of Body Mapping, but I never seemed to find the opportunity to dig in and learn about it, or find out if it could help me. (I was too busy working, and practicing, and taking Advil for my aching joints and tension headaches.) Until last summer, when Bridget Jankowski, author of Body Mapping for Music Ministers, sat down with me one day during the 2018 NPM Convention in Baltimore, and taught me more about this remarkable practice.
This podcast episode is essentially a distillation of that conversation. Bridget’s work, and her book, talks not only about Body Mapping as a vehicle to increased clarity and efficiency (and decreased pain!) for the musician’s body as we make music, but also about how this practice can help deepen our awareness and focus as we perform our work as ministers. Our conversation quite literally changed almost everything for me about the way I conduct, the way I sing, the way I teach, and the way I work with my own choruses; it is truly amazing—and I’ll leave it there and let you listen, since Bridget explains it all far better than I can!
(And if this intrigues you even a little—Bridget herself will be speaking at the Raleigh NPM convention in a little over a week, giving one of the Mega-Breakouts. Please come see her in person and learn from a truly remarkable teacher!)
Music heard in today’s podcast:
As recorded on Vision, CD-295
Sing Amen! the Podcast, with Jennifer Kerr Budziak
Sound by Jim Bogdanich
Sing Amen! opening music: Promenade, by Bob Moore (from Let Every Instrument Be Tuned for Praise, CD-491, from Liturgical Suite #4, G-4789 ©GIA Publications, Inc).
Sing Amen! closing music: Amen, (from More Sublime Chant, CD-459, The Cathedral Singers, Richard Proulx, conductor. ©GIA Publications, Inc.)
Thank you, Jennifer and Bridget, for this wonderful podcast! It’s a great reminder of the richness of Bridget’s book which is replete with helpful, potentially life-changing information. I was especially touched by Bridget’s concept of the more you understand and map your body, the more your body “gets out of the way” and allows Holy Spirit to fill and guide you more completely. Because you no longer have to direct attention and thought to your body, you become a more open and useful instrument of the Lord. As a dancer, as well as a musician, I find this very helpful. Bridget, you are an amazing, inspired, and selfless instrument of God on so many levels!