 | Mollie Birney is a music educator who believes strongly in the vocal arts as a unique medium through which to access and cultivate the rich and organic emotional territory available to us. Her teaching philosophy centers around the ideals of curiosity, compassion and service, through which she seeks to support her students in their development both as individuals and as part of a larger community. Mollie Birney earned her B.A. in Music from Tufts University in Boston MA, studying Vocal Performance and Choral Conducting under Andrew Clark, and has completed her coursework for her M.M. in Choral Conducting from California State University, Los Angeles. She has worked with the Boston Children’s Chorus and the Los Angeles Children’s Chorus, and currently serves as Associate Conductor with the National Children’s Chorus. Ms. Birney also teaches on the Voice Faculty at the Santa Monica Conservatory of Music where, in addition to offering traditional voice lessons focusing on vocal technique and development of musicianship skills, she also teaches sessions in Music as Meditation. Despite a music-heavy resume, Ms. Birney has considerable experience working in the addiction recovery field, specializing in eating disorders. In Boston she worked with the Multiservice Eating Disorders Association (MEDA), coordinating and presenting lectures to high school and colleges. Through MEDA she received training which prepared her to facilitate free evening support groups for students on the campuses of local colleges and universities (’07-’09). She is active in the Los Angeles recovery community as a volunteer, continuing to serve as a sponsor and sponsee in 12-step programs. Her non-musical education has included courses on Mindfulness, Insight Meditation, Vipassana Meditation, Pranayama and Vinyasa Yoga certification. Each of these practices inform her work as a private voice teacher and served as the catalyst to the Vocal Mindfulness sessions offered at the Conservatory. She brings her experience in recovery, meditation and mindfulness into her work as a musician and an educator and counselor. |
Vocal Mindfulness; Music as Meditation:
While the focus of a traditional voice lesson is the development of a student’s vocal technique and repertoire, Music Meditation places emphasis on the cultivation of the client’s own authentic sound in the service of their own meditation practice. Likewise, as the breath is usually the primary object of mindfulness in meditation, here the resonance of the voice becomes the object of mindfulness. Elements of each session include instruction in mindfulness and meditation, short periods of meditation, breathing techniques, vocalization practices and aural meditations. When the voice becomes the object of mindfulness the client is granted a connection to the body by the resonance created in the breastbone and bones of the facial mask, allowing a more focused experience with the meditation practice itself.
The therapeutic element of this approach arises when the client is asked to relate to their own voice through simple and accessible vocal exercises. The inherent vulnerability that most people experience with singing, attributed to the fact that the instrument is housed within the body, often generates fear, resistance, anxiety, and most significantly, judgement (typically negatively but sometimes positively). This is where the practice of mindfulness explored in the first part of a session (specifically tools like labeling, observation, and most of all compassion), steps in to aid the client’s reactionary experience, be it positive or negative. The exercise then becomes meeting whatever sounds, and sound-induced reactions arise with mindfulness and compassion. These sessions are intended for all levels of experience in both music and meditation - one needn’t be a musician nor a monk to benefit. What I observe in clients with whom I’ve worked over time is an increasing gentleness with self as a result of practicing mindful compassion in the face of a challenging and often uncomfortable experience. In addition I notice an ability to observe themselves as more “right-sized”, and to be less triggered by their thoughts and their reactions to these thoughts. One student reported “I guess I realized I don’t have to believe all of the things I think”. Most clients even develop their own independent meditation practice outside of our sessions.
