Podcast of Linda Brice discussing her path

Podcast of Linda Brice discussing the 4 pillars of singing training

Linda Brice, creator of transformational voice training; voice instructor to opera stars like Nicole Cabell; and actualized woman, spoke with me recently about her path and her mission of healing.

Brice, who has spent her career singing and training singers, comes from a classical and intellectual background.  Life events and a desire to know Source have led her to looking at her work as a way to help others confront, befriend and eliminate fear from their performance efforts.  Looking at fear as the primary thing that stands between a singer and their connection, not just to God, but to a positive performing experience, Brice helps students understand that their art is “being prayerful and creativity is being godly.” She teaches singers to “breathe in Source and exhale God.”

Brice clearly understands that professional singers are seen as a commodity by the recording industry that hopes to make money by using them.  She reminds singers that they are chosen by god and that they are part of a priesthood here to serve god and change the world through their singing.

Brice’s own journey toward understanding Source shifted by reading Matthew Fox and sharing a workshop with Julie Cameron, who later became her student. When she saw her role as a servant of God, her connection to the ideal of “singer as Medicine Man” manifested in a process she calls transformational voice training. She understood that tension destroys the beauty of the human sound and set out to help singers eliminate tension and use singing as their meditation and devotion to Source.

Brice hopes to evolve a transformational voice institute to share the teachings with other teachers, who can help their students.

A bit of history on the minds at Westwind Farm Studio.

Maryellen has been computing since 1984, learning and teaching every type of software from word processors, spreadsheets, database, web editors, graphics editors, and multimedia software from Macromedia. She has taught computing and multimedia at Oregon State University, Portland Community College (PCC), and Columbia Gorge Community College. Credits include creating numerous new courses at PCC, as well as a boating safety game for the Oregon State Marine Board.

Maryellen’s musical background developed when she became the church organist at age 13. She’s played for musicals and as an audition pianist throughout her adult life, getting a start at DeSales University in Pennsylvania, working on projects in Washington, DC, Tampa, Florida, Corvallis, Oregon and Portland, Oregon. During a Fulbright scholarship in Fiji, she acted and directed with the city theater in Suva and sang for an American folk festival at the US Embassy.

In 2001, Larry Schaeffer taught her Logic audio and midi editing for their Elena’s Dream project and she’s been hooked on recording and midi composing ever since.

Larry Schaeffer has been working as a musician, composer, audio engineer and producer since 1975, when he played piano, Hammond organ and synthesizers for Airborne. He has composed and produced music for Portland’s Channel 12 news show, documentaries, multimedia, cell phone ringtones, and children’s cd adventure games throughout the 80s and 90s. Company credits include Microsoft, Intel, HP, Wacom, GoldMine, and V-tech.

Larry recorded, engineered and produced projects with several Portland area artists and groups, including: Tommy TwoTone, Element57, Sequel, Renegade Monks, the Jimmies, Rachael Taylor Brown, and Alan Jones.

Westwind had a party!

The point was to celebrate solstice – renamed “soul”stice because we had Oregon’s “legendary soul diva” here, Linda Hornbuckle. Her band played all night to a very appreciative crowd. Linda and Janice were kind enough to let me interview them.

The day ended up being perfect – no wind, the temp stayed consistently warm, no rain. The caterer, Dave Dalton, set up bistro tables all around the pool, along with a buffet lineup of continuous food. He put a bar and dessert room up in the tractor house to encourage guests to move around the property.

We set up mowed trails through the meadow and up through the pasture for romantic walks and views of the sunset. Many people took advantage of them.

We had 160 guests, with overflows of people parking along the road and throughout the mowed parking lots.

There were smiles on every face, there was not a single person who wasn’t as thrilled to be here as we were to host.

Comments heard:
This is a great thing you do for the community to bring people together like this
I saw someone I hadn’t seen in a long time!
I love the way the structures fit into the land and don’t impose themselves on it.
The water feature looks like it has always been here
It’s so nice to see all the flowers blooming!
What is THAT amazing plant? (about the allium schubertii)

The band played from 8-11 without a single stop – Linda Hornbuckle and Janice Scoggins are tireless. They sang and played through the band’s breaks and sang happy birthday to the children and Rudy Barton, who celebrated his birthday Friday.

People arrived starting at 6:30 and stayed until 1:30 a.m. hanging around the fireplace, talking and enjoying the space, food and drink.

The thing about my personal feelings with regard to the party is this: I felt like I was floating, literally floating the whole evening – perhaps floating on a sea of love, everyone was so happy, I was totally elated and completely uplifted. I thought at one point that it was the happiest day of my life, I had so very much fun talking with all our friends and introducing people to each other. The joy in my heart was so full, it was amazing!