About Me, Marie Black

I'm a lifelong singer and songwriter since age 15, when I had my first few guitar lessons. My mom and I had our voice lessons together starting when I was six.

I continued my studies of music into adulthood with private lessons, in college, in private music schools, and, most recently, in workshops taught by master teachers and masterful performing artists.

I've also sung and played guitar in bands. I've had my own bands from San Francisco to Austin to Portland. Stylistically they were jazz, rock and Americana . I've recorded two full-length CDs and have a third in the works, a fourth one in gestation. Even with my humble beginnings, I once won a Bay Area songwriting contest. Persistence pays off.

leading the circle: Oakland Sing For Your Life

So, in other words, music, to me, has been a lifelong journey.

Because of my childhood, I found it imperative to dedicate a substantial part of my life to the healing process. I am the first female in my family to have a college degree. I practiced massage for over twenty years and skincare for 28 years. I am an active Reiki Master, and have an ongoing distance Reiki clinic. My work now is teaching Voice and Yoga and offering Sound Healings and Reiki.

It was a sequence of events in 2011 and 2012 (but starting in 1991) changed my life forever. It serendipitously led me on my journey of helping people free their spirits through singing.

With my teacher, Rhiannon

But, for that, I must give you the back story.

Imagine New Year’s Eve, before the US invasion of Iraq. Imagine or remember the heaviness in the air. We didn’t want another war. Protests all over. Heavy hearts. You hear that a local legend will be holding something special at Grace Cathedral, perched in San Francisco’s iconic Nob Hill neighborhood. You wander into the cathedral and are surrounded by like minded people. Everyone is singing or on the verge of singing. You are singing. But you're singing strange and unfamiliar consonant and vowel clusters, not really any words. Yet it all feels right. And, what's more, the sound is healing and meditative and gorgeous. A bit further on, a hand reaches out as the person next to you places a fingertip or two on your heart chakra, and you reciprocate the gesture to the person next to you, and so on.

Eventually, the cathedral is so packed that the doorways are overflowing with soaring voices. The song is pulled out of the ethers by Bobby McFerrin. Bobby, in turn, passes the parts to his team of singer-guides who then, pass the parts to the audience. It was estimated that there were 2500 people in attendance at the Chant for World Peace on New Years Eve, 1991.

Marie Black with Bobby McFerrin

I was lucky enough to be one of the singer-guides assisting Bobby during that life-changing experience. My voice teacher at the time, Raz Kennedy, was a founding member of Voicestra and it was at his invitation that I helped out. He was a fantastic voice teacher in Oakland and at the Blue Bear School of Music in San Francisco, where I first met him. He supported me and came to my shows.

Fast forward twenty years to Portland, OR where a friend encouraged me to go to an unusual “open-mic.” I was curious. So, we walked into Michelle’s Piano performance space. The room was full and the woman on stage was guiding singers, giving them tips on how to increase volume, become more resonant, and, in other words, how to gain more authenticity in their voices. It was amazing to watch. And, later, when I spoke to her, I learned that she taught singers how to teach. I began taking classes and, a year later, was in the Voice Teacher Apprenticeship and became a certified Transformational Voice Teacher.

The year long, full time voice teacher apprenticeship was an intense journey. And it would be in one of my classes at the institute where I heard that Bobby is now teaching Circle Singing in New York. So, the confluence of what was to become my life’s work was the river in which I swam. I began attending Bobby’s yearly workshops and studying Vocal Improvisation with others in his same circles. It was no coincidence.

I held my first CircleSong at my Hawthorne Blvd. Studio in 2012. As I began seeing private voice students there too, what was once a holistic skin care and massage studio morphed into a voice studio. And, it was when I gave my first voice lesson in my practicum at the institute, that I realized that voice was exponentially more intimate than touching people during bodywork session. It was a big responsibility.

In August of 2016, I was diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer. Circle Singing became a weekly event at my Hawthorne Blvd. Studio. Sound healings all around. I attribute my healing, in part, to the deep connections made through music, my sound healer friend, Kevin, and all the singing. The picture from the Bobby McFerrin Tribute Concert on the home page was taken two weeks after my second surgery.

Because of multiple events and the illness, I knew deep change was necessary. It was my time to move to the sun. The powerful energy of the Sandias and the land of New Mexico called to me.

At the Transformational Voice Institute, we apprentices were asked to take a vow to spread this work. To help people open their voices, which the world needs so much. To give the world more beauty through helping people learn how to sing beautifully. To help people open their mouths and minds in expression. When we sing, we open up worlds within ourselves.

Now, the voice teacher training from which I graduated, was a Classical voice approach. I was the first singer-songwriter to graduate from the program. I learned early on that the technique transfers to all styles of singing.

In conclusion, I feel that the people, perhaps now more than ever, we the people need to free our voices in music and for good. It is imperative to let ourselves open, open further, and more-so, until . . . . we soar! Aho.