12. Bulgarian State Radio & Television Female Vocal ChoirLe Mystère des Voix Bulgares
I don’t know how I discovered the Bulgarian State Television Female Vocal Choir’s music. Maybe via my sister. My sister’s a really technically good singer. When we were growing up, she’d be singing along with Christina Aguilera or something, doing vocal runs and things like that. I don’t exactly know when she and I talked about this, but I feel like we heard this music together, whether it was this exact album or this style of Bulgarian female singer where they can do these really intricate fluctuations with their voices. There’s this kind of joke between us: “Oh, you could sing these songs too if you spoke the language.” So I think my sister showed it to me, and I just fell in genuine love with it. It’s just so calming and peaceful, the joy and the magic of their human voices coming together and intertwining. It’s really inspiring, and it’s something that I come back to often to listen to.
I think the times that I’ve enjoyed singing most on tour have been when I’ve had a player with me who can also sing back-up. I’ve had that in a couple of different incarnations. One was with Aurielle Zeitler, who’s a really talented multi-instrumentalist and musician on her own. She has a beautiful voice, and singing with her was just so pleasurable. Another was with Andrea Calderon, who played violin with me for a couple of tours. Again, it felt like our voices melded together and became one. It’s so magical when that happens. I really enjoy singing with other people. I hope to do more of it and bring more human voices together myself. This album was definitely a big inspiration behind that. This current year is going to be more about touring my new record, which isn’t so much about that, but in the future, I have big dreams of singing with more people. Also, I think it’s in the collective unconscious, to be honest. I have a feeling that more and more people are going to want to sing with other people. Maybe it’s something about coming out of the pandemic and isolation. I think finding the joy of singing together in the same room again is really appealing to a lot of musicians, and definitely to myself.
