Getting Back My Wings

by Jessica DeSimone of Warren Teagarden and the Good Grief

Warren Teagarden and the Good Grief
Photo by Mr. Dodgy

Since I can remember, I’ve been performing. My earliest memories are dancing around my childhood home, singing along to my mom’s records, or doing what I can only describe as a cobra pose inside the giant planter boxes at our local shopping mall, pretending I was Ariel from The Little Mermaid. I used to feel like I could fly when I sang, like I had tiny wings sprouting from my back.

As I got older, my grandma taught me how to play piano, back when my hands were so tiny I couldn’t hit an octave. In school, I added choir, theater, and dance team to my repertoire, and I was sure I would be a big theater star one day. But of course, pragmatism won, and I went to college for something far less fun and ended up in a career even less fun, leaving a part of myself behind.

For years, my creative self was suffocated. I was dying to tap back into the freedom that came with being on stage, that rare out-of-body experience when you get to leave yourself behind and become something else entirely.

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From the reclusive “Artist” to the “Rock Star”

by Zach Pliska (Vazum)

From the reclusive artist to the rock star by Zach Pliska (Vazum)
When I’m playing or listening to music time stands still, and the outside world doesn’t exist. My imagination runs free. That’s what I most enjoy about being a musician. I like to spend time alone which gives me plenty of time to write songs, but then performing in front of an audience is an entirely different thing.

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