The Voice

DAVID ARCHULETA

Posts Tagged ‘feeling his voice’

David Archuleta’s Announcement and My Own Personal Journey

Posted by bebereader on Monday, June 3, 2013

daca123

I have avoided watching David’s “announcement video” for the longest time since that day we saw it together in real-time on Livestream. He was hurting, or so I thought and I couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t watch him being vulnerable in front of so many people. Most of all, it hurt me to see him cry.

How would I live without his shining force for two years?
How could I get through two years with no new music, I thought.
Two years is way too long to go without a concert.

It was all about me.

I know about milestones and rites of passage in one’s religion so I should have seen David’s mission announcement coming instead of hitting me from out of left field.

In my religion, for example, when a young person reaches 13 they are considered to have achieved spiritual maturity and are welcomed into adulthood by having a Bar Mitzvah or for a girl, a Bat Mitzvah. This important event is marked by being called to read from the Torah, which is the fundamental narrative of the Jewish religion. This is usually done in temple before family, friends and a congregation of people and the reading is done in the Hebrew language. In addition, they must learn to chant in the ancient melody. Hebrew is written in symbols, not letters in the printed version of the Bible and is very hard to learn. It often takes months or years to accomplish this at the same time they have their regular school studies. It’s considered an honor to fulfill all of the required duties which I have simplified here. There is also a community service requirement.  The Bar/Bat Mitzvah ceremony is a milestone life-cycle event in the life of a Jewish person and is the culmination of years of study.

Having had a chunk of time to reflect on all this, I realize how selfish it was to think of myself and how David’s leaving would affect me.

Last night I was on YouTube as I usually am, watching old concert footage. Instead of avoiding the mission announcement link, this time I clicked on it! I watched it 3x. I saw it differently this time than I did all those months ago. I didn’t see a hurting David baring his soul. I saw a brave young man who didn’t know how the audience would react to his announcement and when he heard applause, was so touched that it brought tears to his eyes. I saw a brave young man who had the difficult task of telling his fans that he was taking a temporary leave from his music career. It was hard for him but he had the strength to do it anyway. I saw someone who had the courage to be vulnerable and who shed tears of relief.

Video credit David Archuleta

Even in his absence David continues to inspire me. It may have taken me 15 months to have the courage to watch the “announcement video” but seeing his strength is making ME strong enough to wait out the days until he comes back home.

Posted in @DavidArchie, Chile, David Archuleta, Editorial, Mission, The Voice | Tagged: , , , , | 67 Comments »

Cords of Love ~ David Archuleta

Posted by Angelica on Friday, May 17, 2013

Reprinted from The Voice, August 4, 2010
 
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“Every time I would think about my purpose, the answers seemed to come in sounds.  In melodies.  In feelings.”

~ David Archuleta, COS, pg 91

“I perceive the world through the wide range of emotions that whirl all around in it.”

~David Archuleta, COS, pg 193

horizontal_dividers_brushes_by_kawa3

From early childhood he sang all the time, alone in his room or in the backyard.  He sang for family and friends and at various functions just for the love of singing.  He would sing random verses that came into his head at odd moments, a habit he has never lost.  He sang even though he was painfully shy, even though he hated the sound of his voice.  He didn’t believe it when people told him he could sing, thinking instead that they were, “just feeling sorry for me because I was little.”  I marvel at the kind of love for one’s art that can conquer even the belief that you have no gift, or as he describes it in the early days of it’s development, “…my so called gift.”

Yet in spite of this lack of confidence in his ability, he worked hard to improve his voice.  He practiced and studied persistently to increase his range and knowledge of music, taking every opportunity that came his way to overcome his shyness at performing in public (he was much more comfortable singing alone in his room). Just when all of his labor began to pay off and he could see some real progress, came the awful diagnosis of vocal paralysis.  What was that like, I wonder, to work so hard and overcome so much and then suddenly lose the dream?  I think it must have broken his heart.  He could have become rebellious and bitter.  He could have railed against God.  Instead, he accepted His will and his fate and continued to persevere.  He struggled with his vocal exercises, even, as he recalls in his book, Chords of Strength, A Memoir of Soul, Song, and the Power of Perseverance, there were days he felt the whole thing was, “a waste of time.”  In the intervening years till the miracle of his voice returned to him, he learned to face life philosophically with the fervent belief that, “everything happens for a reason.” He learned so much about faith, hope, courage, gratitude, humility, and the very real power of prayer.   Quoting again from his memoirs he says, “From the moment I got the diagnosis, life quickly went from Star Search to soul search.”

On AI he was scoped by the same doctor who had treated him for vocal paralysis years before.  In “Chords of Strength,” David relates how the two pictures were totally different, so different that at first he thought it was, “scary.”  Then he writes:

“….I still had a paralyzed vocal cord, but…my cords had found a way to work around the condition because by some miracle, they were vibrating despite what medically wasn’t supposed to be able to happen…The one vocal cord, it seemed, had actually grown up over and around the weak one in order to adjust for the other not working.”

The one strong cord “grew up over and around the weak one”…reached out and gathered the other cord so that when the working muscle vibrated the one, it caused the other to vibrate too.  In other words, the physical mechanism that produces the sound of his voice is literally an embrace.  It is an act of reaching out and lifting up, causing the weak to stand, and that which was unresponsive to feel again.  How like a metaphor for David’s view of life and the effect his music has on so many.

What had seemed like a curse had in fact turned out to be a blessing, giving his voice a breathy, velvety quality and an emotional power born from the ashes of a refining fire.  There is a pain and heartache in his voice that is genuine.   It is a sound that one feels as much as hears.

Once I stood at a barricade in the noon day sun

And looked up into gold-flecked eyes that sparkled

Brighter than sunlight

And rested in his resting voice to feel

In that eternal moment the peace of unconditional

Acceptance.

Once upon a dream I stood at another barricade,

This time at night and David sang

One song after another while I,

Bathed in moonlight (his voice was the moonlight)

Felt him reach out and gather my soul in an embrace.

moondavid112

Posted in David Archuleta | Tagged: , , | 74 Comments »

Cords of Love ~ David Archuleta

Posted by Angelica on Friday, January 11, 2013

Reprinted from The Voice, August 4, 2010
 
8504A6E5-E8F2-4278-9EED-74C44F0F0DB1
 

“Every time I would think about my purpose, the answers seemed to come in sounds.  In melodies.  In feelings.”

~ David Archuleta, COS, pg 91

“I perceive the world through the wide range of emotions that whirl all around in it.”

~David Archuleta, COS, pg 193

horizontal_dividers_brushes_by_kawa3

From early childhood he sang all the time, alone in his room or in the backyard.  He sang for family and friends and at various functions just for the love of singing.  He would sing random verses that came into his head at odd moments, a habit he has never lost.  He sang even though he was painfully shy, even though he hated the sound of his voice.  He didn’t believe it when people told him he could sing, thinking instead that they were, “just feeling sorry for me because I was little.”  I marvel at the kind of love for one’s art that can conquer even the belief that you have no gift, or as he describes it in the early days of it’s development, “…my so called gift.”

Yet in spite of this lack of confidence in his ability, he worked hard to improve his voice.  He practiced and studied persistently to increase his range and knowledge of music, taking every opportunity that came his way to overcome his shyness at performing in public (he was much more comfortable singing alone in his room). Just when all of his labor began to pay off and he could see some real progress, came the awful diagnosis of vocal paralysis.  What was that like, I wonder, to work so hard and overcome so much and then suddenly lose the dream?  I think it must have broken his heart.  He could have become rebellious and bitter.  He could have railed against God.  Instead, he accepted His will and his fate and continued to persevere.  He struggled with his vocal exercises, even, as he recalls in his book, Chords of Strength, A Memoir of Soul, Song, and the Power of Perseverance, there were days he felt the whole thing was, “a waste of time.”  In the intervening years till the miracle of his voice returned to him, he learned to face life philosophically with the fervent belief that, “everything happens for a reason.” He learned so much about faith, hope, courage, gratitude, humility, and the very real power of prayer.   Quoting again from his memoirs he says, “From the moment I got the diagnosis, life quickly went from Star Search to soul search.”

On AI he was scoped by the same doctor who had treated him for vocal paralysis years before.  In “Chords of Strength,” David relates how the two pictures were totally different, so different that at first he thought it was, “scary.”  Then he writes:

“….I still had a paralyzed vocal cord, but…my cords had found a way to work around the condition because by some miracle, they were vibrating despite what medically wasn’t supposed to be able to happen…The one vocal cord, it seemed, had actually grown up over and around the weak one in order to adjust for the other not working.”

The one strong cord “grew up over and around the weak one”…reached out and gathered the other cord so that when the working muscle vibrated the one, it caused the other to vibrate too.  In other words, the physical mechanism that produces the sound of his voice is literally an embrace.  It is an act of reaching out and lifting up, causing the weak to stand, and that which was unresponsive to feel again.  How like a metaphor for David’s view of life and the effect his music has on so many.

What had seemed like a curse had in fact turned out to be a blessing, giving his voice a breathy, velvety quality and an emotional power born from the ashes of a refining fire.  There is a pain and heartache in his voice that is genuine.   It is a sound that one feels as much as hears.

Once I stood at a barricade in the noon day sun

And looked up into gold-flecked eyes that sparkled

Brighter than sunlight

And rested in his resting voice to feel

In that eternal moment the peace of unconditional

Acceptance.

Once upon a dream I stood at another barricade,

This time at night and David sang

One song after another while I,

Bathed in moonlight (his voice was the moonlight)

Felt him reach out and gather my soul in an embrace.

moondavid112

Posted in David Archuleta | Tagged: , , | 81 Comments »

Cords of Love

Posted by Angelica on Wednesday, August 4, 2010

“Every time I would think about my purpose, the answers seemed to come in sounds.  In melodies.  In feelings.”

~ David Archuleta, COS, pg 91

I perceive the world through the wide range of emotions that whirl all around in it.”

~David Archuleta, COS, pg 193

From early childhood he sang all the time, alone in his room or in the backyard.  He sang for family and friends and at various functions just for the love of singing.  He would sing random verses that came into his head at odd moments, a habit he has never lost.  He sang even though he was painfully shy, even though he hated the sound of his voice.  He didn’t believe it when people told him he could sing, thinking instead that they were, “just feeling sorry for me because I was little.”  I marvel at the kind of love for one’s art that can conquer even the belief that you have no gift, or as he describes it in the early days of it’s development, “…my so called gift.”

Yet in spite of this lack of confidence in his ability, he worked hard to improve his voice.  He practiced and studied persistently to increase his range and knowledge of music, taking every opportunity that came his way to overcome his shyness at performing in public (he was much more comfortable singing alone in his room). Just when all of his labor began to pay off and he could see some real progress, came the awful diagnosis of vocal paralysis.  What was that like, I wonder, to work so hard and overcome so much and then suddenly lose the dream?  I think it must have broken his heart.  He could have become rebellious and bitter.  He could have railed against God.  Instead, he accepted His will and his fate and continued to persevere.  He struggled with his vocal exercises, even, as he recalls in his book, Chords of Strength, A Memoir of Soul, Song, and the Power of Perseverance, there were days he felt the whole thing was, “a waste of time.”  In the intervening years till the miracle of his voice returned to him, he learned to face life philosophically with the fervent belief that, “everything happens for a reason.” He learned so much about faith, hope, courage, gratitude, humility, and the very real power of prayer.   Quoting again from his memoirs he says, “From the moment I got the diagnosis, life quickly went from Star Search to soul search.”

On AI he was scoped by the same doctor who had treated him for vocal paralysis years before.  In “Chords of Strength,” David relates how the two pictures were totally different, so different that at first he thought it was, “scary.”  Then he writes:

“….I still had a paralyzed vocal cord, but…my cords had found a way to work around the condition because by some miracle, they were vibrating despite what medically wasn’t supposed to be able to happen…The one vocal cord, it seemed, had actually grown up over and around the weak one in order to adjust for the other not working.”

The one strong cord “grew up over and around the weak one”…reached out and gathered the other cord so that when the working muscle vibrated the one, it caused the other to vibrate too.  In other words, the physical mechanism that produces the sound of his voice is literally an embrace.  It is an act of reaching out and lifting up, causing the weak to stand, and that which was unresponsive to feel again.  How like a metaphor for David’s view of life and the effect his music has on so many.

What had seemed like a curse had in fact turned out to be a blessing, giving his voice a breathy, velvety quality and an emotional power born from the ashes of a refining fire.  There is a pain and heartache in his voice that is genuine.   It is a sound that one feels as much as hears.

Once I stood at a barricade in the noon day sun

And looked up into gold-flecked eyes that sparkled

Brighter than sunlight

And rested in his resting voice to feel

In that eternal moment the peace of unconditional

Acceptance.

Once upon a dream I stood at another barricade,

This time at night and David sang

One song after another while I,

Bathed in moonlight (his voice was the moonlight)

Felt him reach out and gather my soul in an embrace.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , | 178 Comments »

 
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