‘The first thing I would like you to do is to suspend your judgement for a little while… we can allow our feelings and emotions to express through sound, leaving nothing out and allowing it to express in our own voice. Give yourself permission to sing your song in your own way. You’re using your real Voice!’ - Igor
To know ourselves. Our body. Our spirit. Our feelings.
To look at the bottom of what has happened to us. So deeply we get to the bottom of our belly. Of our bowels. That deep part of ourselves that Mongolian shamans call Turtle. The battery.
Namely the force through which we express ourselves. The library of our emotions. A collection of emotions that have not been left free to flow in that big tube with two ends that we are. An open canal between mouth and anus.
‘Our emotions shape a single note that rises and descends in the canal of vital energy and stops when it comes across a block.’ A block that Igor can feel by simply listening to the sound of our voice. As if we were an instrument.
I immediately visualized myself as an alimentary canal through which I assimilate accumulate store regurgitate elaborate and defecate emotions. I transform them. Maybe I create them. And as I listen to him talk about his life and experiences with smiling – sometimes slightly half-closed – eyes I understand that he is also listening to my sound. The sound that comes out of my mouth arising from my canal. And he is feeling where my note has stopped.
I laugh. I think of all the impactions that must be inside myself. And I don’t laugh anymore. So he gets nearer. The bar is fuIl of people and noise. It is raining outside. Humidity is everywhere with its smell. He draws nearer to my ear and sings. His sound flows through my canal and something moves. His voice changes and a flute appears. I feel like there is an orchestra next to my ear. I would like to close my eyes and let myself go. Cleansing by means of the harmonic or overtone singing.
As a complete autodidact, Igor has been striving to find his own sound and to become the constantly evolving man that he is today. He told me about his youth. His life. The series of fortunate and unfortunate events that have somehow led also to our meeting. Like a note, he let himself be carried around the world. I could write loads of pages about what he told me. But I prefer to invite you to read his book Your sound is sacred. Or to participate in one of the workshops you can find on his website.
I am fascinated by people who don’t follow the traditional path. People who wake up every morning and look at the mirror asking themselves questions and trying to find the answers. Searching inside themselves. Looking at other people. Listening. People who can find their own means to express themselves. And to express. People who can go beyond all the commonplaces that we are told or taught. And who – in this case – find their own way through sound. Their own truth.
Igor is a travelling sound. A seed carried by the wind. Free. In search for his truth. His own. Mine. Yours. It is the energy to which nobody can remain indifferent. It is tranquillity. It is also love. As I talk to him I cheer up. There are people who find the meaning of their existence in the energy emanating from countless meetings. Because everything has a meaning. Every note is important in itself.
Igor Ezendam pursues his sound to find tranquillity. And he teaches other people how to find their own. Namely to learn how to listen but above all how to listen to themselves. To that intimate and deep part of ourselves. To fill with a sound that makes us happy.