My name is Sophie. I’ve always enjoyed the arts- they were the place where the most fun happened, where the time passed incredibly quickly and where I felt most alive! music, theatre, art, dance… the advice do what you love… well that was a tricky one and left me even more confused! I ended up choosing the music direction, heading to music college to master my instrument. And i did… yet at the end of it, I couldn’t help feeling that something was missing.
I had had wonderful teachers, could play fast passages, play with colours, dabble with contemporary techniques, make reeds, sightread, play with others… and yet, i was slightly at a loss. It gradually irritated me that I was only ever interpreting music from other people. Where was my own voice? Actually just left with myself and the oboe… well I felt like a fraud. Was I even a musician without written music in front of me? Also a part of me was longing to make music with people. To be able to share that feeling of community and joy, but I felt I just didn’t have the tools.
It was over an Erasmus exchange that I came to discover Rhythmics. A transdisciplinary course which looks at the relationship between music and movement, developing the senses in order to be able to be more in touch with oneself, to hear what is going on inside,and being able to express it, be it in a visual or auditory format (more on Rhythmics). Improvisation lying at its heart. A large focus to its teaching in Vienna is also given to facilitation. How do we learn? What environment does it need? How can music and movement support personal development in different stages of life? How can it be used to create a new experience of a totatlly different Theme or topic? What does the group in front of me need?
5 years later and I am based in Vienna and feel deeply fufilled creating environments where music and movement can be explored, where the connections with oneself and others can be deepened, and where ones spirit is given space to flourish.
sophie lusty 