Towards the end of the summer school, my voice gradually returned. I got some bad news about a friend back home, but being so far away there wasn’t anything I could do and I felt helpless – and also, weird, from being in such a social situation but not really having anybody there to talk to about my jumble of feelings. Everyone a friendly stranger. But the mountains were comforting and with my voice back, I could sing again – and I realised how much I had missed it. Being able to feel the vibrations of something behind the lungs in a forte. How important that is for me as release.
In the tiny village square, next to two lime trees, stands the tiny village church. A modest stone structure with roots from the thirteenth century, it does not look like much to the world. But appearances deceive. On the second to last night, we got to borrow the key and after dinner, a couple of us preformed some songs for the school with our voices and two guitars. The acoustics were incredible. The stones had been placed perfectly to make the sound grow and linger in the dark.
The next night, the last one in Peyresq, Miguel and I went to the church ourselves. Miguel, a Portuguese PhD student, also had a past as a choir singer and we just could not let the opportunity pass. We needed to try our songs against the acoustics of the old stones. With people dropping in, it ended up being an impromptu acapella concert of traditional Portuguese and Swedish songs.
And just like the sound under the arched ceiling of the church, so did we linger there in the dark. It was like a space out of time, the sound of the old stones so clear and fragile. I could have stayed there all night, listening and singing, filled with wonder. Something let loose in me from the vibrations. And maybe the others felt it too – something other than the academic, rational. An opening to an other part of being.
But of course we had to stop eventually. There was a goodbye party to go to. It felt strange, stepping out from that fragile darkness and then going to a dance party, the base heavy and higher in volume than the speakers could really handle. I had to do the dancing in short intervals, with breaks outside to speak quietly or look at the stars.
Katja Malmborg 