Identity wins one over celebrity

Earlier this year I decided to take up singing lessons.

Having already had a fair bit of singing experience, my main wish was to test the limits of what I could do; to see where singing might be able to take me in the years ahead.

In my first lesson I was already learning techniques to help with breath control, vocal range and tonal quality.

Standing on tiptoes on a skipping rope, ends held taut, would help me maintain my breath throughout a long phrase.

To reach those fear-inducing high notes, I must raise my arms above my head in a gesture that reminded me of Pavarotti in his more passionate moments.

To come to grips with the rhythm and mood of a piece, a great deal of skipping seemed to be required.

These unfamiliar, faintly ridiculous movements didn't come naturally to me and my teacher couldn't fathom how I could be so hesitant. "Loosen up! Pretend I'm not in the room," she said.

But I would have considered these to be minor discomforts had I known that in later lessons I would be called upon to flounce around the room in the manner of a child who had been refused an ice cream; to lunge forward, pretending to smell a rose, and then to grasp this fictitious rose and drop it into a pool behind me; and, in a similar spirit of theatrics, to look over my shoulder and feign to twirl an opera cape around.

Each of these exercises had a purpose, and as the lessons progressed, there were moments of elation when I managed to hit notes I had never dreamed of reaching before.

I learned about French time names, Ionian and Aeolian modes, and interrupted cadences.

I sang pieces of such lyrical beauty that I felt transported to other times and places …

But my own experiences of singing in church, choirs and the odd musical hadn't prepared me for the rigour of singing lessons.

It was partly about a lack of spare time … but it got me thinking a lot about discipline, too. I'm in awe of people who can single-mindedly commit themselves to something, and make it their life's work. I've found myself feeling frustrated at my own habit of dabbling in hobbies but never coming close to mastering them … a short course in philosophy one month, French lessons the next.

At one point in my fourth or fifth lesson, as she began to teach me a complex new technique, my teacher told me to remember this moment, because my voice was going to be different from now on. Instead of anticipation, I felt sad.

My singing voice was patchy, too thin at times, it squeaked terribly on high notes, but it was mine and it had got me this far.

It had seen me through decades of hymn-singing at church, singalongs on family car trips, impromptu guitar sessions to Joni Mitchell songs with an old boyfriend, a brief stint in a band with friends and gusty renditions of show tunes with my sister in the living room at mum and dad's.

As raw and imperfect as it was, this was the kind of singing that had always given me life; opened up new ways to worship God; made my spirits soar as nothing else could. There was something about the thought of polishing and refining this voice that suddenly seemed wrong - scary even; as though tinkering too much might take away some of the unselfconscious enjoyment of singing that had always been such a strong part of my identity.

In the end, singing lessons went the way of piano and French classes before them.

At my last lesson I felt wistful as I said goodbye to the feisty teacher who had coaxed and inspired and tested me for the past eight weeks.

But it wasn't too bad … I was already starting to think about the photography course I'd read about a few days before.

Emma Halgren