The Rose Window

Dear Friend,

🌹 🎶 Loving the World this Valentine's Day🎶🌹
The first blooms of spring always make my heart sing -  S.Brown
Here in London, the first flowers are opening their sweet faces to the sun, lifting hearts as days lengthen and lighten.  This month's newsletter is full of rosy Valentine's reflections and a warm invitation to blossom at lots of lovely events including my Spring Sing Workshop 

🌹 🎶 Resources for Celebrating Love this Valentine's 🎶🌹 
When we sidestep the tacky commercialism, Valentine's Day can be a moment to reflect on how we wish to express, experience and share love in the world.

🌹  Self Love - is an inside job.  Committing to thinking, speaking and acting lovingly towards self may feel icky at first, but with practice becomes a healthy habit.  From a positive foundation of self-love, we can nurture and grow ourselves through good food, exercise and creative activities.  
 Here's a fun free Date Night Yoga session from Yoga with Adriene

🌹 People Love - giving from a full cup, it becomes natural to extend loving thoughts, words and actions to those in our intimate relationships, families, and wider community. Who can you love bomb, thank or celebrate?
Here's some beautiful reflections on successful relationships and ways to love our community from Positive News 

🌹  Planet Love - inspires gratitude and care for our home on earth. Consider buying Fair Trade choccies, swapping potted for cut roses, scattering wild flower seeds for the bees, hand-delivering a hand-made card or making a loving donation to your favourite world changing charity.

To cover all bases, take 3 deep tummy breaths and sound a big AAAAHHHHH from your heart for yourself, your people and our planet.

As we contemplate our relationships, I'm delighted to share my latest podcast exploring how we support healthy intimacy in art and life.

🌹New Podcast - Intimacy on Set with Ita O'Brien 🌹
Available on video or Apple Podcasts

  Holding a safe space - on the latest episode of #VocalRevolution, pioneering Intimacy Coordinator, Ita O'Brien shares how we support safe, healthy expression around intimate content on TV, film and theatre and how this relates to issues around sexual expression in wider society.
www.itaobrien.com www.intimacyonset.com

Content/ Trigger Warning: this episode discusses sexuality, intimacy, abuse and issues around consent. If you feel you need support around your experience of these issues, there are people willing to help and listen.
Please click here for a list of resources

🌹🎶  WHAT IS INTIMACY ON SET?🎶🌹
Creating intimate content in a really open, professional, autonomous and empowered way for everybody - Ita O'Brien
Ita O'Brien is the UK’s leading Intimacy Coordinator and Founder of Intimacy on Set, her company set up in 2018, which provides services to TV, film, and theatre when dealing with intimacy, sexual content, and nudity. Ita pioneered the role of the Intimacy Coordinator and since 2014 has been developing best practice Intimacy on Set Guidelines, which have been widely adopted in the industry. 
In our conversation, Ita shares how the Guidelines provide a safe, professional structure for the whole production from the get-go.  Similarly to dances, fights or stunts, intimate content can be safely created and choreographed with continuous consent and dialogue, with an Intimacy Coordinator and all professionals involved in the production.

🌹🎶 SERVING STORYTELLING 🎶🌹
Every single moment is part of the storytelling - Ita O'Brien
Both in life and in art, Intimacy comes with high vulnerability.  Sculpting anatomically correct choreography which serves the emotional arc of the story ensures that actor can stay within character and is never exposed personally.  Similarly to other high-risk activities, such as bunjy jumping, safety measures enable actors to take a huge life-affirming creative leap.

🌹 🎶 GLOBAL IMPACT 🎶🌹
Within structures, there's freedom to fly - Ita O'Brien
The Guidelines and role of the Intimacy Co-ordinator have been globally adopted and championed by movements such as Time's Up.  Ita has worked on numerous high profile productions with far-reaching impact. The intimate scenes in Normal People received widespread acclaim, and are now being shared as part of sex education in secondary schools as a model of first-time intimacy with continuous consent.  
Writer, Actor and Director of I May Destroy You, Michaela Coel dedicated her BAFTA Award last year to Ita, thanking her for:
“making the space safe, for creating physical, emotional and professional boundaries, so we can make work about exploitation, loss of respect, about abuse of power, without being exploited or abused in the process."

🌹🎶  SELF-CARE 🎶🌹
It has been a tremendous honour to bear witness to Ita's journey in our coaching sessions and a true joy to celebrate the revolutionary impact of her work on our podcast.  Our work began because she wanted to safeguard both her actors and herself when working with sensitive issues on a devised theatre piece. Her instinctive understanding of the importance of self-care and care for others has blossomed into a global mission.  The inner work of honest self-reflection yields vast rewards as that which we transform within ourselves transforms our experience and contribution to our world.

So whatever form self love you take this Valentine's and everyday, know that you are contributing to the growth of love globally! 

Sending big singing bouquets of roses for a beautiful self-loving, people-loving, planet-loving Valentine's Day

Be well, be safe, breathe deep, sing loudly 

    BIG THANKYOU! 
For staying tuned and singing your song!
Much good singing vibes!

katie@therosewindow.org
www.therosewindow.org

 Singing Calendar  
Ready to sing and shine? - Drop me a line!

🌹 🎶Welcome Choir 🎶🌹
Thursdays 7-8.30pm at St John the Evangelist, SE19 2RX
Sunday April 3rd, 1pm - we'll be singing at West Norwood Feast
Thursday April 7th, 8pm - Spring Singing Party 

🌹 🎶Breathe Harmonix NHS Choir 🎶🌹
Honoured to be collaborating with Mike King & Breathe Arts 
April 8th - Concert St Catherine's Church, SE14 5SG, Telegraph Hill Festival

🌹 🎶 Carers Support Centre Choir 🎶🌹
Weds 10.30-11.45am, Carers Support Centre,
24 George Street, Croydon, CR01PG 
Wonderful news that the Carers Centre is now fully reopened!

🌹 🎶 Caterham Community Choir 🎶🌹
Tuesdays 7-9pm, de Stafford School, Burntwood Lane, CR3 5YX

🌹 🎶 HeartSong 🎶🌹
Holwell Village Hall, Pirton Lane, SG5 3SS
Bi-monthly New Year Singing from Jan 28th

🌹 🎶 Heart & Lung Songs 🎶🌹
Hybrid Sessions @ Tooting Works from Jan 6th
At the moment we are not able to take new members

🌹 🎶 St Christopher's Hospice Choir 🎶🌹
Newly relaunched for 2022!
https://www.stchristophers.org.uk/timetable/event/st-christophers-choir/