Meet our new Studio Administrator, Rachel De Fontes.
Originally from oh so sunny Southern California, Rachel now lives & works between the US, UK & EU. She has a great love for traveling and has been known to tune in for Helena’s Resiliency Circles and Scene Study classes from the deepest corners of the world (where there’s wifi, there’s a way).
She is Director of Murmuration Studios, a London & Dublin-based theatre & film production company, which she co-founded with two other actors she met at Helena’s studio (shout out to Sarah Noll and Justin Ensor!)
She first met Helena in 2019, and has been in close connection with the studio ever since, meandering through the different acting courses/workshops as well as the RCs, which she has always felt incredibly supportive and meaningful to her life.
She is at her absolute happiest both when she is in nature - hiking, listening to the sounds around her, feeling the ground beneath her feet - and when she is engaged in meaningful work - in a magnetic rehearsal room, connected with collaborators, or on the stage, a sense of magic in the air shared with audience and performer alike.
Outside of her work at the studio, she is an actor, writer & producer. In 2022, she starred in a short thriller, produced 'An Intervention' in London (Riverside Studios), co-wrote a short film (set for 2023 production), aired one of her theatrical pieces in a Festival of New Writing, saw the release of the Paramount Pictures film “The Infernal Machine” which she acted in alongside Guy Pearce and began developing her feature-length film, “Jenny, and”.
She’s trained/worked with various companies & professionals across the US, UK, Ireland, Russia, Portugal & Australia and she feels that Helena’s studio is particularly special. She is very happy to be a part of our Studio Team and says she can’t wait to see where 2023 will take us.
IMDB | Spotlight
Interview with EmpowerHer*Voice Theatre Spotlight Collective
Actor Training Ireland
Actor Training Ireland aims to create new opportunities for the continued training of actors and for the training of new actors in Ireland.
Actor Training Ireland provides a strong framework for actors to engage with thought, action and emotion while working on text, improvisation, movement and song.We encourage actors to be playful, thoughtful and purposeful. Actor Training Ireland aims to:
● Provide contemporary actor training within Ireland
● Provide and develop new skills and techniques for the contemporary actor
● Develop and
Actors, what’s interesting for me when I watch actors on camera, I can see the ones who are holding their breath and the ones who have the ability to surf with the experience. Because fundamentally “breathing is meaning”
And tone, is almost like the setting, the atmosphere, the tone of the piece, but it’s actually also the physicality of our voices. And that makes love, peace or war. It’s not the words. It’s actually the tone that I respond to as opposed to the words.
Helena’s teachings are inspired by Organic Intelligence ® & Fitzmaurice Voicework ®
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If you want to work with Helena and really liberate your expression, enliven and bring more subtlety, diversity & nuance to your acting craft or if you just want to really inspire and engage those around you, comment “me” below and we’ll reach out with details of our new online voice, acting and empowerment programmes.
https://www.helenawalshempowermentstudios.com/store
13/09/2022
“The Resiliency and Empowerment Circle has been a gorgeous space to be part of. To receive and be received within a trusting collective of open hearts. That’s a powerful and beautiful thing. Very grateful for it.”
~ Fiach Kunz, Actor
The Empowerment and Resiliency Circles are a wonderful way to empower yourself. They are weekly gatherings largely based on self care and aim to give you ground and stabilize you as well as support you during the week, especially if you are feeling overwhelmed.
Clinically proven benefits include:
•Reduction of stress, anxiety, depression, addiction and trauma.
•Development of resiliency, emotional regulation and cognitive functioning.
•Reduction of chronic issues such as sleeping problems, chronic pain.
•Embodiment of social belonging and meaning.
Our next 10 week course starts Wednesday September 28th, 4pm - 5.30pm (GMT+1) with Human Empowerment and Resiliency Coach, Helena Walsh and Rebekka Haas Çetin - Meditation & Yoga teacher, and Organic Intelligence® Coach.
A maximum participant / tutor ratio of twelve to two provides a high level of individual attention, coaching and feedback.
DM to get started!
https://www.helenawalshempowermentstudios.com/empowermentcircles
Your job as the actor is to embrace the dialect of vulnerability.
We have been conditioned to believe - my felt experience equals there is something wrong. Oh there is something wrong if you are feeling something.
Basically what I’m saying is when I’m sad, angry or hurt and someone says “what’s wrong”? Why should there be anything “wrong”? I’m feeling.
There are different questions we can ask.
You look sad - you can name it. Do you feel angry? So that’s acknowledging the experience.
When we do that, then what starts to happen is the body starts to feel seen, the body starts to feel heard.
So what you are doing is attuning to the language of the body instead of skipping a beat and trying to understand.
~ Helena’s teachings are inspired by Organic Intelligence & Fitzmaurice Voicework ® & NeurosystemicsTM
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If you want to expand and deepen your acting process and bring more diversity, nuance and complexity to your performance. DM to get started. We are now auditioning for The Actor’s Practice!!
https://helenawalshempowerment.mykajabi.com/theactorspractice
Honouring the power of Vulnerability as a language all by itself.
It has a special dialect of connection and relationship.
Vulnerability is the language of the HEART.
This HEART language needs a compassionate space of awareness in order to elevate this art form, the human experience to a deeply personal and collective one at the same time.
~ Helena Walsh on voice and acting
Helena’s teachings are inspired by Organic Intelligence ® & Fitzmaurice Voicework ® & NeurosystemicsTM
~ PS. Like this post, share with your friends
Want to see more posts like this follow us on instagram
If you want to expand and deepen your acting process and bring more diversity, nuance and complexity to your performance. DM to get started. We are now auditioning for The Actor’s Practice!!
https://helenawalshempowerment.mykajabi.com/theactorspractice
30/06/2022
When we allow the body do the listening, the voice is alive with the colours of the story.
When only thinking, the voice has no access to this colouring box.
The voice being the most intimate expression of our sense of self, requires craft and skill, in order for the listener to feel the character's humanity in the very sounds being expressed.
The nature of this intimacy resides in the deepest impulses in our bodies.
Our bodies act as sensory impulses that feel the relationship with our environment from within.
When this ability to be within and without aligns with the breath, the breath carries the feeling through vibration and into expression to the listener.
The story is felt and the character is seen.
The seeing is deeper than just with our eyes but opens up our heart in new ways.
We are after all opening our audience to their own hearts and compassion by drawing them into someone else’s life and asking them to feel with them.
So therefore the actor sees with their heart.
~ Helena Walsh on voice & acting
Helena’s teachings are inspired by Organic Intelligence ®, Fitzmaurice Voicework ® & NeuroSystemics
~ PS. Like this post, share with your friends
Want to see more posts like this follow us on instagram
If you want to expand and deepen your acting process and bring more diversity, nuance and complexity to your performance. DM to get started. We are now auditioning for The Actor’s Practice!!
https://helenawalshempowerment.mykajabi.com/theactorspractice
29/06/2022
You are building trust through shared complexity
It is our ability to trust our characters' complexity that opens the actor to a deeply compassionate performance, one that embraces bias, judgement & discomfort.
This listening, at this complex level, requires the actor to feel safe, then brave enough to be in human experiences they have never experienced.
It is the actors' compassionate imagination that has the skill to create the fibre and muscle of their character’s being.
Then this complex nature flows from story, to be expressed through body and voice to the listener, in this case the audience.
The actor, being in complexity, invites the audience to resonate and be moved by the character's human experience.
This is what builds an intimate relationship with trust.
~ Helena Walsh on voice & acting
Helena’s teachings are inspired by Organic Intelligence ® , Fitzmaurice Voicework ® & NeuroSystemics
~ PS. Like this post, share with your friends
Want to see more posts like this follow us on instagram
If you want to expand and deepen your acting process and bring more diversity, nuance and complexity to your performance. DM to get started. We are now auditioning for The Actor’s Practice!!
https://helenawalshempowerment.mykajabi.com/theactorspractice
16/06/2022
“See the possibilities and places your voice would like to go” ~ Ruth McGill
A full day of singing.
Only a few spaces still available
The Deets:
* Date: Saturday 18th June 2022
* Time: 10am to 5pm
* Location: Glendalough Hotel, Co. Wicklow
Includes: singing workshops with Ruth McGill that will help you
✅sing with confidence and clarity
✅sing with ease and enjoyment
✅sing with more power and precision
✅Learn Top Vocal Techniques to keep your voice in shape so you can sing with precision, power and in a playful way
✅Learn how to engage your creative mind with a playful quality
✅Learn how to engage your whole body in the action of singing
Fee: From EUR 150 per person
🌟A maximum participant/tutor ratio of fourteen to one provides a high level of individual attention, coaching and feedback.
To book or learn more, follow this link
https://www.helenawalshempowermentstudios.com/singingretreat
09/06/2022
"I just wanted to be able to project more which was true but something much bigger happened. It has literally opened my lungs and is close to pristine."
"Ruth is such a beautiful soul and a pleasure to work with. The classes are fun and feel like a little adventure every week, you never know what direction it will take but something beautiful is always created. Love love love."
“Ruth is an extraordinary teacher. This course transforms singing into something you do with ease and joy, rather than something out of reach - though make no mistake, you'll be better and more confident as a result"
“it was a wonderful experience. I can hear confidence and clarity in my voice since the beginning of the course so thank you thank you thank you! “
“Ruth helped me overcome my fear of singing in front of others.”
🌟Ruth loves nothing more than to be a source of empowerment for people when it comes to their relationship to their voices
🎶That’s why Ruth has created this 1-day workshop to help you discover your authentic sung sound!
And can offer you skills that will help you
👉sing with confidence and clarity
👉sing with ease and enjoyment
👉sing with more power and precision
🌟With over 20 years experience singing & performing on stages, tv and radio as well as teaching singing workshops and classes worldwide, Ruth knows how help people get more connected and shine in their singing!
🙌🙌If you want to work with Ruth and really feel the fun and freedom around singing, join us in Glendalough SATURDAY, 18th June, 10am to 5pm
Click link to register
https://www.helenawalshempowermentstudios.com/singingretreat
How do you have an empowered voice?
Well the first thing is, you want to be able to breathe more easily.
How do you breathe more easily? You need to feel safe and secure
How can you feel safe and secure when you’re on a film set, where there’s a lot at stake or when you’re in front of an audience where there’s a lot of people? You have to strategically and skillfully choose to sit into your animal body, your senses: what do you see, hear and touch.
Because they are a fact. What you hear is a fact. What you see is a fact. What you touch is a fact.
What goes on in your mind is not a fact! What your mind is telling you- “you’re good, you’re bad, this is terrible….you’re feeling anxious” etc is not a fact!
There is nothing factual or rational about the mind when the body is in situations where it may feel it’s overwhelming.
If the body is feeling overwhelmed, then the only way through that like the bear hunt is with the body. The mind is not going to get you out of that rabbit hole. So what we want to do is honour and build this relationship like animals do in the natural world - what do you see, what do you hear, what do you touch.
Now the mind is going to have resistance and is going to go “but that’s not what I’ve been taught” because it's conditioned that way.
What that does is, it builds a container for you to be able to breathe more easily, for you to have a felt experience so that then when you are expressing yourself, you are not listening to the sound of your voice, it’s a feeling, a vibration that’s moving through you, that’s empowering you to express.
When you feel grounded and stable, then the voice will express from a more nuanced and cultivated creative space.
Let me know your questions and your insights in the comments below.
If you like these types of voice and empowerment techniques, there are two opportunities to continue your study with me coming up:
🗣The Empowered Voice 1-day retreat at the Glendalough Hotel on Saturday June 25th 2022
🎬'The Art of Acting' 3 night retreat with me & Chris Edmund at Killary Lodge from September 4th - 7th 2022
🎬“The Actor’s Practice” 10-week advanced actor training, online with me and Benjamin Mathes starting September 2022
See the link below for registration for these opportunities.
https://www.helenawalshempowermentstudios.com/store
02/06/2022
🌟 Meet Ruth McGill
Ruth is one of the leading singing coaches in Ireland. Uniquely experienced and established as one of Ireland’s finest character actors as well as founder, musician, singer and songwriter with the multi instrumental, 3 part harmony group "The Evertides". , who "loves nothing more than to be a source of empowerment for people when it comes to their relationship to their voice". .
She has performed on National Television (The Ray Darcy Show, Fleadh TV) and received extensive radio play on various shows on RTE 1 & Lyric Fm amongst others, whilst packing out & wowing audiences at top venues and festivals including Whelans, "Doolin Folk Festival" & "Body & Soul Festival" (The Wanderlust Stage).
She is currently teaching singing at The Lir National Academy of Dramatic Art and has taught singing worldwide and is innovative and original in her approach.
We are delighted to join forces with Ruth for a day-long singing retreat in the heart of the Wicklow Mountains at Glendalough. With over 20 years experience singing & performing on stage, TV and radio as well as teaching singing workshops and classes worldwide, Ruth knows how to help people get more connected and really stand out and shine in their singing!
This unique opportunity takes place Saturday June 18th at Glendalough Hotel from 10am to 5pm. Limited space available. Click link to register.
https://www.helenawalshempowermentstudios.com/singingretreat
I’m interested in you being inspired by the present moment to create.
By noticing the ten thousand intimacies in your day, you can then use those colours, textures, shapes to bring a deeper and richer experience to your acting.
You will have fostered a relationship with the present moment that is alive and alert and one you can create and reveal the textures of your character's human experience from.
We are after all made up of these moments of flow if we say yes to what is moving through us.
We have often been educated to numb this more creative and intimate relationship with our lives.
We move too quickly to notice but the actor needs to become the artist that slows the world down and sits and listens and sees so that a more wholesome experience of life is manifested.
~ Helena Walsh on voice and acting
Helena’s teachings are inspired by Organic Intelligence ®, Fitzmaurice Voicework ® & NeuroSystemics
🤩Our upcoming in-person retreats and courses:
🎶The Art of Singing 1-day retreat with Ruth McGill at the Glendalough Hotel on Saturday June 18th 2022
🗣The Empowered Voice 1-day retreat with Helena Walsh at the Glendalough Hotel on Saturday June 25th 2022
🎬'The Art of Acting' 3 night retreat with Helena Walsh & Chris Edmund at Killary Lodge from September 4th - 7th 2022
🎬“The Actor’s Practice” 10-week advanced actor training, online with Helena Walsh and Benjamin Mathes starting September 2022
Limited spaces available; DM to get started!
https://www.helenawalshempowermentstudios.com/store
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