For 25 years, Ann Dyer was a successful touring and recording vocalist, singing jazz and other styles. But around 6 years ago, she took a hiatus from performing to devote herself to a deep study of yoga, especially Nada Brahma, or the yoga of sound. Originally she thought she would take about a year off, but actually, she never really returned to her old performing life. She opened a yoga studio in Oakland, and made teaching there the focus of her career.
Recently, though, she has begun to integrate her years of yoga practice with her artistic work, in a year-long project at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco. It’s culminating this weekend in a performance called Vak: Song of Becoming. The show includes a 70-member choir of non-professional singers, a band including some Bay Area greats like saxophonist/composer Hafez Modirzadeh, and choreography by Erika Chong Shuch.
KALW’s Hana Baba sat down with Ann Dyer in our studio for a conversation about yoga, sound, and music. She started by leading Hana through a yogic vocalizing exercise.
