Some lessons in my travels

My nephew Toby and I had a wonderful Alexander lesson together. We were outside the hotel we were staying in at Mathraki, (there is only one hotel, completely empty except for us) on the concrete square where the washing lines were. The wind was blowing Toby’s shirts on the line as we talked of consciousness and awareness and he rose gently up from the chair and sat down again and walked about with me, my hand on his back, or his hand on mine, discovering when we had lost our widened attention and lost contact. It was very exciting and I am pleased to say Toby’s eyes twinkled and his whole self glowed when I suggested we continue in the autumn for a weekly lesson.

I was sad to leave him and my brother at the security queue in the airport in Corfu. I was getting a later flight and had a lunch appointment with Miranda, who teaches at the Ionian University, at the Esplanade.

Also at the table was a colleague of hers, Spyros, who teaches violin and just back from teaching in Ohio. He asked me about his stiff neck/shoulder and a pain in his thumb which he gets when doing vibrato. So a short table consultation, and I suggested he be aware of what he is doing with his legs whilst playing. Aha! He realised that more recently the pain has been getting less and he is standing rather than sitting to play....he promises to attend my next workshop in the autumn which Miranda is hoping to arrange. She made the point that musicians playing for 5 hours at a time are like athletes, and have no lessons to help them with their bodies and fitness.

I stayed with Alexis in Thessaloniki for a couple of nights. He has been on a number of my workshops there, is a wonderful composer and musician and has found Pilates very helpful to help him out of his old use patterns. I gave another lesson to a man who is hoping to come over to Alonnisos this summer and who found me in London in the winter. He had been feasting as you do on a Sunday with friends with the help of wine and ouzo....not so helpful for lessons to be feeling giddy, but by the end he said he felt much more centred.

But my favourite lesson was with Alexis – he is so sensitive to the work, and had one of those sartorial experiences when I placed my hands on the bottom of his ribs at the back and he had a sudden release that gave him more breath and height and o...almost impossible to recount except he put it nicely ‘ Pilates gives you the external, it is nothing like Alexander, it is exercises. But this is something completely different, it gives you change on the inside. It is unbelievable...’


We went off for a drink at his favourite bar to talk more – I needed to be back early so he dropped me home at 12.30am before going off into the night with another friend....and in the morning at 6.30 I was half asleep and jammed the plug into his wash basin with no way of removing it. Ho hum.

All of this to say how fun it is to sow a few seeds in my travels.