Judith-Kate Friedman
photo by R. David Zaslow
AT ESSENCE we’re all creatives.
Our artistry thrives when conditions are good for blooming, for harvest. Now is such a time. The truths and voices we carry are deeply needed.
Be you a seasoned adventurer in the arts or a new arrival to creative identity….
Welcome to Aliveness Through Arts ~ This website is a gathering place, a hub for my diverse arts and offerings. It’s filled with invitations for you to join me in practice places and on play-grounds for creative souls who love the world.
If you're here to connect more fully with the artist you are or wish to become... You’ll meet others here, who, like you, are seeking more courage, confirmation, and camaraderie....
I offer a range of resources that boost juice, increase joy, and help metabolize grief.
The experiences, tools and music I offer are intended to uphold well-being for you and those you love and serve. Some of my methods are research-vetted. They’re all road-tested. :)
Schedule a breakthrough call to discuss your needs, design a series of coaching, mentoring, or consulting sessions, or see if a cohort for women creatives may be a good fit.
For a selection of original music, art, poetry,
and videos see the buttons on the about page and the social media links above and below. A gallery of my favorites will soon be added.
If you’d like to book a concert, invite collaboration, hire me as a cantorial soloist,
or commission a new musical or multi-modal work, click here to schedule a conversation.
If you’re a community leader, educator, musical facilitator, mythteller, or teaching artist — I offer diverse resources, training, and support. You can learn about my work as founder and CEO of Songwriting Works Educational Foundation and as steward of the Mythsinger Legacy Project at their respective websites. Contact me to discuss how I can serve you.
There’s so much good that we can do together.
This is the time.
I look forward to speaking with you soon!
~~~Judith-Kate
A Celtic tale:
The God Lugh seeks to enter the Gates into Tara, dwelling place of the Gods and entryway into the Other World. Its denizens keenly say yes only to those with talents they truly need.
Each time Lugh approaches and beseeches, naming one of his many skills: smith, harper, poet, magician, worker in metal, historian, physician….
Each time, he’s told they already have, and don’t need, what he brings.
Yet, unstoppable, Lugh asks again, and again, each time bringing a different aspect of himself forward. Finally, exasperated, he claims and proclaims his true fullness:
“I am all this!”
Swiftly the Gates open.
Lugh is granted access to unforeseen, long-guarded, and longed-for realms.
So it is with us humans, too. And with our projects and collaborations.
Each of our creativity and presence matter.
And the combinations of our gifts, skills, foibles, and curiosities?
They are like none other on earth!
If you’re here to more fully become and express all you are and came here to be, let’s connect.
I’m honored to bring my own artistry, and 35+ years of experience as a mentor, coach for creatives, and community-based arts facilitator, on behalf of your success and the thriving of your communities.
Who and what calls to you? How might I support you in your unique work?
I look forward to talking with you soon,
Judith-Kate
Judith-Kate Friedman is an award-winning composer and producer, multi-modal artist and author.
Support for Your Creativity in 2024-25 and beyond
Judith-Kate offers coaching, mentoring, consulting, and music/multi-modal commissions.
Ways we can work together include:
Your Breakthrough Year ~ Small Group Cohorts for Creative Women artists, dreamers, leaders, and changemakers
Individual Coaching Sessions and Packages for Creatives of All Kinds ~ “Free or Find Your Voice, Speak or Sing Your Truth!”
Dr. Claire Zammit’s 7-week Feminine Power for the Awakening Woman course
with authorized coaching and guidance from Judith-Kate
Publications and Press
“We never give up, although we give in
We drink the above and grow from within
We wave in the breeze
We watch you begin
And teach you to listen for what weaves and spins”
“A tremendous songwriter with a real gift for prose, too.”
Myth amidst Music.
As Judith-Kate says: “These years of the pandemic have challenged us all. My music has been very alive throughout, though quite close in, as I met and nourished my inner introvert! I’ve continued to expand my Oral Tradition meanderings and find myself now carrying myths as well as songs.
It’s five years since I started serving as Steward of the Mythsinger Legacy Project. It is one of the great honors of my life to keep alive the work of my belated beloved Daniel Deardorff (1952-2019), musician, songwriter, mythteller, author, ritualist, and revered teacher. I’m thrilled to represent and now teach his book, The Other Within: The Genius of Deformity in Myth, Culture and Psyche, 3rd ed. (Inner Traditions, 2022).
Join me and a growing, global community of mythsingers, tellers, ‘waistrels and vagabonds.’ We gather ‘round the virtual hearth (online) to savor
the old stories and deepen our senses of ourselves as we take in the food/wisdom of the ancients applied to our personal/collective realities.
Yes, new songs and poems are also part of the feast. Always check the events page for upcoming dates and details, subscribe to my lo-fi missives, and follow me on social channels. Thanks for sharing in the beauty with me!”
Go here for a selection of Judith-Kate’s podcast interviews about myth, story, and her work and life with mythsinger Daniel “3D” Deardorff.
Poetry
Judith-Kate’s poems appear in Arbella Poetry Magazine Winter 21/22 and the London Writers Salon’s Writing in Community anthology #2 (2022), #3 (2023), and #4 (forthcoming in Sept 2024). Following the death of poet Robert Bly in November 2021, she wrote daily poems for 366 days. She is reprising this poem-a-day practice in 2024 as a participant and social media moderator for The Stafford Challenge. Learn more here.
Through September 19th you can find her poem-a-night posts #91daysofwonder on facebook.
Poetics of Imagination
In a wild sliver of time, from the far reaches of the rural Pacific Northwest amidst the surreal extended liminality of pandemic plus bereavement,
Judith-Kate took up mythologist Martin Shaw’s invitation to dive deeply into myth studies with himself, Tracy Warr, and faculty at Dartington Arts School, UK (2020-21). Through forests of feasts and ferocity, she emerged with a Master’s degree and a newly-braided sense of her creative identity: artist, scholar, and activist.
Click here to visit her multi-modal gallery and creative dissertation “Mandorla Rising.” There you’ll find her full hour-long video recital and six galleries that invite you to take in the same material at your own pace. Please leave a comment in the guest book about what speaks to you!
What’s Next?
Oct 1, EARLY BIRD PRICING ENDS FOR NEW COHORTS FOR CREATIVES and Coaching Packages
Oct 2, Creative Playground, 11am-2pm Pacific
Oct 15, Mythsinger StoryNight DownUnder in collaboration with The 5th Direction, Australia. 7pm AEST. TheFifthDirection.com
Coming 2025, The Shape of Things Other - a short-course deep-dive into Daniel Deardorff’s The Other Within - in collaboration with The 5th Direction, Australia. Watch this space for updates, or contact us at: mythsingerlegacy at gmail dot com.
For dates and details about these happenings see the events page and return here often!
Current and Recent Projects
Tapestry, Deer Park, Olympic Mountains, WA —Judith-Kate Friedman