Jill Rogoff

95% musician is a fair description: as a singer, I spend a huge amount of time reading around the lyrics that I sing; studying languages; translating rare or obscure lyrics and preserving traditional songs; I also check my pronunciation carefully with native speakers of whatever languages I happen to be singing in at the moment. There's more work involved in my music than my audience is ever aware of, and I love it. How lucky can a person be to be able to travel to far-off places, meeting lovely people in every place, and singing beautiful music that I love! Music is my oxygen, pure and simple!*** I also take lessons 'outside the box', to round out my approach to my music: in recent years, this has included Latin and ballroom dancing, toning (I couldn't do it very well) and 'ethnic' drumming (darboukas, frame drums and djembes) -- all great fun!*** After that, there's a little time left for actually earning a little through my very-part-time day-job; trying to keep our apartment from being overrun by self-proliferating papers; keeping my web-site updated; experimenting with new recipes on my poor, unsuspecting family and friends (I *love* preparing dinner parties and special events); photography (I use my snapshots for my own greetings cards), trying to get some physical exercise into my routine... oh yes! and paying some attention to my family! :-)... Of course, that's if I'm not totally incommunicado with my head in a book!... I'm a very passionate person; what can I say?! (Typical Scorpio?)***Five years ago, I began to study the therapeutic uses of music. I helped establish a harp circle here in Israel, back in 2002, and five of us began to explore this fascinating, fulfilling path quite seriously. We each do slightly different things with it. I, for one, play a small harp (34 strings) most weeks in a local hospital, focusing particularly on the Oncology ward and Day Centre; when there's enough time, I reach out to other departments as well. Now, as of November 2008, I am a certified therapeutic musician, but there's always more to learn. See my web-site for more material about this side of my work. *** As I manage my own career, I also spend a lot of time setting up concerts both within Israel and overseas. It takes a certain amount of determination and energy, and I have had to train myself to be more assertive -- not something I was taught to be, back in New Zealand. With my husband's support and belief in me, I've managed to make a lot of my musical dreams come true: I count myself among the lucky ones!***You can get a fuller idea of what I do by looking at my web-site: http://www.jillrogoff.com/