Pregnancy Retreat: A Song for Your Baby

A one-of-a-kind voice retreat for pregnant women. Join us for a deeply nourishing day of singing, vocal creativity, and connection – and come away with a co-created song for your baby. No songwriting experience or musical training necessary, and all singing abilities are welcome.

Connect with your baby through the power of song

Experience the power of your own voice to self-soothe, and to comfort and connect with the incredible being that’s growing inside your womb.

Women’s experience of pregnancy can be dominated by tests, scans, and waiting on tenterhooks for results. Although tests and scans can give us useful information, they can also leave us feeling anxious, disembodied, and disconnected.

As incredible as it is to see a real-time image of your baby via ultrasound, our focus on screens can make us lose sight of the way pregnant women have connected with their babies and their own sense of safety for millennia. That is, through their own bodies.

This day retreat is all about remembering your power to experience a unique and intimate relationship with your child in the womb. By slowing down, becoming embodied, and exploring your voice in creative yet accessible ways, you’ll become more present with your baby as well as your true self.

You’ll also discover your innate ability to make up songs to express love and care for your child – even if you don’t think of yourself as ‘a singer’ and you’ve never tried to write a song before!

Co-create a song for your baby

During the retreat, we’ll work together as a group to create a simple song to soothe your child. The group will create one song for everyone, drawing on different participants’ ideas, which we’ll generate through journalling and vocal improvisation.

Anyone who enjoys singing can take part

You might be thinking, ‘but I’m not a songwriter!’ or ‘I’ve never improvised music before!’ Please know that it’s a myth that vocal creativity and improvisation are just for trained and experienced musicians. In fact, everyone who enjoys singing can experience the joy of these in accessible ways.

On the day, you’ll be given the option to explore vocal improvisation by making up very simple musical phrases of just a few notes. Through a step-by-step process, you’ll learn how words can be woven with rhythm and the notes you improvise to create the lines of a song.

The song we’ll create together will be something you can start singing to your baby straight away, as they’ll begin to hear your voice well before they are born. Continuing to sing the same song to your child after birth can be a powerful way of soothing them, by reminding them of the comfort and safety of the womb.

Choose how you’ll participate

Our aim as your facilitators is to create a safe space where you feel free to take part in the day’s activities at the level you feel comfortable with. If you’re shy or nervous you can choose to sing only in ways that blend in, or at any time simply listen.

On this day retreat, you will:

• Deepen your connection with your child in the womb – through guided meditation, journalling and song

• Experience the benefits of singing in pregnancy – for lowering stress, processing emotions, self-soothing, and soothing your baby

• Explore your creative voice through accessible improvisation in a safe, welcoming circle

• Co-create a song, and learn a process you can use in your own time to create your own

• Connect with like-minded pregnant women in community

• Celebrate your pregnancy, and rediscover the joy, vitality, and ease that’s available to you as a pregnant woman

What to bring:

• Comfy clothes that allow freedom of movement

• A journal and a pen

• A bottle of water

NB Herbal teas and snacks will be provided.

We (Agustina and Danielle) look forward to welcoming you into our pregnant women’s circle! If you have any questions in the meantime, please reach out to us at danielle@birdfliesfree.com

FAQs

Do I have to be a singer to take part in this day retreat?

No, you don’t have to have done any musical training or even sing regularly. All the techniques we’ll be using will be broken down, taught step-by-step and by ear.

Is this for all trimesters of pregnancy?

Yes, absolutely! This retreat is about enhancing your connection with the being that’s growing inside your womb, no matter what stage of pregnancy you’re in.

Meet your facilitators

Agustina Plos

Agustina is a birth doula, space holder and vocal improviser based in London. In 2019, the day she finished Michel Odent's doula course, she headed straight to Wales for an intensive vocal improvisation training that changed her relationship with singing completely.

She'd sung since childhood, took lessons and performed covers in bars in Argentina, her home country. But it was only through vocal improvisation that she realised she'd always been trying to sound like someone else. For the first time, she could sing truly from herself. The judgement and performance pressure lifted and singing became what it was when she was a child: fun, light, playful and free.

She's always wanted to bring this to the experience of pregnancy. In a time of disconnection and disembodiment, vocal improvisation offers an accessible way back to oneself, one's voice, one's body and one's baby, and a way to bring joy back into this short and precious stage of life, so often overshadowed instead by stress, fear and anxiety.

Danielle Styles

Danielle is a creative vocalist, and vocal improvisation and songwriting coach. Working under the name Bird Flies Free, she has specialised in helping nervous and inhibited singers to unlock their artist within, and sing with true freedom and confidence in front of others.

Since discovering Collaborative Vocal Improvisation, Danielle has dedicated herself to the study and practice of it, training with many of the UK’s leading practitioners. She is currently writing songs for her first album.