Looking back at 2024

I read somewhere that, when we keep looking forward to the next thing and the next thing, we don’t notice how we are also continuously moving the goalpost forward, thereby forgetting to look back at where we started. And in the age of social media it is easy to compare yourself to others, usually the ones that are much farther along in their journey than yourself. Which obviously is a recipe for feeling bad.

So I wanted to write this blog post to sort of commemorate my musical journey so far instead of lamenting everything I did not do. 

At the start of 2024 I was feeling hesitant about putting my music out and putting myself out there. I was working almost full time and my music was suffering. In 2023 I had done just two open mics and had suffered terribly from stage fright. How was I ever going to be performing on a regular basis? And all the other musicians I talked to said that they only way to overcome stage fright was to perform more…

So I did. And at first it didn’t get better, but I kept going and I was lucky enough to receive advice both from musicians and from my wise friends. Both advice on how to deal with stage fright just before a performance but also on how to think about the stage and one’s own performance in general. One thing everyone agreed upon was: You have to have fun, when you’re on stage, otherwise what’s the point?

So getting back to enjoying being on stage. 

Berlin is a great city to be in as an artist – although the ever rising rents are making it more difficult. (EDIT: I used the term „rising rents“, however that is wrong. Rents do not rise by themselves, like some law of nature, they are being actively raised by your landlords.)

Be that as it may, this town still has a bustling artistic scene and loads of open mics where one can go and practice performing and get to know other artists. And I have gotten to know so many lovely, talented people over the last year. 

I took up vocal lessons again and learned a lot, about breathing, standing, thinking… I can greatly recommend any singer to find a good or better yet, great vocal coach.

In total, I performed at 13 open mics last year, a great improvement to the year before.

As winter approached I applied for a curated open mic, the Open Mic L J Fox Special at Madame Claude in Kreuzberg, and I was selected to be one of three performers  for the first OMLJF Special!  On 21 November 2025 I played my first actual gig, a 30 minute set to an absolutely roaring crowd (shout out here to my amazing friends to came to support me) and I noticed that,

 I was having fun on stage again.