Emotionally as a child, Margaret Dungo wrote poetry and sang to vent her anguish. Her feelings freeing exercises led her to discover her musical gifts.
At 20, this engineer gave her debut concert on October 18th. 25 in Seda Vertis, where she was cast as Tera, the last four letters of her name spelled backwards.
Reaching his goal wasn’t easy. During her journey, she survived two traumas: the breakup of her parents and a codependent relationship with a boyfriend who had substance abuse. At 15, she passed the Disney Channel audition. However, her hopes of moving to Los Angeles and becoming a Disney talent were dashed when a customer gave up on paying for the plane ticket.
During her moments of depression, she devoted herself to writing songs to help her cope with difficult situations.
Studies have shown that songwriting can positively affect the structure of the nervous system and the activation of nerves in the brain. Writing the melody and lyrics activates the frontal lobes, which involve general brain function and memory, and the insular cortex, which gives meaning to painful experiences. While making music, the temporal lobes behind the ears sort the audio information and program the memory.
Buried emotions
At the same time, songwriting helps the individual unearth traumatic memories and buried emotions that may not be easily recalled in conservative therapy. Some music therapists use music as an intervention for different populations, ranging from pediatric patients to hospice patients and trauma victims.
Tera’s parents separated when she was 12. Although she is the third of four children, she has become responsible for her siblings to help her mother. She guided them through their homework and made sure her siblings did well.
Fascinated by William Shakespeare, she learned to write texts on her own by studying the verses of the English bard and their metric schemes. She then modeled the verses on Shakespeare and used metaphors about her painful past and hope for the future as she bared her soul.
Over time, he collected notebooks of his songs, mostly in free verse. When she underwent therapy, she learned that songwriting wasn’t just an emotional outlet. As a therapy, her songs allowed her to reveal her emotional scars and her attitude towards certain individuals.
To hope
An original, “Higher Dosage”, allowed her to share her experience of being in a dysfunctional relationship. Dungo was 14 when she fell in love with her and she thought she could save her boyfriend from her addictions. Feeling miserable, he expressed his views on how people become slaves to gambling, drugs and alcohol: “Voices, noises, whatever is watching them / The offspring of the devil biting your ear / Voices , noises that ruin your choices / And this is why you need a higher dosage. Another original, “Façade”, voiced his unsolved problems and took a look at the holier attitude that although of people: “You speak with tongues that crawl / In the listener’s brain / Break the atmosphere and fill it with pain / Control whoever spits your name in vain / It’s all a facade / It always looks so perfect on the outside / But it’s all ‘other than seamless.
The lyrics of both songs are cleverly disguised representations of the people in his life. However, acquaintances who have listened to his recordings may identify with the lyrics. With a professional musical arrangement, Tera sounds like she is channeling American songwriter and singer Billie Eilish or Andra Day.
Her therapist was impressed with Tera’s talents and encouraged her to continue. “She Could see how relieved I was every time I wrote. She also saw my joys and my passion, ”says Tera.
The budding singer says keeping her songs over time has made her more introspective. Her therapist advised her not to be hard on herself, to love herself more.
On the brightest note, Tera says her parents were in favor of singing. Her mother acts as her host while her father pays for her music lessons, including vocal coaching. She is a talent under her father’s company, Merlions Productions.
Tera says writing songs ultimately gave her hope. “The songs showed me my end game, my goals. They pushed me to keep going, whatever happens ”. – Contribution INQ
