Today, we’d like to introduce you to Rachel Mari Kimber.
Hi Rachel, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
Music, chocolate, and therapies have always been the glue of my life. From a very young age, music was my first love.
My family are all musically gifted in various forms, so I had a natural aptitude for pitch and harmony. From being absorbed by so many different musical influences, I would create melodies on the spot. Singing whatever I was communicating was normal for me, and I still do it often without thinking. I was seen as a bit of an oddball at school, often self-absorbed by my inner musical world, which, to me, was far more interesting than anything else going on.
I gravitated towards bass instruments and I was lucky enough to learn to play on my grandfathers cello, growing up in the UK. Although my life there is a distant memory now, the Celtic influences can still be heard in many of my sound creations. After art and design college, I went on to study performing arts with music and songwriting as my main focus.
Using my instrument skills to create songs from the experiences I went through, most of my writing was and is connected to relationships of the heart, perceiving and navigating them through my unique lens. I would spend hours alone figuring stuff out, I would get totally lost entranced by the harmonics and structures coming out of me.
Words make rhythms, find rhyme and tone, or absorb sound around me, including radio songs, man-made noise like roadwork or planes, and sounds from nature such as birdsong and the cadence of running water. I would be described as ‘away with the fairies’ by those who saw me.
It took me many years to cultivate my gifts to a point where I felt grounded and confident enough to offer them as services, and the road here and now has had many bumps, cracks, and detours. Almost as if something has tested me over and over again to make me strong enough to handle the capacity of who I am and who I have become.
My middle name honors my Welsh roots – Mari is the Welsh spelling of Mary. All of these reflections have been the path of self-discovery and then the path of allowing myself to shine and to be confident in my purpose, which I feel is an ongoing process.
Can you talk to us about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back, would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Assistance with navigating my career came in my late 20s when I met and married my friend and manager. He was practical, adventurous, and intelligent, and just what I needed at the time, so we recorded and released a couple of albums.
After becoming a mum and living in a few different foreign countries, bucket list experiences such as racecar driving, firefighting, and mountain living, life had other plans for me. We went through a breakup, which made me break down and reinvent myself again, this time in the land of Arizona. Music was my constant all this time – it was how I would process and express myself. I released a handful of recorded singles in between juggling depression, motherhood, and finding myself.
Searching for balance, chocolate was how I would self-soothe from the things that stressed me. From prior self-destructive over-indulgent partying in my teens, I was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease (intestinal disorder) in my late 20s, so cutting out all processed foods, stimulants, alcohol, and sugars led me to teach myself to make chocolate sweetened with honey or maple because I didn’t want to miss out!
When I moved to Arizona 12 years ago, I developed a range of simple, clean ingredient chocolates and truffles, which I would sing to, using single tones and positive words of affirmation. I embraced my weirdness and found that people were not only accepting of it, they loved and appreciated what I was producing. Turning my chocolate habit into a small business allowed me to share that element of joy with more people, so I am grateful to see how far I have come from the humble beginnings of messy but good experiments! My lovely daughter, Jasmine, is my chief taste tester.
In between music pursuits, I was also a student of complementary therapies, which came in handy, helping me help myself heal my body from Crohn’s, alongside the cathartic nature of songwriting. I mastered various modalities of bodywork and energy work and later tuned in to my psychic nature, which I continue to cultivate through card divination and meditation, adding more to the melting pot of healing.
I now offer my own style of healing services, along with music and chocolatey delights, a culmination of mastering my life experiences to assist others in their healing journey.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I continue to write songs and have a backlog of about three albums worth to record. I intend to find a way to get them done in between all of the other wonderful things on my ‘to-do’ list. I am so very grateful to be a channel for the complexity of sounds that come through me and to be able to interpret them in real-time.
In addition to writing songs, I create what I call ‘soundscapes’ using a loop pedal to temporarily record live layers of sound. I can make a whole orchestra of cellos and voices and mimic birdsong with my mouth. I love the miracle of technology that I get to utilize!
Chocolate-wise, I produce maple-sweetened heart-shaped truffles in various flavors for three different cafes: Giving Tree Cafe in Phoenix, Desert Roots Kitchen, Tempe, and Tempe Farmers Market, Tempe.
I also offer private ‘Transformational Tarot’ readings, which are a unique combination of counseling, card divination, energy healing, and sound healing, Tailored to the person and their situation, with the intent of assisting life direction and purpose in an uplifting self-empowering way.
So, how can our readers or others connect or collaborate with you before we go? How can they support you?
I would very much appreciate your social media support As well as the generated youtube channel, I put live videos on ‘Rachel Mari Kimber – Live’ so please subscribe there if you are able to.
You can also find me on all music media platforms to listen to my recorded works under my full name and can interact with me through the internet on the links provided
In addition to music, you will find me therapeutically under ‘Free Your Spirit Healing’ and Chocolately under Chocologie or Chocologielove. Check for when I have gigs by visiting Songkick or my main website, and come hear me play live! I am currently looking to collaborate with an excellent drummer who can keep up with my unicorn ways!
Thank you very much Canvas Rebel/Voyage Phoenix for the interview, I appreciate your social service.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.rachelmarikimber.com
- Instagram: instagram.com/rachelmarikimber
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rachelmarikimber
- Linkedin: https://www.youtube.com/@freeyourspirithealing
- Twitter: instagram.com/chocologielove
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@rachelmarikimber-live
- Yelp: instagram.com/freeyourspirithealing
- SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/rachelmarikimber
- Other: https://chocologielove.wixsite.com/love/musical-chocolate-fun
Image Credits
Syvonne Kozuch Photography linktr.ee/syvonnekz and Jasmine & Rachel by Jazzy B
