This is a reprint of an August 2017 blogpost – I recently had a rehearsal where a conductor asked us to do this and it’s something that just goes against me. Here’s why (things I’ve added are in bold and brackets): ****** This morning, the subject of my meditation app involved a lot of focusContinue reading “Suspending the Breath – Why I Don’t Teach It”
Tag Archives: Breath management
Voice lessons and physical therapy
This morning I was reading a blogpost by Seth Godin about The Physical Therapy Metaphor and I was thinking about how much studying voice and physical therapy have in common. I’m not talking about voice therapy in the event someone is dealing with a vocal injury; I’m talking about the process and goal of voiceContinue reading “Voice lessons and physical therapy”
Holding vs. Sustaining
There are two words used in singing (especially choral singing) that I think should be stricken from the face of the earth: HOLD CUTOFF We’ll deal with cutoffs another time, but right now I’m going to focus on the word “hold.” Often, I find that my students have trouble “holding” a note. They run outContinue reading “Holding vs. Sustaining”
Your voice is a [fill in the blank]
I like analogies. I don’t teach solely by analogy, though, because they’re so personal and sometimes they don’t mean anything to people. I use them to illustrate concepts that I’ve explained technically. And I use them judiciously. For example, when we sing, we are singing on the exhalation. It’s important for that exhalation to beContinue reading “Your voice is a [fill in the blank]”