A New Way of Voice Training

In the Sept/Oct 2021 Volume of the Journal of Singing, Scott McCoy, long time leader in the field of teaching voice envisions a world where voice teachers are a part of a multidisciplinary team working together to build voices. His list includes a vocal technician, style coaches, language/diction coaches, life counselor, medical team, and fitness coach, to name a few.

I volunteer as tribute.

Truth be told, no person can be an expert at everything.  For years I’ve not been shy in sharing my belief that a voice teacher who believes they are the expert in all things for their students proves by their very words that they are an expert at nothing.  

I often use the analogy of medical doctors when describing this concept. A person uses many many doctors throughout their lifetime.  They have their primary care doctor that they go to for regular checkups and for routine health care. This would be the equivalent of the singer’s primary vocal technique teacher.  But what if something goes wrong? There are an unlimited number of specialists the primary care doctor will refer you to: allergist, internist, podiatrist, etc.   You certainly don’t want your primary care doctor doing heart surgery on you!!!  And they would never dream of attempting it.  This is an egregious form of malpractice.   

A few years back I started to do some really deep thinking around this subject.  And realized that

I am NOT a “primary care” type voice teacher. 

Of course, I CAN work with beginner students on their basic technique, musicianship, sight reading, etc.  But that is not my specialty. There are many other teachers that specialize in this, and are SO.MUCH.BETTER at it than I am.

For myself, through my training, mentoring and experience in the real world, I’ve developed a specialty of working with “stuck” voices, to help them get unstuck and back to business.   I relish the challenge of stubborn Muscle Tension Dysphonia that doesn’t respond to speech therapy, singers who have lost the belief they can sing, performers recovering from traumatic training or performing experiences that stunted vocal and creative development. These tough cases are where I can help, and can help bring lasting change to singers’ voices.

And the more I worked with these types of cases, the more I realized that there were so many other things at play, that are OUT OF MY SCOPE OF PRACTICE! This is what inspired me to start building a multidisciplinary team of specialists. Not just laryngologists, which of course are key for diagnostic and medical management. I also have a massage therapist, physical therapist, psychologist, pelvic floor therapist, speech language pathologist, and the list continues to grow every day (looking for a great voice aware dentist if anyone knows of one!). All of whom are not only highly qualified, but are willing to do the research and work to apply their knowledge directly to the field of voice--many are even singers themselves.

Sure, this team approach means the voice teacher may not see as much of the singer, and may not be able to take ALL the credit for their progress… but… ummm… isn’t the point for the singer to have ownership of their own talent and voice, and to be able to freely express themselves and go do their thing?

I firmly believe the future of learning voice is going to be a team approach, focused on the whole singer and not just their voice. No ONE voice teacher can have all the answers.

I know I’m not alone in this belief.  So, how do we make the future of voice training happen today? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Here’s to a better future…

Crystal

PS I am NOT the person to go to for help with German diction 😆. But I have a friend who I can refer you to for that!