Beyond the Notes: How Opera Singers Express Emotion Through Voice and Face
Tuesday 11th March 2025, 5:00 PM - 7:00 PM (London Time)
Opera singers are unique performers who must balance vocal mastery, emotional depth, and theatrical expression. Unlike actors, who can rely solely on dialogue, opera singers must convey emotions through their voices while adhering to the demands of music, technique, and expressiveness. This intricate interplay between facial expressions and vocal parameters is central to the emotional authenticity of operatic performances.
This course, " Beyond the Notes: How Opera Singers Express Emotion Through Voice and Face", dives deep into the multimodal communication of emotions in opera, focusing on how facial movements align with vocal acoustics to convey anger, joy, fear, and sadness. Drawing on research and practical insights, participants will explore the facial action units (AUs) most relevant to emotional expression in singing, such as eyebrow movement (AU1, AU4) and jaw displacement (AU26), as well as the corresponding vocal features like vibrato rate, pitch modulation, loudness, and spectral characteristics.
A key highlight of this course is demonstrating a new motion-capture method developed specifically to analyse singers' facial expressions during performance. This innovative system, which combines lightweight motion-capture helmets and video analysis tools, allows for the accurate tracking of facial markers even in non-laboratory settings. Participants will gain hands-on exposure to how these tools can quantify subtle changes in facial dynamics during emotional singing, offering valuable insights into performance practice.
We will discuss practical applications of this research, such as how performers can refine their emotional portrayals while maintaining technical precision. For example, anger may involve pronounced jaw lowering and vocal fold adduction, leading to greater vocal intensity, while sadness may exhibit softer dynamics and subtle facial movements. By understanding these correlations, singers, vocal coaches, and directors can optimize emotional expressivity.
The course will be structured into two main segments:
- Theoretical Foundation: An overview of the emotional communication framework in opera, integrating studies on facial expressions and vocal acoustics.
- Practical Demonstration: A step-by-step presentation of the motion-capture method and examples of emotional singing analysed through facial markers and acoustic data.
By the end of this course, participants will leave with a deeper understanding of the dynamic connection between facial expressions and vocal emotion in opera. This knowledge will provide individuals with tools and insights to enhance their performances, enabling them to strive for a balance between vocal mastery, emotional depth, and expression, tailored to their unique strengths and styles.
🏷️ Price £30 (UK VAT inclusive)
🎥 Recording automatically sent to all who book (even if you cannot attend live)
▶️ Rewatch as many times as you like
📜 Certificate of attendance available
Tiago Lima Bicalho Cruz
Tiago has dedicated his career to helping singers from various musical genres refine their technical skills and enhance their expressive potential, always focusing on individual development.

Attend this course for as little as £22 as part of the Voice Professional Training CPD Award Scheme.
Learn MoreSorry, this is an archived short course...
We have plenty of upcoming short courses coming soon. See details of some of them below or look at the full list of short courses.

Tuesday 22nd April 2025
3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
Wednesday 23rd April 2025
3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
Thursday 24th April 2025
3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
Friday 25th April 2025
3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
Monday 28th April 2025
3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
Tuesday 29th April 2025
3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
(London Time)
Certificate In Applied Neuroscience And Voice with Voice Scientist Heidi Moss
This six-day course is designed to provide an introduction to the neuroscience of vocalization. It aims to provide a foundation for those who are looking to fuse science with art and understand that the voice is so much more than an instrument.

Monday 28th April 2025
12:00 PM - 2:00 PM
Tuesday 29th April 2025
12:00 PM - 2:00 PM
Wednesday 30th April 2025
12:00 PM - 2:00 PM
Thursday 1st May 2025
12:00 PM - 2:00 PM
(London Time)
Mental Health and Musicians Certificate with Dr George Musgrave
Join Dr George Musgrave – co-author of Can Music Make You Sick? Measuring the Price of Musical Ambition (2020) – for a deep dive into the social and psychological experiences of musical career creation and development, as well as the effects of the music industry and its practices on mental health. Dr Musgrave will present an overview of current research on career musicianship and mental health before exploring an array of specific themes, including success (and the management thereof); career sustainability; and cultural, social and symbolic capital. A comprehensive look at the ethics and morality of the industry provides the finale to this course!


Thursday 1st May 2025
5:00 PM - 7:00 PM
(London Time)
The Neuroscience of Speech and Song

Dr Michel Belyk
The Neuroscience of Speech and Song offers an engaging and accessible introduction to the fascinating interface between the brain and some of the things that we use it for. This course is designed to unravel the complex processes underlying how we speak and sing, using simple and accessible language.This course will start from basics and assume very little prior knowledge. We will cover the basic structure of the brain and how it works in general, then narrow in on specific processes that are relevant to speech and song!