The Magic* of Vocal Function Exercises!
Tuesday 6th June 2023, 3:00 PM - 5:00 PM (London Time)
Vocal Function Exercises, or VFEs, developed by Joseph Stemple, are a set of 4 systematic exercises designed to improve strength, balance, adduction, and coordination - and anecdotally, also improve control, flexibility, and range. They are each intended to be executed with specific vocal qualities, vowel shapes, and volumes on set pitches, and are most effective when performed 2x each, 2x a day for 6 weeks with a taper schedule that is similarly exacting.
You may find yourself asking “But aren’t vocal exercises of any kind ultimately designed to improve function? Why these particular exercises when we already have so many functional exercises for the voice designed to improve strength, coordination, flexibility, and range? Why be so seemingly prescriptive? Aren’t all our exercises, by design, Vocal Function Exercises?”
Ah, but if only it were so! VFEs are different. Rarely do we see a set of exercises so prescriptively detailed, so extensively researched, and yet seemingly so impossible to do despite the near mythical status they’ve come to enjoy. And I’m beyond excited to show you this magic*!
This workshop will demystify the four VFEs, explain how they address rebalancing each of the voice subsystems, and help you determine what’s most important about both modeling and explaining them to help your client succeed.
We’ll get super practical as we learn and practice all four exercises together, and you’ll have the chance to ask questions and get feedback on your production. We’ll try different prompts and cues to elicit each target sound, and I’ll even share a tracking sheet to help your client keep track and stay accountable. We’ll also discuss how to know when a vocalist is on the right track or off the rails, and what - if anything - we can do about it.
And lastly, whether you’re calling it pivoting, individualizing, adapting, or winging it, we’ll look at how and where we can intentionally tailor these magical* exercises to each vocalist for maximum results. You’ll leave loving the fact that you gave VFEs an honest try.
Melanie Tapson
Melanie Tapson is a professional singer, Singing Voice Specialist, and speech-language pathologist whose practice specializes in voice assessment and therapy...
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.
Monday 12th January 2026
12:00 PM - 1:30 PM
Tuesday 13th January 2026
12:00 PM - 1:30 PM
Wednesday 14th January 2026
12:00 PM - 1:30 PM
Thursday 15th January 2026
12:00 PM - 1:30 PM
Tuesday 20th January 2026
12:00 PM - 1:30 PM
Wednesday 21st January 2026
12:00 PM - 1:30 PM
(London Time)
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Are you a voice, acting, or singing coach looking to expand your expertise and add accents and phonetics to your teaching repertoire? This 6-session course covers essential topics such as articulatory, acoustic, and auditory phonetics, the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), and ethical approaches to accent and dialect coaching. By the end of this course, you'll be equipped with the knowledge and practical skills to start to bring phonetics and accent coaching into your coaching and provide more comprehensive support to your clients.
Monday 12th January 2026
2:00 PM - 4:00 PM
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How does the singing voice influence the speaking voice? How does the speaking voice influence the singing voice? When is there a disparate relationship between the two? Can they help each other? Can one harm the other? How can we use them positively in the voice studio. During this short course we will consider the voice as we sing and as we speak. The acquisition of language is a very interesting journey from birth through old age. We will broach the topics of “lexical” which refers to learning words, and “semantic” which is how we use words in the context of language.
Monday 12th January 2026
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Dr David Juncos
What exactly is meant when we label ourselves or someone we know a perfectionist? It is a good to be this way? Or are you setting yourself up for failure? Can a performance psychologist or a other performance-related practitioner help you if you’re a perfectionist? In this short course, you will learn how perfectionism is defined according to popular models in clinical psychology, and whether it is maladaptive or adaptive. You will also learn how perfectionism impacts on music performance anxiety, in addition to other areas of importance for performing musicians, like work-related stress and burnout, and procrastination with one’s practice.