What Every Singing Teacher Should Know About Vocal Health: Fact-finding and Myth-busting (Part 2)
Tuesday 12th March 2024, 5:00 PM - 7:00 PM (London Time)
Singing teachers are on the frontlines of vocal health.
As vocal athletes, singers are at a higher risk for developing voice disorders. Singing teachers are in an optimal position to educate students about vocal health. Informed, evidence-based education can help prevent students from developing voice problems. However, spreading misinformation can perpetuate vocal health myths and possibly contribute to developing voice problems and/or delaying appropriate voice care.
As expert monitors of sound, singing teachers are also often the first to identify a possible voice problem in a student. Knowing the signs of a voice disorder and making appropriate referrals is another way that singing teachers can make significant contributions to vocal health.
With this role comes great responsibility: it is incumbent on the teacher to make sure the vocal health information they are passing on to their students is accurate and up-to-date, and not based merely on hearsay or opinion. Singing teachers can play a major role in dispelling common myths and misinformation about vocal health.
This workshop will cover a number of topics related to vocal health education, including:
- What the singing teacher should know about voice anatomy, physiology, and the basics of voice disorders
- Vocal hygiene
- Medical factors and the voice, including upper respiratory infections, pulmonary conditions, allergies, laryngopharyngeal reflux, long COVID, musculoskeletal injuries, temporomandibular disorder (TMD), and others
- Optimizing efficiency of the speaking voice
- Vocal pacing:
- Balancing voice rest and vocal conditioning
- When to recommend complete voice rest
- The singing teacher’s role in identification of dysphonia and making appropriate referrals to the vocal health team:
- Ending the 'blame game': abolishing the concept of 'vocal abuse'
- Working with singers who have or have had a voice injury
- Common vocal health myths and how to dispel them
Full course dates and times:
Thursday 7th March 2024 (5:00 PM - 7:00 PM UK time)
Tuesday 12th March 2024 (5:00 PM - 7:00 PM UK time)
Leda Scearce
Soprano Leda Scearce has been featured in leading roles with the National Opera Company, Hawaii Opera Theatre, Long Leaf Opera Festival, Triangle Opera...
Sorry, 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 7th May 2024
5:00 PM - 7:00 PM
(London Time)
Parallels in learning to talk and sing: Social mechanisms of vocal learning in baby humans and songbirds
Michael Goldstein
To gain a better understanding of the development and evolution of vocal learning, we will examine the processes by which birds learn to sing and human infants learn to talk.
Thursday 9th May 2024
5:00 PM - 7:00 PM
(London Time)
On the Nose: Nasality as Percept and Physical Reality
Nicholas Perna
This course will address three perspectives on nasality: distinctions between nasal airflow and audio signal (velopharyngeal opening) and perception; deciphering between the two timbral qualities commonly related to nasality - twang and honk - and which are related to velopharyngeal opening; and the pedagogic usefulness of velopharyngeal opening to reduce laryngeal instabilities near points of registration shifts.
Tuesday 14th May 2024
5:00 PM - 7:00 PM
(London Time)
Tuvan Overtone Throat Singing
Jerry Walsh
This two-hour class on Tuvan throat singing will be an opportunity to learn five different styles of overtone singing that first originated in Central Asia. Several styles can be learned quite quickly while others are more complex and require deeper study. This class is great for singers of all levels from absolute beginners to professionals.