Chapter Four
The Beginning Student
What’s the quickest, surest way to get competency from the “rank beginner to professional?” Beginning singing students are from all walks of life: children, high school kids, adult recreational students. They may even be professional actors or dancers who need to sing competently for an impending performance. As a community school for the arts, voice instructors at Utah Conservatory have to work with scores of beginning students, and find the challenges of the “community student” are unique. Usually, they are “recreational singers,” that is, they are looking for enjoyment of a new skill that enhances their quality of life, reduces stress, or accomplishes some personal goal; yet, their quest is not usually the central focus of their vocational goals. These students are part of our new “consumer mentality.” They are looking for maximum results from their “professional trainer” without a whole lot of leisure time to study at the “professional track level.” If they spend their time exclusively with vocal drills and exercises, they feel progress is too slow, as they have not “product” or songs to show for it. Conversely, if they only work on their favorite songs, they may not experience the essential basics of technique that the drills and exercises have to offer. At any rate, we usually find that they need to feel quickly that there is a change in their abilities for the better.
These issues have brought us to put our heads together and pose the question: what have we, as a faculty, seen as the consistent methods, strategies and techniques that contribute to solid progress and competency for the rank beginner student, particularly the voice student who practices less than 45 minutes a day? And, when they do practice, they are usually double-tasking.
The Answer for us is in “synergistic principals.”
Here are some of our guiding strategies:
Extrovert the student’s attention and strengthen their focus.
Insist on Perfect Posture: Why? Because perfect singing posture get the student out of his/her own way.
It will prevent the student from overcompensating in other areas. This includes: feeling tall and loose; sensing broadness on both sides of the sternum with a high torso; teaching skeletal alignment, feet balanced and shoulder width apart, a feeling of “roundedness” and a “synergistic balance.”
Breathe with the Student in Solidarity: Proper breathing can be led by example. As we all recognize that correct breathing is foundational and synergistic to the rest of the singing process, the example of our breath with the student will help to re-pattern their habits.
We recommend the instructor put her on own hand on her own abdomen while the other hand plays the scales. Let the student always see you breathe move and they will do the same. Some basics: Keep the energy low, talk about the “pelvic floor” and the feeling of breath energy flowing through the body and into the floor, allow no tightness to come into the posture during the breath, practice long slow breaths, pant, “plie” with the inhalation, or prop the students entire back side, knees bent, up against the wall, and have them bend down while inhaling. Encourage them to practice low slow breathing while laying in bed with a dictionary on their abs, or when walking or driving.
Support!
The fastest way to get new students to progress is to really get them to support, even if the high sub-glottic pressures might cause them to over-sing a bit. We find that the over-singing can be quickly resolved by just noting to the student that their voice is doing a little more work than it needs to, and that they can release their voice through more air flow. We are so afraid of damaging beginning voice students with over-singing, that they go for months, even years, with unembodied, wimpy tones, never really finding out what their “real” voice sounds like. Conversely, teaching the student about the apoggio and its ability to build the voice is the key. The sub-glottic pressure can first be felt with bubbles and lips drills, then a little feeling of pressure with arpeggios on “ZZZZZ,” followed by the [u] vowel and then some sirens. Sirens get them to feel the way that the air pressure can raise their voices without any vocal work. Last, and perhaps the most controversial, we find that the student who know how to shout, can transfer than sensation to the torso strength that it takes to sing on the breath. We recommended lots of speech-to-singing exercises. We even recommend that students monologue, loudly, their pieces, and then sing them.
Lesson Structure: A Balance approach in a small amount of time
- Basic drills and exercises (5-10 minutes)
- Sieber or Concone (5 minutes)
- Classical Style Song of teacher’s choosing (5-10 minutes)
- Contemporary song selected by Student with teacher’s approval (5-10 minutes)
- Taping the lesson as a pattern for practice
- Keep explanations concise so that the student is singing for most of the lesson
- Keep focus on actual learning time (reference)
- Stay Socratic and positive
- Avoid critical evaluations
Immediately focus the student’s attention, and work to extrovert their attention. Most beginning students have introverted attention, which manifests in low energy, over-intellectualizing or processing, confusion, or constantly “judging” or “criticizing” themselves. It is the teacher’s first job to get the student singing and feeling the result, rather than listening to their voices. Listening to their voices is the surest way to introvert attention, reverting to an under-energized and unsupported tone. Direct the student to identify singing with communication. That will also increase their energy. Have them monologue their pieces several times (50 to 100) to a teddy bear, photo, tree, or another person. It is preferable that they use their imagination, rather than an actual person, but using a person is an acceptable gradient step in the process of developing communication skills. The ability to communicate is synergistic to their success. When you require the appropriate energy in performance, it is foundational to good singing. At all times, synergistically match your energy with what you would expect from the student. Even when the student is singing alone, pattern your energy to match or exceed what is required. Such involvement is synergistic, the solidarity of which keeps the student on task. If you lose this “matching energy, watch how the beginning student will quickly become introverted and critical. Conversely, as they gain more ability to extrovert their attention and send energy to a specific point of communication, you can help them to “feel” the success of the energy versus their mistaken postulate that singing is exclusively about listening to their own voices.
So, to recap:
Extrovert the student’s attention, put their attention on communication, and get the student to non-threatening performance opportunities: master classes, friends at lessons, rest home, etc. The students who perform make the best progress.
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