Various Posts

No matter how old you are, it’s never too late to work on your singing. The muscles respond to exercise. The production of vocal sound is physical, therefore, if you work at it, you can improve.

I am happy to report that more and more training is aimed at function (rather than resonating your forehead, eyebrows, nasal cavities and teeth) and that we are moving toward an understanding of vocal function based on science, not science fiction. It is true that change has been exceedingly slow and fraught with argument, but it is also a fact that younger people “get it” and are happy to accept technology alongside art. Why not? Most of the web is represented through graphic design and it is certainly a technology, as is the cell phone we all carry.

Once we get free of Art Songs from foreign countries as being the only way to begin vocal training, then we will be able to focus on the amazing repertoire for the styles that were born in this country and fostered by average folks, not royalty or clergy. It will be a great day when Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, Cole Porter and Leonard Bernstein are held in the same regard by academics as George Crumb, David Adams, Elliott Carter and Phillip Glass. We will also be able to ascertain, without negative judgement, what those styles demand in terms of vocal production. Then we can investigate differences within style and within individual singers in each style.

I imagine a day, 100 years from now, when students say, “Wow, in the old days, you could only study classical music and vocal technique at school. How weird is that?”

I might be well dead by then, but wherever I end up, I will be smiling.

I met a rock singer recently. He had an interesting story to tell.

He has a degree in music composition and has sung in a rock band for 20 years, writing a lot of the band’s music and singing lead. They toured a lot, in Europe and South America, but here, too, in smaller cities. He sold some songs to other singers and groups and generally did OK but when he reached 37 a few years ago, he decided that it was time to settle down and lead a more secure life. He found a place to pursue a master’s in music education part time and finally finished his degree and got a job at a small liberal arts college. He was asked to teach music theory, song writing, and some private voice lessons. His students were music education majors, mostly, but also participated in the college choir and semi-annual music theater productions. They were required to learn classical vocal material and pass a jury at the end of each semester.

Now this man had never had formal vocal training. He had sung in his school choruses in both high school and college and the choir directors had given general information (although some of it was conflicting) about “breath support” and “placement” of “the tone”, and musical guidance about the kind of expression necessary in the diversified repertoire the choruses were performing. Beyond that, the man had heard a few classical concerts of Pavarotti on Public Television and had also heard a few classical singers in various other events over the years. He was a little familiar with the major composers like Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin, etc. and thought that classical music could be both interesting and exciting, but had never had time to delve deeply into it, since he was on the road, writing songs, performing, etc.

His plan was to listen to a few recordings which he would download from iTunes and buy a couple of student books he had found at Amazon and teach enough of these classical songs to his students to get by. He felt that he could talk about breath support, and placement, using what he remembered from his college studies, and describe what he had heard when he listened to Luciano. He also knew a little bit of German and French, enough to get a meal or travel around in Europe, so he figured he would be able to teach songs in these languages. All in all, he thought, he had enough general knowledge to teach his students what they were required to know in order to learn the songs for the juries, and to get a decent grade. He was very interested in keeping his new job, and in hanging on to it long enough to develop some credibility, in the hopes that he might move on to a larger school and more money in a few years. There were only two other teachers on the faculty and the one with the most singing experience got the best students, so he assumed that the people coming to him wouldn’t be that good in the first place, so anything he could tell them would be helpful, no matter what it was. The other teacher was very young and had classes to teach. That man had no private students at all, so there would be no competition from him.

Things went along pretty well the first few years, but the college was growing, and with it, the department. Eventually, in the fourth year, a new teacher was added and this woman had a degree in voice from a classical conservatory of some repute. She had very definite ideas about how to teach singing and was quite proud of her own voice and performing experience in opera and concert. Trouble quickly brewed.

Long story short, a big divide between the two teachers emerged. The rock guy had gone along quietly teaching what little he knew, with the students following him, not knowing good from bad. The new classical woman wanted everyone to sing classical music, sing it to her personal standards, and to sing nothing else in or out of lessons, lest the student be damaged or permanently confused. The department chair was busy trying to handle the growth of the other parts of the music school and paid little attention to the situation of the singing training, deciding to let things “work themselves out”.

I do not have an end to this story because I made it up, but I think you know why. I invite you to post your own ending here.

PS

You are welcome to turn the story around. All you need to do is put someone trained in classical singing, with only classical experience, in the place of the rock guy and put in that that person was asked to teach music theater students. If you leave the classical woman as is, then you will have a reality based story rather than a fairy tale. The ending might be easier to imagine that way. What do YOU think?

So, you have a student in front of you who wants to belt. You are teaching in a college, you have juries to contend with. The kid has to sing “classical” for the juries. You don’t know how to belt, or if it’s safe, but the big musical at her church this year is Hairspray and she wants to try out. You don’t know if belting helps or hinders “classical”. You need this job to pay your rent or mortgage, to feed yourself and your kids, to make a career for yourself. You maybe need it to move you toward “job security” or what is called “tenure”. You want your colleagues to know you are competent and skilled. You want to help the student, to be able to get into the show, and you want her to get a good grade at school, too, and to be OK with all of it. You want her to have a chance to have a career as a singer when she graduates college.

WHAT THE H**L DO YOU DO?

If you are religious you pray. If you are not, you breathe hard and gather yourself together and maybe you do burnt offerings to the gods of singing or the muses of the arts.

This is an insurmountable situation and it can only mean that everyone loses. The teacher, the student, the program and the school. Anyone who says otherwise is just deluded.

Mostly what happens is that you teach “classically”, you ask the student to learn Italian or German art songs, and you work on resonance and breath support (what else?). In the middle of the semester you ask the student to bring in her “belt” song. You ask her to sing it for you, she does, in her “belt sound”. You ask her, “Does that feel OK?” You listen and think it sounds loud and ugly. You ask her “Do you feel the resonance in your face and head? Are you supporting?” She says “YES!” You leave her alone. You have no clue and you certainly cannot tell her that.

She sings the classical pieces at the juries and gets a decent grade and evaluation. You talk with your colleagues about how the students “have trouble focusing” and about “how they like to think too much”, “how they like to hold on to their throats” and “how they always seem to have trouble with breath support”. You keep your job and go forward, hoping not to be “found out”, and teach another semester, and another, and another. You make sure to let the student decide whether or not the belting is good, and you learn more songs each term.

You live in fear that someday, one of those students is going to come back to you and say “how dare you”? You live in fear that someday one of them is going to come find you and ask you “what were you thinking?” You always hope that you will never be asked to explain to other teachers how you work with your “belters” or why you teach belting, or, worst of all, be asked to sing the sound yourself in front of your peers. You tell yourself that “the kids know how to do that sound.”

You may be able to hide, but you really do know, inside, that this is making the part of you that loves to sing go dead. You manage to cover your you-know-what.

No, I’m not guessing that this happens. I KNOW it happens. And if you think that there is nothing wrong with this scenario, then you are part of what is very very wrong with our profession.

There are so many things in life that we can care about. There are so many things that we shouldn’t care about. It is an endless list with all kinds of components. There are things we care about that are strictly personal, things that are a concern to our immediate family, things that concern the community, and things that concern the world, or many people in the world. If people are starving, war is raging, there is no healthcare or work, the icesheets are melting, why should anyone care about singing? Really, we can live without singing.

But can we? What would the world be like if there had never been any singing or was none now? What if we collectively forgot how to sing? Wouldn’t that change life everywhere?

And, if we care about singing, there are so many ways that we can care. We can care about certain styles of music, certain practices in certain styles of music. We can care about who is singing, and what they sing, and how it is sung. We can care about the voices of the singer or singers, we can care about how the voice is being used, we can care about what the relationship is between the music and the person singing it…..if indeed there are notes involved (as opposed to rap, which some would say is a form of singing). There are probably lots of other ways that I can’t think of now.

But if we don’t care, now that’s a problem, at least to me. If we are singers and teachers of singing and we don’t bother to really care about the whole process, all of it, that’s NOT good. And if we do care, and care with passion as many of us do, we have to be careful not to get lost in that passion and let it dominant our thinking. We must remain open to all the various possibilities.

I can be over-zealous. I can sometimes care too much. It has taken me a long time to learn how to step back, calm down and back away, seeking objectivity. I am someone for whom singing matters very very much. I stop being effective, however, if I cannot find the calm quiet place deep within which is the clear pool from which music arises. I must remember always that I can care deeply and let go at the same time. This is a tricky balance to strike, but it is always necessary. Life without singing would be bleak indeed, but living as if singing was everything would be foolish.

Wherever you are with your point of view about singing……..take a look at how you care, or IF you care, and what impact or import that may have. It can be very illuminating.

There is, in this world, such as thing as specialization. There are many people who are “elite” at what they do, and they got that way by being concentrated on one thing and one thing only. There are very, very few exceptions where someone might be equally good at two things, but, generally, if the whole world acknowledges that someone is “the best” at whatever it is, that is the case.

Think about it. The world class athletes who are medalists don’t do more than one thing unless doing more than one thing is what they do (decathlon, triathlon, Iron Man/Woman) but even the people who do those sports do not complete again the specialists who just do a specific one. It’s not a surprise that great baseball players are not also great tennis players (although they might be pretty decent), or that great swimmers don’t automatically do gymnastics well, (even though both sports are “whole body” developers).

Broadway asks that performers be “triple threats”. Dancers need to do ballet, tap, and jazz and sometimes other kinds of dance as well (swing, African, modern, etc.). It’s the same for acting on Broadway…..present moment, revivals, drama, music. If you include other forms of acting (TV, film, industrials) the range actors must have is enormous. Singers, too, must be very versatile. Very few can do “just one kind of singing”. You need to do rock belting and legit and formal styles, new productions, older shows. There are some few performers who have skirted the issue of having to sing “all over the place”, but not too many.

If, however, you want to specialize in singing elsewhere, you can, and often it helps to do so. If you are a “Verdi” baritone, you do that rep most of the time. If you are a true “Mozart” soprano, you don’t do much, if any, Puccini. If you are a prima ballerina (or male principal danseur), you don’t tap. If you are the Swan Queen, you don’t do Alvin Ailey’s choreography. If you sing Rose in Gypsy, well, that is a whole world in itself!

Yes, there are a few exceptions. Wynton Marsalis has played classical trumpet and done well (but has not garnered as much success for doing that as he has found in playing jazz). Eileen Farrell was successful years ago with her blues singing (but nowhere near as successful as she was in opera). Paul McCartney and Billy Joel have written classical music (but neither has been as successful in that as they had been writing/performing in their original styles). It takes so much time to be really good at one thing.  Also, in terms of acceptance from the public, often the people who are attracted to one style are not attracted to something else, so the fan base isn’t the same when an artist switches. 

Sometimes people make a transition into something else after they retire. Opera singers have gone successfully into Broadway when they no longer do opera. Actors have become directors, singers sometimes can become conductors. There isn’t anyone now, as far as I know, (and I’m willing to be wrong here) that is equally well known, successful and acknowledged by their peers as well as by the public, as being really at the top of their game in two very different disciplines or places, and I don’t think that has ever been true. If you want to develop world-class abilities you cannot compromise the time you spent on your primary choice by also spending a lot of time on something else.

All of this I expostulate to build my case for the following argument.

Over the weekend I had occasion to work with a young lady who is in her second year of college studies working toward a degree in music theater. As is typical now, in her singing lessons, she is being taught to be a classical soprano because it is “good” for her. Now, in most cases, I would agree that this would be a beneficial thing and something that makes sense, but not in this case.

This young woman is a natural high belter the likes of which I rarely see. With little assistance she has developed a powerfully strong, clear, free belt that can go to a G top of the staff in the healthiest, most correct sound one could ask for. Her training, which focused mostly upon songs and performance and not too much on technique, allowed her to go to a very good place (albeit one that is still no piece of cake to do) by essentially leaving her sound alone. What she needs is to stay where she is, specialize on gaining even more strength and stamina, understand what she cannot expect herself to do, and work to keep what she has from causing her any health issues (and this is paramount). Why? Because this kind of natural ability is unusual, and in today’s music world, it is THE sound that is most prized in pop, country, gospel and other styles of music, including Broadway. Add to this that the young lady is attractive, expressive and musical, and you are looking at someone who has the highest possible chance of being successful in having a high level professional career. What she needs is support to be better at what she already does. What she is getting instead is training that undermines the very aspects of her vocal production that need to be strengthened, taking her away from her natural gifts, and confusing her both vocally and mentally.

If you have a teenaged prodigy, who can beautifully play a concerto by Mozart on the piano at the age of 15, do you tell him or her that it would be BETTER to learn to play Duke Ellington because jazz is American and all young pianists need to understand how to play in the jazz idiom in order to be correct and musically sophisticated? Or, do you tell the youngster about Mozart’s life and work, take the child to Germany, teach the child about all of Mozart’s works and then introduce them to other composers of classical music to broaden that knowledge while they continue to train their piano technique?  Learning about Ellington might be really cool, but necessary?  I don’t think so, at least not right away.

The educational system for vocal musical training in colleges has absolutely no idea what to do with kids like this young woman. They need to not be trained in classical vocal production after they are fully grown (age 16 or so) if they have a high level of other vocal skills already. Training a voice that is happy belting, and has learned to carry that sound up high without undue effort should be aimed at SPECIALIZATION. As it is, her “classical” training is taking apart the core aspects of her vocal production, the ones that need to be attended to, because of the almost universally held belief that classical training is better. The tenet that it is necessary to study classically in order to have “healthy technique” no matter what kind of music is being sung is never challenged. The mere idea that anyone, anywhere, can sing the kinds of sounds that this young woman produces and be healthy simply doesn’t exist in the minds of singers who do not, themselves, also make this sound. If educate, which comes from the Latin, educare, or to draw out, is about continuing to call forth the unusual vocal abilities of this young woman, then she is not being educated, she is being dismantled. Even if this is being done without malice (and I assume it is), and it is being done for “all good reasons”, it is still WRONG.

I am in New York and she is not. I cannot easily help her. If I knew someone to send her to who I was SURE could take her further in her high belt/mix, I would send her there, but I don’t. If she were my kid, I would tell her to get a degree in something else, like acting, and keep on doing what she is doing on her own until she can find someone to nurture the specialized and outsized vocal gifts she possesses.

Singing is a sensual experience. It’s like eating cold chocolate ice cream on a hot summer day. It’s like settling into a warm cozy chair in front of a blazing fire. It’s like swimming in a crystal clear bay on a gorgeous Caribbean beach. It’s like snuggling your favorite little one on your lap while you read their favorite story.

I could go on and on.

Singing is just plain delicious fun. I usually feel sorry for people who don’t experience singing that way. When singing is work, when it feels hard to do, when it isn’t fulfilling, when it is a chore, something is wrong. Unfortunately, many people think that those things are normal or that they are to be expected. I have heard experienced singers with a great deal of training singing in public with a sound that is just plain not good. Clearly, they have never had an effortless sound joyfully emerge from their throats else the comparison would be enough to make them NOT sing in public. Again, I say, how sad!

For those who do not sing or who think they cannot sing, I can only say — try! If you find a compassionate and patient teacher you can learn, and in doing so, also learn to have fun and enjoy not only how you sound but how you feel. Why deny yourself that opportunity?

Since we carry the voice around with us, don’t forget that it can be your companion when you are lonely. It can cheer you up when you feel blue. It can entertain you when you are bored. It can challenge you when you are curious. It’s free, it’s always available, and it is yours to share or to keep to yourself as you please. We can’t say that about very many other things in life, can we?

The world is full of sounds. Some of them are melodious, some are ugly, but the one sound that is always potent is the sound of your own voice. Pay attention to it and it will serve you well.

The the thing about singing is that the joy of singing is the joy of being alive to sing.

I have said many times that there is no mystery to singing, and of course, there is plenty of mystery. I have to admit that I contradict myself not only in this but elsewhere. That’s because truth is often paradoxical. Sometimes two seemingly opposite things occur simultaneously. Life is full of examples of this. Water, when it is still, reflects as a mirror, but there is nothing there except light bouncing off the surface. Light is what allows us to see shadow. Forward movement creates a backlash.

The voice is a very real phenomenon but it has no weight, no size, no taste, no color and cannot be seen. The voice is personal and unique but has some characteristics that are the same for all human beings. Scientists don’t really know why we can sing. We don’t really need to sing to survive and the vocal folds evolved to protect the lungs from foreign objects, not to make sound, that came later. So how is it that we sing?

Since no one can answer this question, perhaps we should stick to things that can at least be discussed with a small measure of understanding. A good topic that never gets exhausted is vocal registers. If we take this discussion to that topic we must begin by defining again what a vocal register is:

A register is a group of tones or pitches that have the same texture or quality.

This definition says nothing about pitch. That is because registration is independent of pitch but in a beginning singer we use pitch to help access registers because the extremes of pitch help make the behaviors of registration more perceptible. A very high light sound is LIKELY to elicit head register and a very low loud sound is LIKELY to elicit chest register, but this is a probable, not definite, response. In a skilled vocalist chest register quality can be made on higher pitches (sometimes very high pitches) and head register quality can be made on lower pitches. Understanding this is crucial if one is to understand the difference between vocal production (or laryngeal behavior) and musical style.

CCM styles are predominantly chest register oriented in both men and women. Head register is found on some high pitches in some styles or can be used for ornamentation or expressiveness. By and large, however, since most of the CCM styles came from the “common person” rather than aristocracy or nobility, they were derived from speech, which, in most people is chest register dominant. The various styles have evolved over the decades but the declarative quality of most of our “popular” music is unmistakable.

The question then becomes, how does one take chest register higher as a vocal quality without shouting? Or, can shouting be musically and vocally acceptable? Is a gospel singer, wailing away on some very high pitch, singing, shouting, or is that a moot point? When a heavy metal singer is screaming, is that an effect of the electronics or is the person really doing something that is far away from normal vocal use? Where does taste come into this discussion? What kind of boundaries do styles have to have in order to be “authentic” and are those boundaries personal, musical, vocal, or some combination of each? (No, I don’t have answers. I just like questions!)

The question that comes up most often is “how do I belt correctly?” First of all you must understand that belting is using your chest register at a loud volume on pitches that are above what is traditionally called “the break”. If you do not agree with this you either don’t belt yourself, don’t understand what’s happening in the larynx when you do, or belt in some kind of sound that isn’t actually belting, but you think it is. Sorry. You don’t have to take my word for it, but that is what I do and teach.

The way to “carry chest up” is to carry chest up. If you can’t hear chest register as a quality, then you are going to use what you feel as a guide and if you try to carry the same feeling up, you will kill your poor voice in short order unless you have very sturdy vocal folds or keep your upper range very short. If you think that making a nasalized, squawk is “belting” you will end up sounding weak and ineffective rather than powerful and dynamic because you don’t have enough chest register in your mechanism to generate the quality or color that sounds appropriate. If you think that there are no registers, or five registers, or different registers for every pitch, and that resonance is enough to teach you to belt, good luck in your search. Of course, you can find all of these ideas and more on YouTube…….the world is full of folks who will sell you their DVDs. (I don’t have any).

This may be a mystery to some folks, but not to me. It’s not one of those paradoxes, it is something that is replicable, definable, specific, and consistent. The mystery is why others are mystified.

Keep those cards and letters comin’ in, folks.

The human voice has limits. Human beings, from the smallest to the largest and tallest, can only make a certain range of audible sounds. The longer and bigger the throat, (and the larynx/vocal folds), the lower the voice. There are people who claim that the voice can cover 8 octaves (that’s in one person), but I have no idea how that could be possible. The Roy Hart Theater folks say that’s what Roy Hart could do, but I don’t know if that is fact, fiction or fairy tale. Most people are lucky to have two octaves and a little more than moderate volume.

I do know, however, that the voice is nevertheless, unlimited. By this I mean that no matter how much one investigates it, how much time one spends studying speech or song, how thoroughly one thinks that they have learned all there is to know about their own instrument, it really isn’t possible to plumb its depths completely. This is because the human mind doesn’t stop being curious and the spirit of growth and expansion is unquenchable in our hearts.

To work with each person’s individual sound is to embark upon an uncharted journey. We don’t really know how a person experiences making a voiced sound. We don’t know what the landscape of sound is like in the person’s mind and body. Each voice has a lifetime connected to it. Memories, sensations, experiences, connections, associations, relationships……every sound we have ever emitted since the first cry at birth has carried life and breath from deep within us out into the world. Every sound we have ever made has had the potential to effect our environment. Even our first words can be etched into the minds of our parents or grandparents for the rest of their lives. If you also consider that every sound we have ever heard also has an impact on what we know about sound, about how it works, about what it is, you expand the potential of the aural world exponentially. Remember that it is nearly impossible to speak if you are born deaf. We rely on our ears to teach us about sound for the first two years of our lives and learn by repetition to speak, with no conscious idea of what is going on in our bodies for that process to take place. Those who begin singing as very young children also learn without really understanding how that sound is created. Somehow or other, it just comes out, and if we are fortunate, it sounds OK when it does.

Since your sound is ALWAYS with you, you can’t leave it home, pack it up, or forget where you left it, and since it is more or less always the same, it is in some ways a reliable comfort. Something that shows up when you need it because it does. It is a portable, invisible, handy companion, and it can be taught to do some very fancy things if you are a patient teacher. It’s better than a pet, because it doesn’t cost anything to maintain as long as you don’t mistreat it!

The way that most of us understand how much our voice means to us is the first time it disappears. Then we know how important it is and how much we depend upon it. We realize that this thing we take for granted carries so much of our energy into the world. The unique, potent, peculiar sound of your voice, touching the lives of those with whom you come in contact, cannot be replaced by anything else.

We begin to appreciate how truly dynamic the voice is when we start the exploration of what it can do, or perhaps it would be better to say, what ELSE it can do, besides what we are accustomed to in daily life. How we can ride upon waves of air, surfing the tones that flow out, moving up and down, bouncing on the vowels and consonants! What sweet deliciousness awaits us when we traverse the slopes of sorrow or the hills of elation, allowing our voices and our emotions to become one! How humbling it is to hear the tremble of vulnerability or the softness of consolation carrying with it the depths that we feel in our hearts!

If ever you find that you have come to an end — that you have learned it all and have nothing left to discover — shake yourself hard! Do not fall into this trap, for it is a game that your mind wants to play. Your voice is the ocean, the sky, the earth, it is all the universe, and it opens before you as a guide, a teacher, a puzzle, a partner, a world. Never cease to love it and explore it, always with joy and appreciation and you will always be rewarded!

I had the great pleasure this evening of hearing Ann Hampton Callaway at Dizzy’s Club Coca Cola in midtown with three amazing musicians, Ted Rosenthal, on piano, Jay Leonheart on bass, and Victor Lewis on drums. The room is gorgeous and was packed this first show on a Saturday night. Callaway was in fine form in all directions.

Callaway’s voice runs from a deep warm open low to a floating delicate clear super high and possesses a million colors of belt and mix in between with nary a bump in sight. She seamlessly bounces through rounds of scating — while her strong voice rolls in and out of all kinds of sounds with supreme control, always in service of what she wants to do with the song. She sings without fear, but also without conceit, and her heart is true to what she wants to convey. As a fine musician, (she is a composer and pianist of renown) Ann is very much at home with the three giants on stage with her and she trades riffs with them with great joy. And, if that were not enough, she composes a song (always) at the end of the set that includes a few phrases from the audience. It is amazing to hear her come up with lyrics and notes that work as rhyme as well as melody. Cheech!

Her mom is a singing teacher and Ann learned much from her, but not everything. She had other classical teachers at school. The rest, she once told me, was her own invention. She sings as someone does when they know that they know and it is a true privilege and gift to hear live music of this calibre. Her belting is powerful and strong, rangy and free, and she does not ever lose her voice. Her three octave range is expressive and under her command as she improvs her way along or holds a vocal line to the nth degree, decrescendo-ing down to triple piano when she wants.

Guess you can tell that I was very impressed. Don’t know why she isn’t a “household” word. She puts many a younger singer who has reached “fame” under the table. (Duffy, are you listening to this?)

Go buy her new album, “At Last”. Etta James needs to make room for someone else to sit with her on that throne.

By definition, an artist is someone who creates. The creation comes from the inner vision of the artist. If the depth of the artist’s vision is significant, that which is revealed could be unlike anything that has existed before. The difference between this kind of creativity and that of an inventor is that art doesn’t need to have any purpose other than its own existence.

Fine art — painting, drawing, sculpting — and performing arts — dance, music and drama are not much valued in our society unless we speak of those things which are put before mass culture in a commercial manner. There’s nothing wrong with that. Andy Warhol certainly put any idea that “pop art” wasn’t valuable out to pasture. But some of what is out in the world to be bought and sold by large groups of people is just “merchandizing” of various kinds, sometimes disguised as creative work, and sometimes out there boldly just being itself.

Since we all see the world in our own manner, it makes sense that what appeals to one person will not necessarily appeal to another. This diversity is what makes the world go ’round. Each of us brings our own sensibility to what we enjoy and no one can arbitrate what art is or is not. That debate is doomed always.

It is possible, however, to be open to a wide range of expressions, experiences, ideas and activities and to participate in enjoying art with an open mind. Sometimes doing that makes for great surprises and true illumination.

I have gone to things that I thought I would hate only to find that I enjoyed them immensely, and have also been very disappointed in other things I had expected to enjoy. Not knowing how one will react is part of the fun. So, too, as a creative person, it is a challenge to bring oneself to the process of creating. No matter how hard we prepare no one ever knows exactly how a performance will go ahead of time. It can be exhilarating or devastating.

If a teacher is going to help a young person develop creativity, the process must begin by exploring creating something. This is best done in an atmosphere that is safe and supportive. Cruel criticism is hard enough for a seasoned, experienced artist to endure but it kills the spirit in a novice or in someone who is very sensitive. Developing creativity starts with questions and observation. What do you see? What do you hear? How does this feel to you? What do you want to convey?

Helping someone answer those questions allows the person to contemplate what, exactly, their vision might be, could be, should be. It directs them back into themselves. It reflects back what is being created so that it can be refined and polished. Even children have the capacity to create great art, since they do not have a jaded view of life. Uniqueness has no age limit.

If our society placed a bit more value on what was insightful, different, unusual, and challenging rather than on what is “hot”, what sells, what will make the most money, everything would be different. As long as only some artistic things are valued and the process of making something from nothing is not looked upon as something magical and special, everyone loses.

If singing teachers are to teach students to make music with their voices, then they must explore how music feels (emotionally), how it affects us (as physical reaction), how it moves us (by how we react to it) and what it might stimulate us to do or be. Teachers must ask questions before they make statements, they must explore with kindness before they condemn with harsh criticisms. They must listen and look before they decide they understand. And they must always appreciate the creative process even if the end product is not something they personally enjoy. To fail in this is to fail in teaching. It stifles rather than fosters artistry.