Canada's National Voice Intensive

Where to begin? I was fortunate to have spent the past week with some of the faculty from Canada's National Voice Intensive. The work was challenging, exciting, revealing and downright fun! Judith Koltai reminded us that some aspects of the body are well designed and some are not so well designed. In light of that fact, we "oiled" a small segment of our spine with a pelvic tilt and felt the rest of our bones fall into place. Ian Raffel shared his ideas on rhetoric and we were all able to tell a great story about sixty pretty women. Dale Genge, from Studio 58, got everyone up and moving while exploring Henry V's "Now entertain conjecture of a time..."-- I'm still sad that I missed that one. And David Smukler? Well, he reminded us that our form is a house, and within that house is a need, and as that need is triggered it becomes a thought, and as that thought is processed it travels through a channel until it begins to resonate, and as we resonate we then articulate, but most importantly our voice is your response.

If that doesn't make any sense, send in your application for Canada's National Voice Intensive.

http://www.theatre.ubc.ca/vi/

Bravery

Seventy-five high school drama students in a small theatre. Sandwiched between their early morning technical rehearsal and their afternoon run-through, I had the privelege to deliver a two-hour workshop on Voice. Some of them definitely did not want to be there. Some maintained a steely concentration that allowed them to focus on the material for their own benefit, others went through the motions because that's what they "should" do, and still others were much too pre-occupied by the woman or man standing in front of them. The challenge of being heard was multi-layered. Physically the task of enabling them to hear my voice, was a challenge to say the least, then the idea of communicating a message was an even greater challenge. To allow them to move through their own fears of being embarrassed, doing something different, trying a new way of relating that may not be be deemed "cool" was a mighty endeavor. I encouraged them to participate, bravely, and speak from their hearts.

This morning a faculty member was experimenting with gesture. "I'm not good at that." she stated. The rest of the class refuted her claim. "Yes, you are, you just did it!" And she had.

At night, in the few moments between doing dishes and preparing for the next day, I pick up "Reading Lolita in Tehran" by Azar Nafisi. Nafisi asks her students how novels can relate and inform their lives. I ask myself how this book can relate to my life. It is teaching me bravery and passion around my profession. To allow myself to believe in the transfomative power of voice work, even in it's smallest gesture.

At the end of the workshop for the high school students, a young man with pale blond hair and a red toque came up to me and gave me a hug. "Where did you learn all that?" he asked. He had been brave and spoken from his heart in front of the group. Somehow, despite the noise, I had been heard.

Vocal Yoga?

So I finally had a chance to get back to my yoga routine. Twenty minutes was all that I found, wandering between the dishes, email and a fast approaching bedtime. I wanted to kiss those twenty minutes when they were over. My body felt more relaxed than it had in ages and it was as if I had polished all the rough edges off of my voice. While working with a student last week, we were opening up the rib case (cage) with some gentle lengthening. "This is just like yoga!!!" She exclaimed. "It is yoga." I replied.

I did a little search and found that, sure enough, someone is actually leading coarses in Vocal Yoga. She even has a nice and simple description of Fight or Flight's association with breath. Check it out if you get a chance:

http://www.vocalyoga.com/vocalyoga/breathing.html

I'm not one for selling products but if you need a quick twenty-minute guided yoga workout, get ahold of either Suzanne Deason's Stress Relief Yoga for Beginners or Patricia Walden's PM portion of the AM/PM Yoga for Beginners and ease your way into a blissful sleep.

What I didn't get for Christmas

To prepare for my graduate defence, I was required to read what felt like four hundred books, consisting of both theorectic texts and plays. Like any sensible student, I put off reading the majority of them until the final six months. Bleary eyed, I became more excited about the little red check marks used to tick off the title of each text than the process of reading. There was one exception-- the voice books.

Huddled uncomfortably in a wooden framed library chair overlooking the snowcovered limestone walls, I started to feel my breath in the same full and easy way I had experienced in my voice classes. The more I read about the breath, the more I experienced it in my body. Since then, I have relied on books on breath and voice to keep me sane whenever I have been unable to attend a voice class.

In the chaos of this holiday season, traveling back and forth between relatives and attending celebration after celebration, I realized that what I should have asked for was a breath book. The one I am most curious about is called, "Free Your Breath, Free Your Life" by Dennis Lewis. I haven't had a chance to pick it up yet, so let me know if you get to it before I do.

In the meantime, here's a great little exercise to keep you busy, or rather to slow you down:

http://www.authentic-breathing.com/straw-breathing.htm

Happy New Year!!

'Tis the Season

Usually around this time of year, I am teaching non-stop or rehearsing for a holiday show. In either case, the physical sensation is the same: fatigue. All I end up wanting is a cosy night at home to rest. Fortunately, I have decided, in the interest of my little boy, to keep a fairly light schedule this season. Little did I know that the gift I had intended for my child was really for myself. As December hits, my stress level is fairly low and most importantly, my voice doesn't feel warn out.

However; at the moment, I have a student and a co-worker who have speech pathology appointments to examine their vocal folds. Both of them are either teaching or rehearsing for long hours and complain of tired voices and sore throats.

"What did the speech pathologist say?" I ask my friend after his appointment.

"She told me to get some rest. Say no to a job, if I need." he replied.

"But we're the 24/7 workers." I tell him. "This is what we know."

We both laugh, and then there is a silence. Somewhere there is the knowledge that we can't keep this pace up. Our voices are our work, and without them, we lose our ability to express our passion and keep food on the table for our families.

We pour a cup of tea and sit down on the couch, listening to the rain.

"You know,I read a story in the news about a Japanese woman whose husband had died while working for Toyota. She sued the company for contributing to her husband's death." he tells me.

"Did he win?" I ask, thinking of the poor man.

"No, he lost. But his wife won the lawsuit." my friend replied before he headed off to the other room to rest his throat and contemplate working a little less.

Onomatopoeia

What is that word and what does it mean?

Well you may not have visited this one since Grade 11 English, but it can definitely add a life and energy to anything you say. Onomatopoeia is a term that refers to words that sound like the word they represent. So "splash" is what happens to water when a big truck runs through a puddle. If you say, "splash" the sounds you make are the exact sounds you hear before the water from that puddle soaks you. (As it does me every time I walk home in the rain). "Whisper" is mostly made up of voiceless consonants, so you have no choice but to slightly, "whisper" whisper when you speak it.

Our language is made up of so many onomatopoetic words, but in our on-going attempt to be "cool" we tend to cover them up: to deny their life. In skipping over the sounds of such rich words, we rob the listener of a sensual experience of language. No wonder people's attention spans are short-- we are constantly denying each other the excitement of fully savouring each sound.

So buzz, slip, slide, bark, splash, whiz and gurgle into your next conversation and see how much fun you and your listener can have!

Tongue Flapping and Vocal Health

With a busy fall term, there hasn't been as much time as I had hoped to make my blog entries. I find myself chasing my one-year old around the park,reflecting on the challenge some of my students have doing tongue work. "Griffin, watch out!" I holler as he almost topples head first over another little boy. My fatigue and lack of vocal rest are evident in the slightly tender sensation in the throat after hollering. I thought I better include some links on tongue work and vocal health.

There must be something in the air (besides the overabundance of clouds and rain) because when I checked out my favourite Voice Blog, Eric Armstrong's Voice Guy, I noticed that he was focussing on the exact same issue as I have been for the past few weeks. The separation of the tongue from the jaw. Pull out your mirrors and check out his site for some great exercises.

http://voiceguy.ca/blog/voiceguy/tongue-flapping-in-and-out

Several weeks ago, I had a very unique experience where a group of local voice instructors got together with a laryngologist and a speech pathologist to discuss voice issues as they pertained to the arts. It's not often that I find myself in a room full of people who love to talk about voice issues and are passionate about encouraging vocal health. All too often, people injure their voices purely because of overuse or abuse. Check out these quick reminders on keeping your voice healthy and safe during this busy time of year.

http://www.artindex.com/voxcura/exercises.html