Acoustic Vocal Pedagogy Workshop

June 21 - 25, 2021 

 

ONLINE FOR SUMMER, 2021

 

Fundamentals, Theory, and Application of Acoustic Vocal Pedagogy 

“Advances in technology, understanding, and pedagogic application of acoustic vocal pedagogy have surged over the last twenty years, though dissemination and application lag behind. This course represents an honest annual attempt to help us all stay current in our understanding of concepts both established and emerging, and to enable us to incorporate the effective new strategies which these advances are yielding.”  - Ken Bozeman 

Join us online this summer for five days of thought-provoking presentations on vocal acoustics and perception, explorations of pedagogic applications, and tutorials in technology for studio explorations. If you are a beginner looking to get your feet wet or an experienced teacher looking to better understand and incorporate the principles of voice acoustics and perception in your studio, you will find a home here.  

Study with nationally and internationally recognized teachers, researchers, speakers, and authors in the fields of singing voice acoustics, perception, and pedagogy who work out practical applications of this material in the teaching studio while finding answers to the questions:  

  • What is actually happening?  

  • What does it sound like? What does it feel like?  

  • How can I make it happen for my student? 

This online workshop offers time to process content, engage in follow up discussions with participants, and observe and take observable lessons with the course instructors.  

Private, non-observable lessons with the course faculty are available at an additional cost of $25/30 minutes. Private tutorials on VoceVista Video Pro, Madde, and other programs are available for $50/hr.  

Lectures will be recorded and accessible to participants for review. Much of the foundational course material is drawn from Kenneth Bozeman’s book, Practical Vocal Acoustics, which participants are strongly encouraged to read prior to attending. 

Participants are encouraged to hard-wire via ethernet connection and wear headphones for the best quality experience. Pre-workshop tech tune-ups will be offered on Thursday, June 17th and Friday, June 18th to go over proper Zoom settings and microphone gain.  

Enrollment is limited. Register by June 14th, 2021 to reserve your spot!  

Faculty 

  • Kenneth Bozeman, author of Practical Vocal Acoustics and Kinesthetic Voice Pedagogy, served as Professor of Music at Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin for 42 years. He was awarded the Van Lawrence Fellowship by the Voice Foundation in 1994, is the chair of the editorial board of the NATS Journal of Singing, has twice been a master teacher for the NATS Intern Program, and was inducted into the American Academy of Teachers of Singing in 2019. His work explores the acoustic landscape that all voices inhabit, describes the inherent relationships of its components, and seeks ways to motivate efficient singing while respecting both acoustic reality and effective historic pedagogy. 

  • Ian Howell, DMA is a professor of voice and vocal pedagogy at the New England Conservatory in Boston. He has sung in most major concert halls across America, Europe, Canada, and Japan as a soloist and with the Grammy Award winning ensemble Chanticleer. During the Covid19 Pandemic, he pioneered the practical application of low-latency technology to enable real time music collaboration. His research interests include the intersection of human perception and the singing voice with a special focus on the role of auditory transduction. He believes that by asking how the hearing brain processes sound and reliably introduces perceptual qualities, we can come to understand what sounds the human voice can possibly make. This allows us to better notice, label, and anticipate these properties in the teaching studio.

  • Chadley Ballantyne is an assistant professor of music, voice at Stetson University. His work explores the application of voice acoustics across singing styles, voice pedagogy for adolescent singers, somatosensory awareness, and the use of speech sounds to leverage desired acoustic outcomes in singing. He believes that a deeper understanding of how we acquire and execute speech motor skills can demystify many of the challenges of singing and voice pedagogy. He is a contributing author to The Evolving Singing Voice: Changes Across the Lifespan. 

  • Bodo Maass is the founder and main software developer of Sygyt Software. He first began programming at the age of 11. After studying Cognitive Science (Psychology and Philosophy) at the University of Oxford, he worked on voice based human-machine interfaces for a company called MicroStrategy in Washington D.C. He subsequently returned to Oxford to become the first employee of the newly founded company NaturalMotion, where he was the lead developer for NaturalMotion’s award winning 3D animation software “endorphin”, a commercial product to synthesize human movement based on artificial intelligence research. He discovered Overtone Singing in 1994 and immediately wanted to learn this seemingly impossible art of singing two melodies at the same time. He and his teacher in this method, Wolfgang Saus, talked about the lack of good software to assist teaching overtone singers, and thus “Overtone Analyzer” was born. This work was later expanded to create the next generation of the software “VoceVista” together with the voice scientist Don Miller. 

Who should attend? 

  • Voice Teachers of any age or level of student who aim to enhance their teaching with a better understanding of acoustic pedagogy 

  • Instructors of college-level voice pedagogy classes, especially those interested in expanding their offerings in vocal acoustics, psychoacoustics, and perception 

  • Voice Students (18+) who are performance or voice pedagogy majors  

  • Choral Conductors who incorporate voice training in their rehearsals  

  • Voice Therapists specializing in the rehabilitation of singers 

  • Performers who want to understand and optimize the acoustic use of their instruments 

  • Anyone who wants to learn to hear a voice with specificity, acquire language to describe the sounds, correlate the sounds with the physiological choices of the singer, and guide acoustic results through affect and motivation.  

Course Outline (subject to change)  

Fundamentals with Ken Bozeman  

  • How Humans Perceive & Experience Voice 

  • What Acoustic Efficiency Requires of Respiration & Phonation   

  • The Vocal Tract Filter   

  • Vowel Construction and Perception   

  • Chiaroscuro Balance  

  • The Case for Acoustic Registers   

  • Vowel Migration & Modification   

  • Implications of Acoustic Pedagogy   

  • Treble and Non-Treble Voices: The Essential Training Differences   

Theory with Ian Howell   

  • Introduction to Psychoacoustics   

  • Pitch   

  • Auditory Roughness   

  • Absolute Spectral Tone Color   

Application with Chadley Ballantyne  

  • Vibrotactile Sensation   

  • Acoustic Pedagogy for Belt and Rock   

  • Auditory and Speech Targets   

  • Adolescent Acoustic Vocal Pedagogy  

  • Observable Teaching in Contemporary Commercial Music 

Daily Schedule (subject to change) 

Times shown in EST 

  • 8:00am-10:00am: Observable teaching/private voice and technology lessons
  • 10:00am-12:00pm: Live lectures and small group experiential learning over Zoom 
  • 12:00pm-1:00pm: Break 
  • 1:00pm-3:00pm: Live lectures and small group experiential learning over Zoom 
  • 3:00pm-6:00 pm: Observable teaching/private voice and technology lessons 

Tuition & Registration 

The deadline for registration is June 14, 2021.  If you have registered or taken part in any previous Acoustic Vocal Pedagogy programs, you are entitled to a discount on tuition for our 2021 summer program.  For more information, or to receive your qualified discount code, please email Kayla Gautereaux.

  • Full tuition: $745 
  • Reduced tuition for previous program participants: $585
  • Registration Fee:  $40 

For questions about registration please contact Rebecca.Wolff@necmusic.edu for more information.

 

Register for Acoustic Vocal Pedagogy Workshop

 

The AVPW faculty acknowledge the individual, international, and systemic circumstances which may impact the financial feasibility of participation in our program. Aiming to improve equity of access to AVPW, we are offering a fee reduction to those on our need-based enrollment waitlist. AVPW must meet a full-priced minimum enrollment threshold to ensure we can offer any discounted spots. Waitlist participants will be offered spots on a first-come-first-served basis. Participants who are able to pay the full price for the workshop are encouraged to do so early, as enrollment is limited. To join the need-based enrollment waitlist, please email Kayla Gautereaux. 


Advance Preparation  

Participants are encouraged to purchase and read the following material prior to attending: