For as long as I can remember, I have always loved to sing.
Growing up, however, I did not possess a voice that others considered beautiful. Years of fruitless auditions for middle and high school musical theater productions finally led me to give up singing in favor of playing the clarinet, which earned me far more encouragement and success.
Then, shortly after completing my bachelor’s in music as a clarinetist, something extraordinary happened. I engaged in a course of bioenergetic analysis, a therapeutic form of bodywork designed to resolve chronic muscular tensions and improve breathing. These sessions exposed long-ingrained habitual patterns of holding that were inhibiting not only my breathing but also movement throughout my throat, mouth, and face. As I became capable of releasing these tensions, my voice gradually became notably more resonant and my range much easier to navigate. I took up singing again for the first time in years . . . and when I finally found the courage to perform in public, people began to tell me that they found my voice beautiful.
The discovery that such a profound change could take place in my voice brought me tremendous joy. It also inspired me to question other long-held assumptions about my body’s limitations, such as an apparent lack of athletic aptitude.
As a child I was even less a natural athlete than I was a natural singer. Throughout my adolescence I was bullied for being weak and uncoordinated. I recall how humiliating it was in middle school to have to perform a gymnastics floor routine in front of my peers when I could barely execute a decent somersault, to be picked last for the basketball team, and to be eliminated in the first round of track-and-field meets.
I began to wonder: If I could learn to free my voice, couldn’t I also learn to free my body? While browsing in a bookstore, I came across A Woman’s Book of Strength by Karen Andes. This was in the early 1990s. Andes had earned some fame as Cher’s trainer, and she capitalized on it to reach out to and empower women like me who longed for physical strength but had no idea where to begin. Her book helped me discover that while I might not have had an aptitude for gymnastics or basketball, I had quite an aptitude for strength training. I have worked out consistently ever since.
This is how I came to identify as both a singer and an athlete. These experiences also kindled my desire to teach. I was so grateful to find myself enjoying these newfound abilities that I had feared would remain forever beyond my grasp. I figured that if I could learn to do these things despite early setbacks and discouragement, perhaps I could help others to learn to do them too.
My graduate studies in voice performance were thus informed by my experiences as an instrumentalist and an athlete, as well as a keen interest in pedagogy. It was the first time I had ever studied alongside so many serious classical singers, and I shared with them my story about how bodywork had freed up my throat and articulators. Shortly after that conversation, my voice teacher summoned me to her studio for a chat. “It has come to my attention that you have been participating in primal scream therapy,” she announced. “I feel that it is my responsibility to inform you that I do not approve.” While I recovered from my amazement at how quickly gossip can ricochet around voice departments, I attempted to assure her that there was no primal screaming (whatever that is) going on and to explain my experiences. She maintained that such practices had no place in her studio and informed me that if I insisted on continuing down this path that I would have to find a new teacher.
In the years that followed I discovered that she was far from alone in expressing reservations about the potential impact of bodywork or other physical activities on the voice. Subtle practices like the Alexander Technique and relaxation methods were deemed useful and safe, but anything that had the potential to create structural changes in the singer’s instrument was regarded with suspicion: The miraculous voice you were born with must never be tampered with.
Of course, I knew firsthand that I would not be singing at all had my own voice not undergone significant positive structural changes. While I imagined that not all singers were burdened with chronic muscular tensions to the extent that I had been, it seemed likely that many would benefit from a means of exposing and alleviating any problematic tensions that affected their voices.
When I began teaching voice full-time myself, it became clear to me that many of my students were indeed being held back in their ability to apply the technical principles I shared with them. I could see that chronic tensions and postural distortions often kept them from being able to move their bodies and voices in the direction I asked them to. I knew that these tensions and imbalances could be resolved, so I refused to accept them as built-in limitations of my students’ instruments. But the means available to me in the voice studio were insufficient. I had to find a solution.
Tensions are muscular contractions. Postural distortions are the result of muscular imbalances. I wondered whether conditioning the skeletomuscular system itself could evoke positive structural changes that would give singers the mobility necessary to cultivate optimal breath and laryngeal coordination, as well as the physical stability to maintain excellent singing technique while meeting the demands of stage movement.
I began to observe the trainers at my gym. I noted strong similarities between the way they instructed their clients and the way I worked in the voice studio, and I thought, “I can do this!” I signed up for a fitness certification course and applied for a job. The manager naturally wanted to know why a woman in her late thirties with a doctorate and no fitness experience was seeking an entry-level position at his gym. I explained, “I’m tired of telling my voice students to stand up straight and take a deep breath. It doesn’t work. I need a way to help them actually do it.”
I worked in gyms for two years. My clients ranged in age from their early twenties to mid seventies, and they represented a broad range of strengths, dysfunctions, aspirations, and learning styles. And while I did learn how to help my students become capable of standing up straight and taking a deep breath, the experience ended up being far more valuable than I ever could have imagined. The deep understanding of biomechanics and motor learning that I acquired in the gym has become integral to my pedagogical approach in the studio.
The concept of fitness training for singers was a hard sell at first. As I pointed out in “Sport-Specific Training for the Vocal Athlete,” my 2005 article for Classical Singer Magazine:
Generations of voice professionals have warned singers against vigorous exercise. P. Mario Marafioti, Enrico Caruso’s laryngologist, wrote that “While it is urgent for a boxer or a fencer to keep his muscles in continual training, it is hardly necessary for a thinker, a writer, or anybody who is devoted to a purely intellectual form of activity to overtax his physical strength. As singing belongs to this latter class of activities, all books and methods advocating physical training for singers seem to consider singing more as a muscular action than as an intellectual achievement. . . . We would suggest that singers take care of their health just by following the normal rules of all intelligent people, without exerting themselves in any form of physical training.” Richard Miller assents to athletic activities that “ensure excellent, general physical condition and if they are not strenuously carried out past the age when physical exercise should be cut back,” but comments that “Even in the prime years, it is questionable that muscular development, including those muscles directly related to singing, need attain special dimensions for singing.” Barbara Doscher and Meribeth Bunch agree that light forms of exercise, particularly swimming, are beneficial, but heavy weight lifting should be discouraged. Pedagogy books typically include an entire chapter on the singer’s formant but devote a mere paragraph to exercise, and the tone is usually cautionary.
In the years since my article first appeared, I have been delighted to witness an ever-increasing interest in and enthusiasm for fitness among the singer community. Since 2007, the Barihunks Blog has celebrated the athletic achievements of low-voiced men on and off the operatic stage. In 2013, Classical Singer invited me to initiate a monthly column on fitness and singing called “Musings on Mechanics.” Stability balls and resistance bands are now frequently seen in voice studios. And in June 2018 (right around the date of this book’s publication), the Voice Foundation will devote the Friday-morning special session of their annual symposium to presentations on exercise and the voice. But for me, of course, the most gratifying evidence that this is an idea whose time has finally arrived is the fact that you are now reading this book!
The instrument that you were born with is indeed a miraculous thing. Its miraculous nature stems from its extraordinary malleability and responsiveness to training. Through achieving balanced strength and flexibility, you can unlock its full potential.
I am indebted to an extraordinarily diverse group of people and organizations for the inspiration and support to write this book.
W. Stephen Smith, my dear friend and mentor, taught me that anything can be made manageable when broken down into simple components. Mark Milani, my first fitness trainer, showed me that I was capable of becoming far stronger than I ever imagined possible. Artist Michael T. Fry put a copy of The Anatomy Coloring Book in my hands and persuaded me that, with patience, this was a topic I could master.
I am grateful to the National Academy of Sports Medicine for the exceptional training and technologies they provide to fitness professionals and for their ongoing commitment to cutting-edge sports science research. Particular thanks go to Stacey Cooke Penney, for encouraging my interdisciplinary writing about fitness, and singing and Rick Richey, who was also my fitness manager when I first became a personal trainer.
David Ley and Elissa Weinzimmer, creators of Vibrant Voice Technique, have pioneered methods to optimize singers’ physical instruments that have proved invaluable for my work in both the studio and the gym.
Karen Andes, Blandine Calais-Germaine, Barbara Doscher, and Meribeth Dayme wrote books that were vital not only for my education but also for the inspiration to write my own.
Sara Thomas, editor of Classical Singer magazine, offered me a platform for writing about singing and fitness in the form of my monthly “Musings on Mechanics” column; years earlier her predecessor, Carla Wood, launched my writing career by encouraging me to write an article on the topic.
Natalie Mandziuk and the editorial staff at Rowman & Littlefield have sustained me with their belief in and invaluable assistance with this project. Rowman publishes many of the titles that formed my foundational understanding of vocal pedagogy, and I am so honored to count myself among their authors.
The National Association of Teachers of Singing, the Voice Foundation, Opera America, and the Performing Arts Medicine Association all helped me find my voice and connect with the wider musical community through their invitations to present at their symposia and serve on discussion panels.
William Holt and his wonderful staff at Hype Gym provided a bright and versatile environment for our photo shoot.
Bioenergeticists Judith and Michael Jamieson gave me greater access to my own body; Alexander Technique teachers Lori Schiff and Malcolm Balk helped me to reeducate it.
I am grateful to Melissa Malde for her excellent application of body mapping principles for articulation anatomy; Matthew Hoch and Mary J. Sandage for adapting exercise science principles for vocal warm-up techniques; Nicholas Pallesen for sharing his hypnosis expertise with the classical vocal community; and David Salsbery Fry, whose personal experiences navigating the treacherous waters of the American healthcare system formed the foundation of my chapter on maintaining robust health while pursuing a performance career.
The sensational artwork in this book would not have been possible without the generosity of the nearly 300 patrons who pledged my Kickstarter campaign, especially major contributors Judith Friedlander and Jamie Patterson, two of the most dedicated avocational singers a voice teacher could ask for.
The Barihunks, Sybaritic Singer, and OperAthletic blogs shine a spotlight on the athletic nature of classical singing, helping to lay to rest the archetype of the ungainly opera singer.
My delightfully irreverent social media community is a daily source of support and inspiration, most notably the NEW New Forum for Classical Singers, the Professional Voice Teachers, the Collective Union to Nurture Talent and Singing, and the Danger Clams Fitness Fun Club Facebook groups.
The countless voice students and fitness clients I have been privileged to teach over the years provide a vibrant laboratory of sound and movement that continually shapes my understanding.
A heartfelt thanks to my friends outside the classical singing and fitness communities for keeping my perspective broad and my life in balance.
Finally, I could never have undertaken this project without the unflagging encouragement of my beloved husband, mother, and sister. Their steadfast belief in my vision has sustained me through the challenges and self-doubts that inevitably attend a project of this scope, and I feel so fortunate to have had their support.