Functional Voice Training
The Technique
Functional Voice Training demystifies ideas about aesthetics, breathing and diaphragmatic support. It allows both teacher and singer to explore the voice and its associated muscle systems, to identify its strengths and weaknesses and establish a variety of exercises that aid in healthy vocal development or repair. Much like a fingerprint, one voice cannot be duplicated by that of another singer. It can however, be trained and built to respond to musical phrases with reflexive habits having more to do with relinquishing control than maintaining control. Singers thus learn to embrace their own voices without falsified imitation or poor concepts.
Without a comprehensive understanding of the vocal mechanism and the tonal qualities it yields, many teachers resort to a “one-size-fits-all” approach to vocal training. These teachers pass on misguided instruction without anatomical knowledge to hide vocal flaws such as breaks in the voice or lack of breath. This might be compared to an interior decorator who uses wallpaper to hide holes and cracks in walls instead of repairing them. Singers who cannot respond to such instruction often come to believe they lack in talent and that liberated, free singing is an unattainable ideal. The psychological despair of having a poorly functioning voice will cause many to leave their performance ambitions unrealised for life.
“The Liberated Voice” has a developed, extended range of well over two octaves that can sing both fully and quietly on all accessible tones. A “Liberated Voice” is one which has been trained or cultivated to allow the singer to express musical ideas freely and simply and without great bodily effort. The “Liberated Voice” gives the singer a sense of physical and emotional well-being.
When freed from undesirable muscular tensions, ALL voices are uniquely beautiful.
“Her teaching is enormously effective because she does not judge whether something is ‘right or wrong’ about the singer’s approach, but instead determines what the vocal difficulty signifies about the function of the vocal mechanism. Thus she offers the singer real help without dogma through own her personable dry humour.”
Teachers of Functional Voice Training (North America)
Sharla Nafziger
New York City
sharlanafziger.com
Katharine Posner
South Carolina
katherineposner.com
Donna S. Reid
New York City
donnasreid.com
Kristine Anderson
Toronto, Canada
krismezzo@gmail.com
Teachers of Functional Voice Training (Europe)
Stefan Grunwald
Darmstadt, Germany
stefangrunwald.com
Ignacio Jarquin
ignaciojarquin.wordpress.com
Monika Kopp
Cologne, Germany
monika.kopp@gmx.de
Thomas Maxeiner
Hamburg, Germany
vocalcoaching-hamburg.de
Uta Minzberg
Lagos, Portugal
Diane Severson Mori
High Wycombe,
Buckinghamshire, UK
www.divadianes.blogspot.com
Annette Regnitter
Cologne, Germany
soprannette@web.de
Noelle Turner
Essen-Werden, Germany
noelle-turner.de
Richard Staab
Germany
wmk-wiesbaden.de
Maria Tuczek-Graf
Wiesbaden, Germany
wmk-wiesbaden.de
Johanna Peine
Berlin, Germany
johanna.peine@gmx.de
David Dunbar
Toronto, Canada
Liberated
Voice
Advanced Singing Technique Master
Contact: information@liberatedvoice.com
Blog | Articles
Qualities of Voice.
As I finish up my first week of 50 out of 100 lessons in Bremen, Germany, I realize that there are certain elements of voice we can never explain in certain rationalities, voices that break the rules and stimulate the ear to wonder. Some qualities of sound merely...
The Vagus Nerve and the Larynx
My old Maestro, Cornelius Reid often said, “destroy the voice; destroy the psyche. Restore the voice; restore the Psyche.”While my intuition and previous vocal conditions told me this was a remarkable fact rather than fiction, I could not come to a complete...