I shared the following graphic on my studio page, and I had to re-share it because it is too relevant to teachers of voice throughout the world.

Every single point in the graphic applies to the teaching of voice.

Every point.

I hope that as a voice teacher I can stay in the left column as much as possible. I want to build a studio and teaching philosophy built on a firm foundation of logic, reason, and common sense. Nothing I teach should be ‘above reproach.’

Drawing from the writings and treatises of the Old Masters has been my pedagogical modus operandi.  Discovering what we know scientifically about the voice has validated the training of the Old Italian School of Singing.  I always tell students that I don’t “own” any of these ideas or concepts, that I am merely putting into praxis what was done for hundreds of years married to the current knowledge of what is actually happening in the voice via science and vocology.

If voice teachers would live more in the left column and less in the right, our advancement as a profession would be swift and decisive.

Nothing in vocal pedagogy should be sacrosanct.

Every idea and assertion should be subject to experimentation and peer-review as any scientific assertion. One must know WHY one teaches the way one does. Isolation is bad. Vague language is bad. Dogma is even worse.

As one of my intellectual heroes said, “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.”