Singing Redefined

2010

A thesis submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the award of the degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY From UNIVERSITY OF WOLLONGONG by Lotte Latukefu (B.Mus., Dip. Opera, M.Mus.) Faculty of Education 2010 iii iv Dedication To the memory of my father Rev. Dr Sione Latukefu v Declaration I, Lotte Mele Vaimoana Latukefu, declare that this thesis, submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the award of Doctor of Philosophy, in the Faculty of Education, University of Wollongong, is wholly my own work unless otherwise referenced or acknowledged. This document has not been submitted for qualifications at any other academic institution.

The Phenomenon of Singing, 2003

2015

The English diction texts by Madeleine Marshall and Kathryn LaBouff are two ofthe most acclaimed manuals on singing in this language. Differences in style between the two have separated proponents to be primarily devoted to one or the other. An in-depth study, comparing the precepts of both authors, and applying their principles, has resulted in an understanding of their common ground, as well as the need for the more comprehensive information, included by LaBouff, on singing in the dialect of American Standard, and changes in current Received Pronunciation, for British works, and Mid-Atlantic dialect, for English language works not specifically North American or British. Chapter 1 introduces Marshall and The Singer’s Manual of English Diction, and LaBouff and Singing and Communicating in English. An overview of selected works from Opera America’s resources exemplifies the need for three dialects in standardized English training. Chapter 2 reviews notational and diction resources, a...

Spheres of Singing 2022 conference, 2022

What constitutes “good singing” can be hotly contested amongst voice pedagogues. The literature on singing evaluation tends to focus on quantitatively measuring the acoustic properties of the voice or qualitative evaluations by expert listeners, who assess the singer’s vocal technique relative to the performed genre. However, little is known about what the general public considers to be “good singing”. Within a larger program of research on musical identity and singing self-concept, this small-scale, mixed-methods survey considered how people (N = 52) described and evaluated three stylistically different versions of a melody as sung by amateurs and professional vocalists to test a hypothesis that reality TV singing may be deemed as “good singing” by the public. Specifically, participants were exposed to three versions of “Happy Birthday”: 1) amateurs singing “as they would normally sing”; 2) professionals performing a “plain” version; 3) the same professionals singing a version in the style of The Voice reality TV show. Quantitative and qualitative results indicate that both professional versions were considered “better singing” than the amateur singing. While respondents focused on the technical deficiencies for amateurs, descriptions of the professionals concerned style. For the professional singers, it seems that technical considerations such as singing in tune were not remarked on because they were able to sing with pitch accuracy. Contrary to our hypothesis that the popularity of reality TV singing shows would influence public perceptions of good singing, people’s preferences for “good singing” were split between the two professional versions, with people focused on sophistication and creativity (the “professional voice” version) or vocal quality (the “professional plain” version). While respondents’ preferred version largely matched their chosen exemplar of “good singing”, participants were more likely to sing along with the “amateur” version. Implications for vocal pedagogy and engagement in singing activities for wellbeing will be considered.

Oxford University Press eBooks, 2015

Singing and vocal development: Introduction Despite the warmth in the room as they shook the snow off their winter coats and gathered around the kitchen table, there was a collective sense of nervousness and, in some cases, unease that was barely touched by the hostess' cheerful manner and greeting. Outside, the dark of a Newfoundland evening had already descended and the hostess wondered if some of the wind's icy chill was reflected in the body language. This gathering was to be the first of several sessions for the group when things usually unspoken, sometimes hidden for many decades, would be allowed to surface. My biggest recollection is school, of course. You went to school, the first thing the nuns would say,-Anybody can sing. You'd go and you were embarrassed to tears because you knew you couldn't sing, and there was no help… I can remember, at least a full row, if not two, in the classroom choirs or the singing choir, that you were told to pantomime. You had to go to music, and you had to listen to all the words and be able to mouth it or lip-sync it like everybody else, but you were not allowed to sing and you weren't allowed to turn it down. (Knight, 2010, pp. 108-9, interview with C., aged 50) I remember playing skipping and singing on the street. I can't remember the tunes now… I don't think I ever really thought I couldn't sing until Grade 7 and the teacher and all my friends and I were in glee club and that was a major time, she stopped and said-Somebody is tone deaf here. She said-It's you Vic, you're tone deaf. She said-You don't have any notes, you just can't sing along with the music at all… I can see the class, I was sitting second row back and there were kids behind me, you can imagine how embarrassed I felt. From then on I just assumed I was tone deaf… I guess obviously it was traumatic, to remember after 30 years. (Knight, 2010, p. 125, interview with V., aged 47) Then in Grade 6 [age 11] … I stood up to sing it and she told me to sit down, that I couldn't sing. Well, I was devastated … I'm sure I wanted to cry. Of course you came home, it was no good of telling your parents at the time that something like this had happened to you… And she was such a powerful person in the community… It stayed with me for so long. It was so degrading at the time. Even in high school, if there was anything to do with music, I hated music … I didn't learn it. I couldn't learn it, as I thought … I'm sure that [incident] affected it, in a lot of ways … maybe she just didn't have the knowledge and it didn't come to her-'I am doing something that's going to affect this child for most of her life.' That's probably the way it was. (Knight, 2010, p. 91, interview with L., aged 42) Over the next few weeks and months, these adults shared many similar detailed, yet negative, memories, particularly associated with their former schooldays. Despite the passing of time, these episodes of childhood were vividly recalled. A sense of embarrassment, shame, deep emotional upset, and humiliation were commonly evidenced, usually accompanied by reports of a lifelong sense of musical inadequacy. For these particular Canadians, as for many other adults around the world in different cultural contexts, the associations between singing and childhood were not positive. Within the local Newfoundland culture, singing competency either as an individual or within a group has always had high status. Consequently, any perceived singing "failure" in childhood has often led to continued self-identify as a "non-singer" (see Knight, 1999) and has reinforced a cultural stereotype of a community that is divided in two: those who "can sing" and those who "cannot"-a status associated with emotional trauma, acceptance, and a sense of "irrevocability" (Knight, 1999, p. 144). Similar findings have been reported from other studies of adults in North America, the UK, and Scandinavia. Yet, despite such experiences, there are some adults who never give up hope of improvement and there have been several successful examples of specialist choirs being started for adult "non-singers" (Mack,

2017

Cognitive linguist, George Lakoff, in the run-up to the 2004 USA election, wrote a heartfelt plea to progressives to own the “frame”. In an earlier publication, he discussed the metaphor of political discourse. He distinguished between the “strict father” ideology of the political right and the “nurturant parent” narrative of the left. Although we might feel that it is not appropriate to play the child to any politician’s parent, nevertheless, the importance of this analysis has been enormously influential. It pointed to a recurring problem in any political or social discourse, namely, that of control of the narrative in which the issues are described. Lakoff provides many examples of the ways in which the USA right controls the narrative and defines the terms in which the left must compete in order to win the argument (at times, with devastating effect). My suggestion here is that the terms used to describe and discuss singing are also potentially equally contentious and subject to...

Journal of the Canadian Association for Curriculum …, 2003

Two years ago, I created a performance piece called Singing Lessons: A Performance about Learning to Sing, in which I tried to demonstrate what I had learned about singing and about life from six remarkable singing teachers. In it, I told the story of my quest for voice, using archival audiotapes and photographs, and by telling stories, by demonstrating some technical aspects of singing, and by singing repertoire I had studied with each teacher. Mary Clare Powell (2002), in a chapter titled "Why I send the poet to teach my courses" explores how being a poet influences her university teaching. It made me think of how being a singer shapes my teaching. This paper is the result. I begin with a segment of the Singing Lessons performance piece which includes the script, photographs, and video clips of the sung material. 1 This ten minute long segment takes place approximately in the middle of the original hourlong performance. At the end of the Singing Lessons segment, I turn to a reflection on what it means to take my singer to teach my courses. The Script: Singing Lessons Aldeburgh is a fishing village on the Suffolk coast of England. The North Sea pounds the shingle shore 2 and the smells of salt sea and freshly caught fish and chips wrapped in newspaper always mingle on that beach. Benjamin Britten, the composer, and Peter Pears, the tenor, lived together in Aldeburgh, and it was there that most of Britten's music was premiered. When I was 27, I went on scholarship to study at the 1 The accompanist is Mark Sirett. 2 A shingle shore is a beach composed of small rounded pebbles.

Cognitive linguist, George Lakoff, in the run-up to the 2004 USA election, wrote a heartfelt plea to progressives to own the "frame". In an earlier publication, he discussed the metaphor of political discourse. He distinguished between the "strict father" ideology of the political right and the "nurturant parent" narrative of the left. Although we might feel that it is not appropriate to play the child to any politician's parent, nevertheless, the importance of this analysis has been enormously influential. It pointed to a recurring problem in any political or social discourse, namely, that of control of the narrative in which the issues are described. Lakoff provides many examples of the ways in which the USA right controls the narrative and defines the terms in which the left must compete in order to win the argument (at times, with devastating effect). My suggestion here is that the terms used to describe and discuss singing are also potentially ...

Voice and Speech Review, 2019

Australian Voice, 2007

A malgamation of the Music and Theatre departments in the Faculty of Creative Arts at the University of Wollongong (UOW) forced a change in the teaching of singing from the traditional conservatoire model that had existed in the Music Department prior to 2001. A snapshot of the UOW singing course in 2000 compared to 2007 shows the development in the course. In 2000, students studied music history, which provided a general survey of Western art music, harmony and analysis, aural and keyboard skills and music performance where students received individual singing lessons and weekly master classes. The teacher chose the repertoire and the pedagogical rationale was that we were working with individual differences and it was not practical to write a one-size-fits-all course and then stick to it. The individual lessons needed to be organic and flexible so that the teacher could concentrate on individual problems. In 2007 the undergraduate students study acting, movement (Feldenkreis & Suzuki), spoken voice, singing, character analysis and dramaturgy. In spoken voice class, students acquire knowledge of the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), skills in transcription, vocal skills including tone onsets, control of resonance, articulation and loud voicing technique. They also develop skills in accent reproduction, text mapping and performance of emotional text. The majority of students now learn singing in small groups rather than individual lessons although we maintain a small number of advanced singers who still received a one to one lesson. A key concept that had to change for the new course design to develop was the notion that every student needed an individually styled technique and that it was up to the teacher to solve vocal difficulties that the student was experiencing. This came