Vocalist.org archive


From:  "DIANE M. CLARK (MUSIC DEPARTMENT)" <DCLARK@r...>
Date:  Fri Aug 4, 2000  8:18 pm
Subject:  Re: [vocalist-temporary] "Honest" singers


Lisa-Marie wrote:

>BUT the Wesley Balk Institute greatly contributed to my fe
elings on the subject.

It's interesting to me that you spoke at length about how you find it easy
to be "natural" and show your emotions on the stage, yet you were trained and
strongly influenced by Wes Balk. And you said you don't know how to teach
your students what you do. My take on Wes's work, which I have practiced and
taught for 23 years now, is that his techniques are quite teachable, and that
these very techniques can give a singer the tools and the confidence to give
an expressive performance. And as the singer becomes more fully able to give
a full performance, he can relax and allow his own true emotions to be a part
of it. It sounds like you may have forgotten how you got where you are! :)

Before I encountered Wes's work, I felt that I was "trapped in my body." The
things I wanted to express could not come out. After I worked with Wes and
started practicing and teaching his techniques (even wrote a dissertation on
it!), people began to tell me how emotionally moving my performances were.
They assumed it was "natural" -- little did they know I had worked long and
hard to "free up," as we say. :)

|\ Dr. Diane M. Clark, Assoc. Prof./Chair of Music Dept., Rhodes College
| 2000 N. Parkway, Memphis, TN 38112, 901-843-3782, dclark@r...
() http://gray.music.rhodes.edu/musichtmls/faculty/dclark.html

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