Estill Voice International President, Dr. Kimberly Steinhauer, and Estill Master Trainer, Diane Gaary, will present “Estill Voice Training® and Alexander Technique: United strategies for optimal speaking and singing” at The Voice Foundation Annual Symposium: Care of the Professional Voice in Philadelphia, PA, USA, May 31st- June 4th, 2023.

The kinesthetically based voice trainings of The Alexander Technique (AT) and Estill Voice Training® (EVT) develop the ability to feel accurately, maintain vocal health, and make specific vocal choices.  As methods of Kinesthetic re-education EVT and AT differ, but share many core concepts and principles, and empower people to confidently increase their vocal health and possibilities.

Merging artistic and scientific principles, Jo Estill created innovative Figure Exercises that train Power, Source, and Filter structures for optimal speaking, singing, and health. EVT develops flexible, powerful, healthy, and expressive voices by teaching people to balance and coordinate access to those individual structures of the vocal tract.

 AT is a holistic way of working with the mind and body that removes habitual patterns of interference with the body’s natural reflexes. Removing unconscious interference profoundly impacts the nervous system and creates conditions in which people can function at their best.  AT optimizes comfort, strength, and coordination in daily activities and enhances the highly skilled performances of athletes and artists. In voice use, AT benefits posture, breathing, vocal health, resonance, range, volume, emotional expression, and performance anxiety.  AT improves the voice by improving the functioning of the whole person.

This interactive hands-on workshop will explore the complimentary nature of EVT and AT.  We will use AT to orient participants in their physical experience of making sound.  Then we will apply this experience of easeful embodiment to feeling and accessing vocal choices provided by the Estill Voice Qualities. As we apply EVT choices to selected songs and monologues, AT will help participants maintain the psycho-physical conditions that help them most ease-fully experience vocal options and avoid tendencies to “try too hard”.  By exploring how AT and EVT can be used to complement each other, this workshop will offer concrete solutions to universal vocal challenges that arise in the studio, in therapy, onstage, and in daily life.

The goal of this workshop is to provide a vocal experience of AT and EVT that leaves participants saying,

“I could use this. My voice did what I wanted, I know how I did it, and it felt great!”