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Teaching on Tender Ground: Voice, Dys-appearance, and the Art of Vocal Feedback

 

                 


                 Let's be honest: Voice teachers often find themselves walking a very fine line.


On the one hand, we're here to help. We offer tools, observations, and suggestions that (hopefully!) support our students with their vocal development. On the other hand our feedback can unintentionally pull a singer into a very tricky space - one where their previously "unnoticed" voice or body suddenly feels questioned or even ... wrong. (What if they were never bothered by that quirky way they make the vowel "Ah"? Or they love that breathy quality in their chest voice?)

This is where one philosopher and physician Drew Leder gives us language for something that many of us instinctively understand. In The Absent Body (1990), Leder describes the concept of body dys - appearance. This is the way that the body tends to fade into the background when functioning smoothly, or you are feeling content in you own skin. Then, unexpectedly the "body" appears to us as it malfunctions or someone points out a flaw or failure.

For singers this might happen in moment of vocal failure - a crack, strain or loss of control. What was once automatic or assumed accessible becomes suddenly questioned or unfamiliar. The voice is no longer something they are in - It becomes something they have, and that has let them down or behaved unexpectedly. This kind of rupture can be unsettling, not just technically, but emotionally. 

But here's the part that really makes me stop and think: This experience doesn't just happen in high stakes environments like auditions or performances, or illness and injury. It can also happen in the singing lesson.

When a teacher - with the highest intentions points out the "not quite rightness" of a singers function or style or musical choice, their easful, embodied awareness may fracture. The body that has been cooperating quietly in the background, becomes hyper-visible. The voice is no longer "me", but a problem to be fixed. The singer then moves from expressive subject to self-monitoring object. That, right there is dys-appearance.

Now, before we get flustered - has this woman gone mad? I want to be clear that I do believe that awareness is an essential component for growth and learning. And this does include acknowledging what might not be working. But we also need to ask: How are we doing it? When? Why? AND do we really have to do it? 

Because when we step into that moment - when we make the invisible visible - we're not just teaching vocal technique or musicianship. We are shaping a singers relationship with their body and voice. That's a big responsibility.

This is where the work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty offers a crucial reframe. In his phenomenology of perception (1945) he introduced the idea of body-subject - the notion that we dont just have a body; we are our bodies.  WE know the world and are known by the world through our body. WE make meaning, not from some detached, floating consciousness, but through our lived, perceiving and sensing bodies that are situated in place and time.

If you've got this far - well done! I appreciate you time and consideration, because I believe that singing teachers do really important work, and we have the unique ability to help people draw closer to themselves through singing.

Singing and teaching singing is tender territory. When we approach both with care, humility and an awareness of the voice as subject, not just object we create something that is far more profound and meaningful that vocal "correction" or "skill acquisition". We are inviting singers to engage and experience their body in profound and empowering ways. Nurturing awareness, agency and connection.

With love dear teachers x

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