Vocal Consistency and Artistic Freedom: Existentialism and Vocal Instruction in Higher Education

As voice teachers, we should strive to help our students uncover their individual sound, and to facilitate technical consistency. Further, we as teachers should ultimately guide students to positive, independent, and emotionally engaged performances on stage - or in recordings. Some teaching approaches may guide students to these experiences - others may not. A successful outcome of vocal study occurs when the student no longer needs their teacher - they are independent and autonomous singers and musicians, and are able to teach themselves - or perhaps others. This study views the student-teacher relationship in the voice student through an existentialist lens influenced by the Sartrean principles of responsibility and freedom. The study examines some commonly used teaching approaches - viewing them from an historical perspective through the National schools in vocal instruction to more current approaches that may be commonly found in higher education teaching studios. This study offers a perspective that hopes to foster discussion, a re-examination of, and self-reflection in the teaching practices of higher education vocal instruction. The research is grounded in hermeneutic phenomenology. This paradigm was a means by which to unearth and uncover the lived experience of students undergoing vocal study. One that was guided by a framework of instruction influenced by the Sartrean notions of responsibility and freedom.