I grew up surrounded by music and began singing in church at a very young age. I quickly realized that singing gave me the ability to process life and communicate my faith in a real and honest way.

I loved it! I found songs that said what I wanted to say and shared them everywhere! I sang in church, school assemblies, talent shows, choirs, musicals -

I loved all of it! 

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In high school, my closest friends and I formed a band and I discovered the joy of writing my own lyrics and music. I would write all week and bring the new tunes to our weekend rehearsals in my bandmate's garage. I remember my mom signing me up for a few voice lessons with a wonderful classical voice teacher during that season. Looking back, I'm sure she was teaching me some helpful techniques, but at the time it seemed so disconnected from the music I was singing. I struggled to understand how to apply what I was learning in lessons to the music I was performing and writing.

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The first time I had consistent voice training was my freshman year of college as a music education major. I was singing classical soprano rep all week and driving home on the weekends to lead worship at church and sing with my band. My voice started to struggle under the amount of singing and vastly contrasting repertoire. I remember asking my voice instructor for advice on how to sing more sustainably between these musical genres. He told me that the best option would be to quit singing the commercial styles of music and focus on only classical for my 4 years of college. I was devastated and became more determined to keep up with it all even though my voice was struggling. 

 

I transferred schools my junior year of college and began working with a teacher who valued exploring and teaching a wide variety of styles. It was wonderful to work with someone who understood me - but singing still felt effortful. I thought that struggle and effort was just normal for someone with my type of voice, but in truth my technique was unsustainable. In God's mercy, I ended up with nodules the end of my Junior year and had to start making some major habit and technique changes.

It was a pivotal season of speech therapy, new vocal exploration, and the small taste of less vocal effort.

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That small taste was all I needed! It led me to seek out further education in functional voice training after completing my undergrad degree. I received my certification in Somatic Voicework™ The LoVetri Method in the summer of 2012 and began to see the amazing power of functional/science based technique in my own singing and in those I was teaching. The ease and freedom this training provided was a game changer and I wanted to keep building my skill. I completed my master's degree in Contemporary Commercial Voice Pedagogy in 2015 at Shenandoah University and am so grateful for the vocal foundation and growth that training has provided me.

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In my past ten years of training vocalists privately and at the college level, I have seen how every part of my story enables me to equip, empathize, and encourage artists to find vocal freedom and establish sustainable functional based technique.

I long to empower singers to ditch the effort and replace it with vocal authenticity that impacts and connects to their audiences.