Registration Form
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Schedule
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Registration includes a full day of speakers from the New England Region, lunch, and a microphone technique workshop hosted by David Scott, a professor at the Berklee College of Music.
PLEASE NOTE: In addition to completing this registration form, you must send $50 to "[email protected]" via PayPal to complete your registration. Conference Details
The New England Region bi-annual conference will be graciously hosted by Dean College in Franklin, Massachusetts. The planning committee is excited to offer a day packed with a mix of practitioner-based social and scholarly events. Please join us and celebrate the community of teaching and singing we enjoy as NATS members!
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7:30-8:30 Registration
7:30-8:15 Chapter Leadership Breakfast and Social 8:15-8:30 Welcome 8:30-8:55 Irish Sean-nós Songs 5-Minute Break 9:00-9:50 Scaling Vocal Exercises 10-Minute Break 10:00-10:25 Trans Voices and Gender Affirming Art Songs 5-Minute Break 10:30-11:20 The Many Paths to a Career in Singing 10-Minute Break 11:30-11:55 Alexander for Voice Teachers 5-Minute Break 12:00-1:00 Lunch 1:00-2:20 Microphone Technique Workshop with David Scott 10-Minute Break 2:30-2:55 The Post 1960 Jazz Vocal Repertoire Project 5-Minute Break 3:00-3:50 The Craft of Audition Cuts 10-Minute Break 4:00-4:25 Teaching Vocal Technique to Visually Impaired Singers 5-Minute Break 4:30-5:20 Strategic Planning for Continued Studio Growth 10-Minute Break 5:30-6:20 Empowering Students with Voice Impairment in the Studio 10-Minute Break 6:20-6:30 Closing |
Presenters and Abstracts
Irish Sean-nós Songs
Bonnie Pomfret, soprano, has sung music from nine centuries in the United States, Europe, and Asia. Her CD of songs by American women includes a song cycle composed for her by Libby Larsen. Pomfret holds the DM in Voice from Indiana University; a MM in Voice from Boston Conservatory, where she also certified as a CMVT-MT; and a bachelor’s in Voice/Piano from the Musikhochschule Freiburg, Germany. She was a Rotary Fellow in Germany and Italy, and received an NEH fellowship to the Bayreuth Festival. Dr. Pomfret has taught at Boston University, Illinois State University, Emory University, and privately.
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Bonnie Pomfret
While the music popularized by groups like the Chieftains, Celtic Woman, and Riverdance may be familiar and accessible, there is a body of Irish folk song that is not well-known outside Ireland, called sean-nós (“old-style’). This music has survived for centuries in the voices and memories of the singers in the villages of the Gaeltacht, the Gaelic-speaking areas of Ireland. Although the words of these songs have been written down, the music has not.
To learn a sean-nós song, a singer must find a good recording and learn it by rote, since there are no written scores. It must be noted that since the several Gaelic-speaking areas of Ireland were historically isolated, they each had their own dialects and pronunciations of Gaelic, and similar differences exist in their musical interpretations. The music of sean-nós is florid; it has some text and improvisational variations which can differ in the various counties of the Gaeltacht. My research project is to publish ten sean-nós songs from Connemara, transcribing the notes and text, providing a translation and IPA rendering, and providing background information where possible.
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Scaling Vocal Exercises: Maximizing Student Learning Through Adaptive Pedagogy
Kayla GautereauxEffective vocal exercises must be adaptable to meet students where they are, fostering technical development without overwhelming or limiting them. This presentation will explore how scaling vocal exercises—adjusting pitch range, articulation, vowels and text, dynamics, registration, and rhythmic complexity—can optimize learning and engagement for singers across skill levels and genres.
Rooted in concepts from motor learning, cognitive load theory, voice science, and historical vocal pedagogy, this session will provide practical strategies for modifying vocal exercises to suit individual student needs while maintaining pedagogical integrity. We will examine how progressive overload, contextual variability, and adaptive feedback can be applied in voice teaching, ensuring exercises remain both accessible and effective. Through interactive demonstrations and audience participation, attendees will explore systematically scaling well-known and lesser-known vocal exercises through:
By the end of this session, attendees will have a flexible framework for scaling exercises in real time, empowering them to tailor their teaching approach and maximize student success. Handouts with adaptable exercise templates will be provided for immediate implementation. |
Kayla Gautereaux is a professor of voice and vocal pedagogy at Boston Conservatory at Berklee, where she teaches vocal pedagogy courses and mentors graduate students through original research presented at national and international conferences. She also teaches a voice studio of musical theater and classical singers. Her graduates hold faculty positions at institutions such as Oberlin Conservatory, Berklee College of Music, and Oklahoma City University. A dedicated NATS member, she has served on the Boston Chapter Board and national committees. She received the 2023 NATS Vocal Pedagogy Award and Berklee’s Faculty Development Grant for Inclusive Teaching.
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Trans Voices and Gender Affirming Art Songs
Ocean Robbins is an undergraduate Vocal Performance major at the Osher School of Music at the University of Southern Maine. His academic and performance interests include uncovering underrepresented composers’ works and transgender vocal pedagogy. For his junior recital Ocean performed only queer composers’ works and had the privilege of debuting a song by a contemporary trans composer. In 2024 he was awarded the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program fellowship. He presented his research on composing for trans voices at the Thinking Matters symposium in April of this year.
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Ocean RobbinsAs transgender people become more fully represented in the field of music, there has been an acknowledged lack of vocal music written for trans singers. Looking at the current state of art songs, there is a noted absence of 1) music written specifically to address the needs and challenges of trans singers, 2) music written with trans singers as the intended performers, and 3) contemporary music that is financially accessible to a wide audience. This project aimed to begin to rectify these issues. Using the most up-to-date research on transgender vocal pedagogy, this project authored a guide on compositional tools to write for trans voices. Using this guide, commissioned composers wrote art songs for trans performers. The composed songs were then recorded in multiple voice types to represent the vast scope of trans voices. All materials were uploaded to the project’s website to ensure public accessibility.
The purpose of the project is to provide a starting point for future contributions to the repertoire for trans voices. The intent is for the guide to expand and change as more research comes to light about the needs and experiences of trans singers. The project's ultimate goal is to create a standard practice of considering trans voices in the compositional process. |
The Many Paths to a Career in Singing
Dana Lynne Varga
Dr. Dana Lynne Varga has presented her lecture “The Many Paths to a Career in Singing” over fifty times across the country including for Opera America, Classical Singer, New England Conservatory, CCM, BU, Boston Singers Resource, the Longy School, Illinois Wesleyan and many more. One of the features of this lecture is challenging the Pipeline Prescription. This is a term Dana uses in her work as career coach and lecturer through The Empowered Musician to refer to the widespread teaching of the following path: attend undergraduate, go straight to graduate school, attend summer programs and/or young artist programs, do competitions, secure management and begin a professional operatic career.
This path is unsuccessful for the vast majority of singers, especially women. A far more inclusive, realistic and modern approach to career preparation is urgently needed and that must involve the input and support of the voice teacher. In this presentation, Dana will outline examples of the many paths to a career in singing. She will clearly emphasize the need for singers to be entrepreneurs with financial savvy, and detail how voice teachers can assist in ensuring their students know how to find resources and learn these crucial skills. She will address the crucial need to destigmatize correlating careers and understand that singers in 2025 must have additional income streams that complement their singing lifestyle if they are to survive and thrive. This presentation will empower voice teachers through a better understanding of the current career landscape of the classical vocal field and help them more confidently advise and support their students. |
A leading voice for change in the classical music industry, Dr. Dana Lynne Varga is a clinician, lecturer, and speaker. Dana brings extensive experience as an entrepreneur, artistic director, performer, voice teacher, lecturer, and writer to her life's work of empowering classical musicians. A fierce advocate for musicians and devoted to progressive change, Dana is on a mission to transform the long-held approach to a classical music career. She regularly writes, speaks and coaches musicians on creating a sustainable music career, how to build a financially stable future, entrepreneurship in classical music, and more.
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Alexander for Voice Teachers
Praised by the Boston Globe for her “pristine timbre and expressive face,” Ms. Matthews is a sought-after soprano and teacher in Boston. An accomplished solo and choral musician, she has appeared with Enigma Chamber Opera, Guerilla Opera, Skylark, Labyrinth Choir, Cappella Clausura, Quincy Choral Society, and Church of the Advent. She currently teaches voice at the Winsor School in Longwood and at Boston University, and was previously both Voice Faculty and Department Coordinator at Brookline Music School. Ms. Matthews received her B.M. in Voice Performance & B.A. in French from the University of North Texas, and her M.M. in Opera & Alexander Technique Certification from Boston Conservatory at Berklee. A passionate bodyworker, she also obtained her 200-hr RYT Yoga Certification and taught yoga for 8 years. She now pursues her D.M.A. at Boston University, in addition to maintaining a full performance and teaching schedule.
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Erin Matthews
It is widely accepted that we do our best teaching when we are calm, clear-headed, and are able to leave our own baggage outside the studio. When we do not find ourselves in this state by happenstance, what are practical strategies we can use to find centeredness, regulation, and put ourselves in our best mindset to teach? What if, throughout the course of a long day of teaching, we find ourselves gradually becoming more frenetic, less gathered, and less effective in our teaching? We will explore practical applications of vision work, activity work, and nervous system regulation to find a deeper and more embodied experience in our day to day activities as teachers. We will also discuss Alexander’s principles of inhibition and body awareness as they relate to these activities. The goal of this presentation will be to give both new and experienced teachers tools to rebalance and find calm in the middle of their lessons, and to be able to stay in the mindset in which they do their best teaching.
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Microphone Technique Workshop
David Scott
David Thorne Scott is a singer-songwriter and instrumentalist who performs in jazz, pop, and classical styles. He is also a composer, arranger, bandleader, and teacher. He often accompanies himself on piano and electric bass.
Cadence Magazine said, "He phrases like a saxophone player and is as slippery and hip as the young Mel Tormé," and Herb Wong wrote, "I haven’t been this moved by a performance of 'For All We Know' since Carmen McRae."
“At a time of great conflict in our country – when words often fail us – music has the power to bridge divides. David Thorne Scott explores the intersection of jazz and Americana, city and country, instrumentation and lyrics, to create lush compositions and covers that are unifying and healing in their beauty.”—Laurie Fanell
Cadence Magazine said, "He phrases like a saxophone player and is as slippery and hip as the young Mel Tormé," and Herb Wong wrote, "I haven’t been this moved by a performance of 'For All We Know' since Carmen McRae."
“At a time of great conflict in our country – when words often fail us – music has the power to bridge divides. David Thorne Scott explores the intersection of jazz and Americana, city and country, instrumentation and lyrics, to create lush compositions and covers that are unifying and healing in their beauty.”—Laurie Fanell
The Post 1960 Jazz Vocal Repertoire Project: Resources for Inspiration, Discovery and Practice
Lisa Thorson and Aditi Malhotra
Our session will introduce NATS members to the Post 1960 Jazz Repertoire Project. https://library.berklee.edu/post-1960-jazz-vocal-repertoire. This online interactive reference resource is a collection of Post 1960 songs with lyrics that broadly represent the evolving genre of jazz and improvisational music. It was created and curated by Berklee College of Music Voice Department Professor Emeritus, Lisa Thorson. The curated content builds upon the Great American Songbook and represents the growing repertoire in this genre that has been created in the last sixty five years. The interactive site includes recordings, lead sheets and biographical and historical information and additional resources about each of the collection’s compositions, composers, lyricists, arrangers and artists.
The Post 1960 Jazz Vocal Repertoire Project is being used as a model at Berklee for other similar databases to provide resources, content and other information to our college wide community as well as a global audience of interested musicians, teachers, students, scholars and music lovers. |
Lisa Thorson has performed at jazz clubs, on radio, on stage, in film and on television for over forty years. She has toured throughout the U.S., Canada and Italy as a concert artist and jazz vocal clinician and has released six jazz recordings as a leader. Her most recent, “Lisa Thorson Quartet Live’ received unanimous critical acclaim and international airplay. Lisa holds a BFA in Musical Theatre from the Boston Conservatory and a MM in Jazz Vocal Performance from New England Conservatory. She is Professor Emeritus in the Voice Department at Berklee College of Music where she received the Distinguished Faculty Award. The National Endowment for the Arts, Berklee and numerous public and private foundations have supported her creative performance and educational projects.
Aditi Malhotra is a vocalist, composer and educator from New Delhi, India. With an early background in Hindustani Classical Music, and later influences in Black American music music, she has performed at notable venues such as the NCPA Mumbai, Kennedy Center Washington DC, Panama Jazz Festival, and Festival da Jazz, Switzerland. She is a recipient of the 2021 and 2025 ASCAP Foundation Herb Alpert Young Jazz Composer Award. She received a full-tuition scholarship to study at Berklee College of Music and recently completed her Masters at the Berklee Global Jazz Institute. She teaches voice and ensembles at the Community Music Center of Boston and Brookline Music School.
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The Craft of Audition Cuts
Eva Conley Kendrick, a teaching artist, composer, arranger and vocalist in the Metro Boston area, is Director of the Eva Kendrick Voice Studio, Professor of Voice at Dean College, and Director of Music at FPUU Medfield. Her students have performed roles on Broadway, National Tours and regional theatre, and have received accolades including numerous NATS NSA Awards, and a Jimmy Award nomination. Eva offers instruction in voice, music theory, sight-singing and composition as well as audition prep for musical theatre productions, college auditions and summer intensives. She loves cultivating a nurturing, creative community in her private studio. www.evakendrick.com
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Eva Conley Kendrick
The Craft of Audition Cuts will take the audience through a comprehensive overview of how to create audition cuts for musical theatre and commercial music styles. We will explore how to showcase your singer’s vocal and acting strengths, how to tell a story in the time allotted, how to make smooth cuts, and how to mark your scores clearly for the collaborative pianist. We will also explore more in-depth topics, such as music theory considerations when your piece includes a key change, changing words/notes where needed, and software available to help you create a professional-looking cut.
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Teaching Vocal Technique to Visually Impaired Singers
Maria Georgakarakou
Music is often considered as a parent’s first priority when dreaming of his or her blind child’s future career. As a visually impaired person’s remaining senses are traditionally believed to be unusually sharp, singing, playing or composing appears to be the perfect choice for every youngster who happens to have a visual impairment.
In the capacity of voice instructor at the Lighthouse for the Blind of Greece, I have taught many blind students who had perfect pitch, an unbeatable ear and a very sweet voice. One would think that such individuals would require a minimum of training before launching a wonderful career. My experience and research has shown that this is not entirely true. I have found that most blind singers, especially those who have never had any useful vision, need to work on an extra set of exercises that run parallel to the curriculum used in the voice-departments of most conservatories and universities around the world. I will now attempt to describe the teaching method I have devised. This method caters to the unique needs of singers who are visually impaired. Focusing on inclusion, my curriculum aims at helping visually impaired voice-students get ready for an outstanding career path. |
Born in Athens, Greece in 1968. 1991 BA in Linguistics, National & Kapodistrian University of Athens. 2001 MA of Music, Early Music Vocal Performance, The Longy School of Music, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2015 PhD in Historical Musicology, Boston University, 2023 (ongoing) Post-doctoral Research Fellowship, University of Macedonia, Thessaloniki, Greece.
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Strategic Planning for Continued Studio Growth
Tim Anderson is a bell choir, piano, and voice coach specializing in education and support for non-traditional learners. He holds a Masters Degree in Education in Instructional Design from the American College of Education, a Certification as a Professional Coach from the institute of professional excellence in coaching, and a Bachelor's Degree in Music Composition from the University of Rhode Island. He has dedicated his musical career to students with alternative learning styles and older adults with memory loss.
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Tim Anderson
A thriving music studio requires consistent reflection and long-term planning. While books on studio management address basics like policies, contracts, and scheduling, they often miss strategies for sustained growth.
Strategic planning, widely used by corporations, is equally effective for solo studio teachers. By implementing this process, I doubled my student base within 12 months and increased my annual income from $15,000 to $40,000 in two years. In this session, I’ll share exercises, visualizations, and actionable planning techniques that helped me achieve lasting success. Together, we’ll focus on setting meaningful goals and turning them into reality. |
Empowering Students with Voice Impairment in the Studio
Emily SiarA significant percentage of singers will experience a voice health challenge over the course of their studies. As front-line voice professionals, voice teachers must be prepared to serve and support students experiencing voice impairment. This presentation defines and contextualizes voice impairment as a social justice issue, describing the myriad physical, emotional, and social challenges that singers navigating voice health challenges may face. Building on research from her doctoral dissertation, the presenter offers specific, actionable recommendations for voice teachers seeking to create safe and empowering studio environments for this population, including tips for working as part of a comprehensive voice care team, using affirming and de-stigmatizing language, educating students on voice hygiene, guiding students toward helpful resources, adapting technical exercises and repertoire to titrate vocal load, and creating institutional support within academic settings. The presentation concludes with a call to action, advocating for more research into the lived experiences and educational needs of students experiencing voice impairment.
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Emily Siar, D.M.A., is a national award-winning soprano, voice pedagogue, and researcher based in Cambridge, MA. Specializing in musical theater and classical voice, she serves as Assistant Professor of Voice and Vocal Pedagogy at the Boston Conservatory at Berklee. A versatile and dynamic performer, Emily has worked with renowned ensembles including the Grammy-winning Boston Early Music Festival, Boston Baroque, and the Henry Purcell Society of Boston. She is also a regular performer at Boston’s Club Café, blending art and activism through engaging cabaret performances. Emily’s research centers on understanding student experiences of voice impairment, with a mission to empower both students and pedagogues to navigate vocal health challenges collaboratively and constructively. Emily holds a DMA in Vocal Performance and Pedagogy from New England Conservatory, a Master of Music from the Eastman School of Music, and a Bachelor’s in Music and Women’s Studies from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she was a Kenan Music Scholar.
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