Winter 2000 p. 3

VASTA INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE 2000

CELEBRATING DIFFERENCE:

THE PERFORMING VOICE FROM AROUND THE WORLD

August 6-8, 2000
George Mason University

by Barbara Acker
Conference Planner 2000
Arizona State University

The VASTA Board is launching (embracing) a new century with a new concept in conferences. This is our first international conference, featuring vocal artists from around the world. The Board honors tradition, keeping “Things that Work” and the state of the profession, but the Board is also breaking new ground with open-mike sessions at night. This year we are even looking into the possibility of teleconferencing a session.

You can sample an amazing variety of vocal performance styles, from Mongolian throat singing to acting a passage from Beijing Opera. You can perform a speech from a Balinese drama, learn how to collect and notate a dialect, enjoy different movement/ voice warm ups, listen to Michael Kahn on the state of theatre and the place of the voice coach, and learn something about the health of the voice from a panel headed by Dr. Robert Sataloff of the Voice Foundation. Frankie Armstrong and Darien Prichard will introduce innovative mprovisation, based on a study of traditional folk songs and the profound emotional response they trigger.

The list of artists is impressive. Xin Zhang, trained in Beijing’s Central Academy of Drama, and performed for years at the People’s Art Theatre, the premier Beijing Opera Theatre. Zhang, now living in the US, earned an MFA in theatre and has performed with Lee Breuer, most recently in his play An Epidog in NYC. Xin Zhang will give us “A Taste of Beijing Opera.” She will introduce exercises for the lips, tongue, mouth, and DanTian (centering), and teach a speech “My Name is Mi Heng” and a short song with gestures of a Beijing Opera character.

Tran Quang Hai, the fifth generation of a musical Vietnamese family, studied music in Siagon and Paris and learned to play 15 musical instruments. A distinguished and celebrated musician and scholar of ethnic music, he has given over 2,500 concerts in fifty countries. He is now with the Department of Ethnomusicology of the Musee de l’Homme in Paris. Based on his study of Mongolian and Tuva overtone singing, or double toning, he has developed a simple and clear way of teaching the double tone. In two sessions he will teach how to produce two tones simultaneously: a base tone with its harmonics and a high pitched flute-like tone. This technique stretches and develops vocal range.

Joseph and Rebecca Carli-Mills are movement and dance teachers living in the D.C. area with expertise in Laban and rolfing. Rolfing is no longer a rigidly structured series of 10 sessions. In the hands of today’s practitioners, rolfing gently unlocks constricted muscles, restoring lost movement potential.

Frankie Armstrong and Darien Prichard, in the first session of their “Moving Body,
Moving Voice” will introduce ritual song and movement patterns. In the second session they will develop the body-voice-impulse-rhythm relationships. These connections lead to collective chanting, improvisation, exploring facets of melody and harmony, and, in their words, “playing across the cusp between body and voice.”

Meribeth Bunch will offer “Presence in Performance,” insights and techniques to
create a “home” on stage, to engage imagination and play in performance, and to deal with the self-critic. Meribeth Bunch is chief executive of the London-based Communication Arts and Associates. She was a singer, who became intrigued by voice science and went on to earn a Ph.D in the area. She teaches and coaches theatre and film actors, singers, and business people. She has published books on voice and communication skills including Dynamics of the Singing Voice, an internationally recognized textbook on anatomy and physiology of the voice, Creating Confidence, A Handbook of the Singing Voice, Speak with Confidence, and a set of audio tapes, Succeed at Work and Play.

Nyoman Catra and Desak Made will present “Balinese Vocal Styles: Spoken and Sung.” They are respected masters of sacred and secular styles of performance in their native Bali. They will lead workshops in dance drama.

We are arranging with Paul Meier and some of his associates to present a session on the IDEA dialect project and a how-to session of collecting dialects. Michael Kahn, Director of the Juilliard School Drama Division and Artistic Director of the Shakespeare Theatre in Washington D.C. will speak. Dr. Robert Sataloff, editor-in-chief of the Journal of Voice and professor of otolaryngology at Thomas Jefferson University, will head a panel discussing some things that do and donÕt work in vocal training and care. He will be joined by Dr. Meribeth Bunch and Dr. Bonnie Raphael, head of the theatre voice program at the University of North Carolina, formerly head of voice at the American Repertory Theatre, and noted author and lecturer.

The conference will be held at George Mason University, August 6-8, 2000. Housing will be available in the George Mason University dorms. A single will cost approximately $37 and a double will cost approximately $27. These fees are per person, per night, plus a $25 dollar facility fee. Parking permits and use of the pool and gym facilities are separate fees. Cafeteria style meals on campus cost around $20 a day. There is a food court and restaurants near by. George Mason University is located near Washington, D.C. There is ground transportation from Dulles and National airports to the campus. Questions? Contact Barbara Acker: work phone (480) 965-5351; Fax (480) 965-5351; email: Barbara.Acker@asu.edu

FYI: Washington DC has several zip codes and three airports that serve the city [the zip code at George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia is 22030-4444]. The airports are: Reagan National (closest to DC, technically in Alexandria, VA, and metro accessible), Dulles International (actually in VirginiaÑmust take taxi, bus service, or hotel shuttle into the city). Baltimore Washington International is 1/2 way between Baltimore and DC; you must take taxi, hotel shuttle, or bus service into town [Baltimore Airport is about one and a half hours away from George Mason].

Submited by Elizabeth van den Berg, Western Maryland College

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