Karen Tillotson Bauer has spent more than thirty years teaching singing in the voice studio, in pedagogy classes, and in choral settings for undergraduate and graduate students. She has taught numerous master classes in the United States and abroad, most recently at the University of London, England. She has taught voice and staged opera for the Opera Festival di Roma, Italy, as well as at North Park University in Chicago, where she is director of the Master of Music in Vocal Performance. Bauer’s passion for teaching professionally bound singers and training future voice teachers has led to this unique three-step approach to singing.
Learning how to sing beautifully and effectively is greatly
facilitated by a volume such as this. Experienced teachers. . .
will discover innovative ways to teach students how to sing. The
Essentials of Beautiful Singing is an excellent guide to the
kinesthetic exploration of the vocal art.
*Journal of Singing*
This is a how-to manual in the truest sense. Bauer, an experienced
voice teacher, eschews the technical information and jargon
currently found in most vocal pedagogy books and concentrates
instead on the physical experience of singing. Her kinesthetic
approach espouses a mind-body coordination supported by sound
technical principles imparted and recalled by simple language
prompts. The explanations provided for each of the three steps of
her method are uncomplicated and adaptable to a wide variety of
teaching styles. Though she cultivates simplicity in style and
terminology, the author reveals a keen understanding of the vocal
mechanism and also familiarity with modern advances in vocal
science and pedagogy. . . . [W]hen Bauer addresses musical skills:
her overly detailed analysis of musical/textual syntax and legato
risks inhibiting a student's natural musical inclinations.
Experienced singers and novices should still find the vast majority
of the book enlightening and refreshing in its ease of use and
practicality. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers.
*CHOICE*
The Essentials of Beautiful Singing is written in a direct, clear
manner. The reading level is appropriate for college students as
well as many younger teenagers. The terminology used in the book is
in line with modern voice research, with Bauer thoughtfully
explaining her reasoning for the terms she uses. The book provides
a[n] . . . understandable introduction to the International
Phonetic Alphabet, and the vocal exercises can be directly applied
to both vocal and choral settings. [The book is] helpful for any
voice teacher and . . . useful as assigned reading for voice
students. . . .Its effective and targeted exercises, and clear
descriptions of how to correct common vocal faults make this a
handy companion to anyone who works with singers of all ages.
*International Choral Bulletin*
The Essentials of Beautiful Singing deserves a space on the shelf
of any serious voice teacher in training if for no other reason
than the promising ratio of brevity to effectiveness. By resisting
the urge to be comprehensive, Bauer’s book accomplishes something
that standard vocal pedagogy texts often do not: it allows the
reader to step into the mind of a teacher who is not only
interested in healthfully produced, repeatable results, but also
the most simple version of the dependable process that gives rise
to those results. In my experience, this—a process that allows them
to sing well when they leave the studio—is what students most
desire to take away from their voice lessons.
*VOICEPrints: Journal of The New York Singing Teachers'
Association*
Bauer's book is a welcome one if only because there is a death of
texts which focus on singing from a kinesthetic perspective. Look
through most publisher's catalogues and what will you find?
Multiple treatises which promote the teaching of singing from a
'declarative' standpoint, that is, by acquiring stacks of facts
regarding anatomy, physiology and acoustics. Great stuff to be
sure, but anyone who knows anything about learning theory knows
that this is not the way one learns to sing—which Bauer makes clear
in her introduction….Knowing the facts regarding anatomy,
physiology and acoustics may be essential for the voice teacher and
scientist, but this knowledge does not help the student learn to
sing any more than knowing how a car engine is built teaches one to
drive. It is for this reason alone that Bauer's approach of
'cultivated simplicity' should be welcomed by
information-overloaded students and teachers of
singing….Well-written and easily comprehended, The Essentials of
Beautiful Singing: A Three-Step Kinesthetic Approach needs to be in
your library.
*VoiceTalk*
Bauer’s helpful approach is not merely one teacher’s bag of tricks
or collection of sometimes useful images. Rather, it applies the
functional understanding gleaned from voice science to the voice
studio in a manner that accentuates practical, reliable, and
repeatable techniques. The valuable philosophies found within The
Essential of Beautiful Singing deserve to be widely shared and
enthusiastically practiced among singers and voice teachers alike.
Reviewed by Brian Manternach.
*Classical Singer Magazine*
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