Let’s Get Vocal in the Drama Classroom

Episode 129: Let’s Get Vocal! How do you incorporate vocal technique into the drama classroom? How do you succeed with choral work? We’ve got two teachers talking about the voice today. Elisabeth Oppelt wants you not only to teach your students how to use your voice, but also how to take care of your own voice. Keith White gives some great tips for getting the most out of students and choral work. Show Notes * Stupid Is Just 4 2day * Drama Teacher Academy Episode Transcript Welcome to TFP – The Theatrefolk Podcast – the place to be for Drama teachers, Drama students, and theatre educators everywhere. I’m Lindsay Price, resident playwright for Theatrefolk. Hello! I hope you're well. Thanks for listening. Welcome to Episode 129. You can find any links for this episode in the show notes at theatrefolk.com/episode129. Okay. We’re talking voice! You know, I think about these things about half a second before I’m about to do them. And then, sometimes, I get in the middle of them and I’m like, “No, you shouldn’t have made that choice!” Anyway, we’re talking voice today, specifically a couple of different avenues. We’re going to be talking to two teachers today. We’re talking about incorporating vocal technique into the drama classroom and then succeeding with choral work. So, Elisabeth Oppelt wants you not only to teach your students how to use their voice – she’s adamant about that and I love that – she also wants you, the drama teacher, she wants you to take care of your voice and to make sure that you’re not stretching and straining in the same way that we don’t want our students to. That’s Elisabeth. And then, I’m going to talk to teacher Keith White. He is in Florida right now – although, when I talked to him, I learned that he actually grew up almost metaphorically from where I am right now which is always cool – small world. He did one of my plays, Stupid is Just 4 2day, which has a lot of choral vocal choral work in it and he’s got some great tips for getting the most out of your students when you’re doing choral work. But, first, let’s talk to Elisabeth. LINDSAY: All right. I am talking to Lis Oppelt. Hello, Lis! ELISABETH: Hi! LINDSAY: Hi! How are you doing today? ELISABETH: I’m doing all right. LINDSAY: You’re doing all right. Tell everybody where you are in the world. ELISABETH: I am in Yuma, Arizona, which is about as far south as you can get before you cross into Mexico. LINDSAY: Oh, okay. Well, that’s very far from us. So, we’re going to talk about voice and voice in getting your students to use their voices properly, using voice in the drama classroom. But, before we do that, let’s just hear a little bit about you. You are a drama teacher. ELISABETH: I am. LINDSAY: How long have you been one? ELISABETH: This is my second year teaching full-time drama. LINDSAY: What made you decide to take that on? ELISABETH: I didn’t intend to. I was going to be a lawyer and then I was going to be a history teacher but I got the theatre bug in high school and I thought I could let it go and I couldn’t. I’m not much of an actor but I love to direct and I love to stage manage. And so, teaching gave me the chance to do all of those things and then I started working with teenagers and figured out I liked it. And so, it worked out well for me. LINDSAY: Which is very funny because, sometimes,