In Conversation with Justin Petersen: Part 2

The initial conversation with my historically-minded colleague Justin Petersen took place over Zoom; however, it somehow didn’t get recorded—a pity since we found ourselves swimming deep into historical vocal pedagogy. But Justin, being the generous man that he is, offered to continue our conversation, so we dove in again.

Transformation

DS: It’s that whole idea of how singing is transformative.

JP: Yes—it’s funny—I’ve found that with my female students: when they are allowed to be loud—when they have permission to be loud, they become more vocal—literally. It’s as though you’ve unlocked something that’s been repressed. And suddenly they are like ‘Wow, I can talk!’ It’s fascinating. It’s almost as if the personality changes. There’s a great book on my shelf called The Voice of Neurosis. It’s written by a psychologist, and is all about how the mental state of a person manifests in their voice.

DS: This I believe.

JP: It’s really cool stuff.

DS: It’s very interesting to me because people thought Miss Harshaw was psychic: what she was was an observer of human nature and constantly listening to the voice. She would tell you things about yourself, and even name the instrument you played—because she heard it in the voice.

JP: That’s amazing. I love that kind of insight. That’s a master’s insight.

DS: She was the only person I studied with who noticed that I was breathing into the right side of my chest more than the left. She told me it impacted everything and I had to fix it.

JP: Oh wow.

DS: She would go right after the ‘thing’—whatever it was.

JP: Any idea why you did that?

Patterns

DS: Possibly this whole mixed-dominant, left-eyed, left-handed thing. I may have inadvertently chosen to be left-handed which caused the left side of my body to contract, resulting in more breathing in the right side of my chest.

You know it’s interesting: I was a premature kid, and when I went to the Listening Centre in Toronto, they asked me if I tied my shoes tightly—and I did. Premature kids do this. They are trying to feel safe—to feel that being-held-ness that they’ve missed in the womb—to complete their journey.

JP: That’s fascinating. My closest experience to what you are describing is when I was in graduate school. I was working with a teacher, and I had this habit of turning my head in one direction—off to the left. And he (my teacher) made a joke in the lesson. He said: ‘What are you doing? It looks like you are singing to your mother.’

DS: Ah!

JP: He was just being silly, and I took that in and realized that is exactly what I was doing! When I started singing as a little boy in church, my mother sat in the back ‘right’ of the church; so I would make eye contact with her. When I could see her, my stage-fright would be alleviated, and I could sing. I would always look for her to be in that spot, and in my muscle memory of singing, that was a part of how I sang—and I didn’t even know this. And when he said this, I said ‘You have hit something really deep here’. My mother passed away when I was 20, so I was like whoa! That I would still be looking for her when I sang was profound. And really: he just made a joke. It didn’t occur to him.

Memory

JP: That someone can be in your physical memory: that’s incredible. There’s a book called The Body Keeps the Score. Have you heard of it?

DS: No.

JP: It’s about people who’ve dealt with trauma—physical trauma—and the body records it as a physical memory. That a memory of someone can be in your body? That’s incredible.

DS: That reminds me of a book that Paul Madaule is in. Each chapter is about a different healing modality. One of them is touch: Feldenkrais. Feldenkrais was able to get people to move again just from touch.

JP: What was the name of the book?

DS: The Brain’s Way of Healing: Remarkable Discoveries from the Frontiers of Neuroplasticity.

Toolbox

DS: Going back to Function and Aesthetics: do you have a toolbox that you use?

JP: Oh, that’s a good question. I’m always listening to what the (vocal) folds are doing—especially throughout the scale—as far as evenness of the sound. The quality of the vowel.

Most singers that start—beginners—have predicable vocal issues. Sometimes I hear it in the speaking voice. And sometimes I’m surprised that the speaking voice doesn’t match the singing voice. As far as tools go: it’s always changing for me.

Let me contextualize this. When I started reading a lot about the singing voice, not only the medical side of things, but also the older pedagogical texts, I started to accumulate a body of knowledge—what things had been missed in my own training. I had a teacher who started every lesson for every student in the same way with the same exercises; and I told myself that when I started teaching I would do it differently. The exercises were something to be gotten through.

It’s such a personal thing with a student. What exercises do they need? What would be great medicine for them? I want to be much more observational and interactive.