Mary-Jane de Havas Singing, Speaking and Performance Teacher
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Real over Right vocal coaching – Authentic Voice and Performance Freedom through the Primal Bridge Method In May 2012 I created VOICERCISE. BVA Voice and Neck.
I love helping people to get the best from their voices in singing or speaking. My college training was at The Guildhall School of Music and Drama and The Royal Academy of Music. I have also attended multi disciplinary voice conferences since the late 1980's to get my voice questions answered that the usual training simply didn't cover. I have been a vocal coach for over thirty years including at
The School of The Science of Acting, as a part time lecturer for the Faculty of Arts Brunel University, and at The City of London School for Girls. As well as one-to-one lessons, I lead Workshops for singers, choirs and professional voice users such as school teachers, and led a Singing for Health and Pleasure class in my local community. More recently, I led voice workshops for the teachers at Chater Infant School, The Aeolian Singers and at Braziers Park Oxfordshire. I will be the teacher on an online voice coaching event on 6th June, and my brand new group online class starts in September 2023. It includes individual coaching in a group setting and people often experience new abilities in just one session. I am a member of the British Voice Association BVA and in 2018 I was invited by Mary Hammond to lead a short practical session on Lax Vox at the Royal Academy of Music's BVA Rock and Pop seminar. I am also a member of the ISM (Incorporated Society of Musicians) and was a member of the Association of Teachers of Singing for many years until 2023, and Equity from 1989 to 2017. I am also a member of the HCA, Hearing Conservation Association. I work with all ages and abilities and have an enhanced DBS. In 2012 I was an honorary observer at The Luton and Dunstable Hospital ENT Voice Clinic. As a Mezzo-soprano I have sung in France, and five cities in Japan with the Ambrosian Opera Chorus including with Maria Ewing as Carmen and José Carreras as Don José. I toured Britain and Northern Ireland, singing Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus for the D’Oyly Carte Opera and chorus. Other roles I have sung include Carmen in Bizet’s Carmen, Elvira in Don Giovanni, Marcelina in The Marriage of Figaro, Dido in Dido and Aeneas, Santuzza in Cavalleria Rusticana, the Mother in Hansel and Gretal, Azucena in Il Trovatore for Brent Opera, Opera London and Windsor and Eton Opera, Orlovsky in Die Fledermaus, the title role in Rossini’s La Cenerentola, Ulrica in Verdi’s Ballo in Maschera, Maddalena in Rigoletto and Martha in Gounod’s Faust. I sang Marcellina and Don Basilio in the Marriage of Figaro with Olivier award winning company OperaUpClose from September 2014 and toured the UK in 2015 with The Marriage of Figaro. Multidisciplinary voice conferences attended(CPD)
2023
The Brain, Music, and Optimal Performance with Dr Karen Leigh-Post
2022
Warming Up and Cooling Down Impact on Function with Dr. Kari Ragan
Effects of aging on the voice, and vocal exercises to promote ability to sing into the senior years with Professor Karen Brunssen
The Necessity Of Trauma-Informed Voice Practices:
Impact, Research, Scope
With Dr Elisa Monti
2021
Designing and Customising Vocal Exercises for Singing Voice Rehabilitation
With Leda Scearce MM, MS, CCC-SLP. The Nature Of Empathy And Its Relevance For Voice Work, Joanna Cazden
My singer has a voice problem. VocalProcess CPD course
Dann Mitton Low Male Voices Development, Technique,and Repertoire
Vocal Process hosted Carrie Garrett certMRCSLT, ASLTIP, HPCP, Vocal Rehabilitation Coach on the role of the singing teacher versus speech and Language therapist (SLT). Singing for Health and Trauma, with Emily Foulkes exploring Neuroscience research, the Principles and Practicalities.
2020
British Voice Association (BVA) - Training the Vocal athlete. British Laryngological Association (BLA ) - Laryngeal Sequelae of COVID19
BVA, Neuroscience for working with Voice, Dr Boris Kleber, Neurophysiology and MRI imaging,
Sing for Parkinson’s, N. Wydenbach,
Dr Michel Belyk, Evolutionary Neuroscience of Voice Motor Control. Dr Maryna Kryshtopava, Muscle Tension Dysphonia. Charlotte Davies, Sound processing. Heidi Moss, training the tonally compromised. Kate Sheppeard, Emotion for Training Singers. Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists, COVID-19 Rehabilitation. Dr David Joncos and Teresa Shaw, Music Performance Anxiety (MPA) with (ACC) Acceptance Commitment Coaching derived from (ACT), Acceptance Commitment Therapy. Alex Ashworth, The Royal Academy of Music on Intention in Singing. Singing for Health conference. Emily Foulkes BA hons, PGcert, ITEC Dip, Trauma and Mental Health Practitioner Dip., impacts of trauma on young people, how that relates to voice and how the voice and singing may support positive mental health and well-being. Singing for Lung Health with Phoene Cave BA Mus Hons, PGDip MT, MA an HCPC, music therapist. Free Voice work, Christina Shewell MA, FRCSLT, ADVS. Dr Gillyanne Kayes and Jeremy Fisher Vocal Process Ltd, Best Practice Update. BVA Inner Jazz with Pete Churchill.
2019
BVA Hormones and the Voice. In 2018
The British Laryngological Association, Perceptual Analysis – Current Theory & Practice. BVA Laryngeal science into practice. In 2017
BVA,Christina Shewell MA, FRCSLT, ADVS. Imperial College London: Therapy for Voice Disorders. BVA Voice Clinics Forum, St Thomas’ Hospital. Estill for singing teachers. Estill Workshop with Estill CMT. In 2016
BVA Assessment, Diagnosis and Remediation. BVA Burnout and The voice in distress, Emotional Repair. The Estill Papers with Anne-Marie Speed. Many more attended from late 1980's to 2016
Before music college
I toured Spain at age sixteen, singing my own composition for voice and string orchestra, also playing cello on the tour.
13/07/2026
10/07/2026
Many people practise to get things right, so that they can reproduce that right thing in performance. Unknowingly they have practiced themselves into a Cage, and the moment something unexpected happens in your presentation, The Cage you prepared for yourself starts to shrink! (Performance Anxiety Syndrome).
After a Voice Print Assessment, I teach people to get things Real over Right, so that they can be completely free and responsive to whatever is.
Authentic Voice and Performance Freedom through the Primal Bridge Method.
