Diana R. Spradling

Diana Spradling has successfully combined teaching and research by bringing music and science into partnership in her book, Jazz Singing: Developing Artistry and Authenticity. In the fall of 2003, after more than three decades of teaching voice and vocal ensembles, she founded the Applied Studio Technology Laboratory at Western Michigan University and has spent the past four years acoustically studying the voices of jazz and classical singers. Every jazz vocalist at Western spends time in the lab developing a vocal profile with the help of a software program called VoceVista, designed at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. This digital imagery resource investigates and analyzes sounds and degrees of technical facility of the singer in live and recorded situations. The information is recorded on real time spectrograms and indicates vowel definition, vibrato rate, degrees and consistency of legato, clarity of onsets and releases and resonance in the voice to name a few.

Sharon Stohrer

Soprano Sharon L. Stohrer specializes in helping musicians overcome performance anxiety through individual coaching and group workshops. A member of the voice faculties at Capital University and Kenyon College, she also maintains a private studio where she welcomes beginners as well as singers of intermediate and advanced technique.

Bob Stoloff

Associate Professor Bob Stoloff is currently the Assistant Chair of the Voice Department at Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. Bob is a distinguished guest conductor, clinician and choir/big band adjudicator of jazz festivals throughout the United States and Canada. His unique and comprehensive workshops include traditional scat singing, spontaneous group improvisation and rhythm section grooves.

"Scat singing is an experience that frees the soul. It's more about a spiritual release than about the style. People need an outlet to let go, and in my classes I provide a safe environment to do that. Afterwards, students often come up and tell me, 'I can't believe how free I feel.'

Karen Surmani

Karen Farnum Surmani taught elementary music for several years in the Los Angeles Unified School District. She had a very successful program as an itinerant vocal and general elementary music teacher at LAUSD, teaching pre-kindergarten through 6th grade classes at multiple schools. Karen has extensive training in early childhood music teaching and has also taught middle school and at the University of Southern California. An accomplished classical vocalist, Karen has performed in venues around the world and continues to sing professionally.

Jo Thompson

Jo Thompson is one of England's leading singing coaches with over 20 years experience in the business. After studying music she worked as a professional singer for many years. When she understood how bad teaching can damage a voice, she decided to study the technique in great detail and pass on her knowledge of good practice to others. For over two years Jo wrote articles on vocals for Guitarist magazine and she is also the author of The Complete Singer (IMP/Warner Chappell 1997) - a singing tutor book. Jo has worked extensively in TV, film and the music business. Her credits as a singing coach include Little Voice and Popstars the Rivals. She has made her name not only working with solo artists such as Craig David, Jane Horrocks and Sophie Ellis Bextor, but also many well known groups including Steps, Liberty X, Five and Triple Eight. Jo 's work includes the development of young artists. Jo Thompson lives in London with her husband and two children.

Nicola Vaccai

Nicola Vaccai was born in Tolentino, in 1790, into a family of doctors. Studying harmony, counterpoint and composition in Rome and Naples, Vaccai launched his career in Venice, initially earning his living by writing ballets and teaching voice. In 1832 he wrote 'Metodo Practico' (practical method) which in part is a codification of some of the period's vocal practices- which remains a standard work to this day.

In 1838 he became the censore of the Milan conservatory, reorganizing the study of singing, inaugurating performances of student operas and starting a choir. He composed 17 operas, five cantatas, four ballets, more than one hundred songs and vocal chamber pieces, instrumental and sacred music. Pesaro, He died in Pesaro, Italy on August 5, 1848.

Ariella Vaccarino

Opera singer, Cantorial Soloist, and actress, Ariella is passionately pursuing a career in both opera and stage. She has premiered the role of Miranda in L.A. Opera's Journey to Cordoba and Maricella in Opera Pacific's Camino de Fey. Singing in the Czech Republic Ariella performed in the Verdi centennial celebrations. There she sang Gilda from Verdi's Rigoletto with the Zlin Philharmonic, and Violetta from La Traviatta with the Karlovy Vary Symphony orchestra.

She Sings Out, Inc. is a corporation created by Ariella Vaccarino. More than a performer Ariella is an entrepreneur and teacher who is focused on making products that help bring music and independence into people's lives at affordable prices.

Ariella Vaccarino has been teaching Voice and Piano for over 15 years in the Los Angeles area. She is an accomplished Opera singer, having studied voice at USC. Ariella has also performed on many movie sound tracks.

Jaime Vendera

World-renowned voice strengthening vocal coach Jaime Vendera is most famously known as the first documented singer in world history to shatter a wineglass by the power of his voice alone. He has been seen on several nationally televised shows demonstrating the power of his "glass shattering" voice, of which a few include "Good Morning America" and The Discovery Channel show, "MythBusters", as well as internationally in Europe and Japan. He has been featured in magazines, test books and on radio shows world-wide.

Jaime isn't considered a typical voice teacher; He's known as the "voice strengthening specialist" by professional singers and record companies alike. Singers who seek Jaime's services all desire to obtain similar vocal goals including: more stamina for long sets and night after night of shows, range increase, added power, more projection, tips and tricks to eliminate vocal strain or vocal loss, ways to improve vocal quality and tone and secrets to keep the voice in shape day after day.

Gary Walth

Gary Kent Walth, D.M.A., is in his 18th year at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. As the Director of Choral Music Studies he conducts the Concert Choir, the Vocal Jazz Ensemble and the University's male chorus Mannerchor. He also teaches courses in Choral Music Education and supervises student teachers.

After receiving a bachelor of music degree from Concordia College, Moorhead, Minnesota, Walth taught and conducted choral music in high schools in North Dakota and Colorado. Walth earned both a masters and doctorate in Choral Conducting from the Conservatory of Music at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. His first collegiate choral conducting position was at Minot State University (ND), where he served for eight years. An accomplished composer, Walth's compositions have most recently been featured at regional and national ACDA conventions and are published internationally. Several of his compositions are published by Hal Leonard, Inc. and Lorenz, Inc. His "Japanese Proverbs" was named as the WCDA composition of the year in 2000. An active guest choral conductor and clinician, Walth served as the director of music at English Lutheran Church, La Crosse for 16 years.

Roma Waterman

Roma's speciality is helping singers who have vocal trouble, including vocal fatigue and nodules. Her passion is teaching healthy singing techniques and performance skills. She also offers private songwriting lessons. She has not only worked as a professional performer herself, but as a vocal coach to many well known performers and actors, and those wishing to brush up their skills for auditions. She is passionate about keeping artists grounded and confident in their skills, regardless of what life throws at them. Please note that Roma is currently booked out for months in advance and may not be available to provide private lessons.

Michele Weir

Michele is currently a faculty member at U.C.L.A. and previously taught at U.S.C., C.S.U. Long Beach and the Phil Mattson School. In demand internationally as a jazz clinician/adjudicator, recent notable presentations include the World Choral Symposium in the Netherlands, the National A.C.D.A Conference and the I.A.J.E Convention. Michele has served as co-chair of vocal jazz for I.A.J.E., as an ARTS panelist for the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts and as co-conductor of the World Youth Choir.

Sam West

Sam West is well known and respected within the UK music scene - especially for his work as a vocal trainer to contemporary singers. Sam works with many singers, and over the years has trained a wide range of artists. His vocal work is varied and involves coaching: individuals, groups, classes (adults, youths and also primary school), church worship groups and choirs.

Carolyn Wilkins

Vocalist and jazz pianist Carolyn Wilkins has been an active participant in the Boston music scene for over 20 years as a performer, educator and composer. A graduate of Oberlin Conservatory and the Eastman School of Music, Carolyn is currently an Associate Professor at Berklee College. In 1989, Ms Wilkins developed a 45 minute "concert-lecture" designed to introduce an audience aged 2 to 92 to some of jazz's greatest composers, their music and the times they lived in. For the past ten years, she has given concert-lectures on "What Is This Thing Called Jazz - a History from New Orleans to Coltrane", "Black Women in Jazz" and "The Roots of Jazz - African Music, Spirituals and the Blues" for enthusiastic audiences in libraries, schools and colleges.

Deborah Winters

A lifelong resident of the San Francisco Bay Area, Deborah Winters' childhood was immersed in music and dance. Heavily influenced by her father, who pursued the drums as a young man, and by her mother, who was a professional ballet dancer for the Oakland Metropolitan Ballet Company, Deborah developed a passion for music, dance and the theatre at a very early age. Big Band sounds rang through the household where Deborah and her father listened to the likes of Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, Stan Kenton and Woody Herman, to name a few.

Deborah Winters' perpetual search for new ways to express her highly captivating and emotionally riveting music are always front and center in her evolution as a singer, guitarist and songwriter. Her legions of fans are in for a treat as her quest continues.

Daniel Zangger-Borch

Daniel Zangger Borch (PhD of Music Performance), Voice Centre, Stockholm, Sweden, is the first singing voice specialist to scientifically study the functioning of the rock, pop and soul voice. He pioneered in subjects such as vocal distortion.

Daniel is a professional singer and contributes his vocal talents to CD's, TV and concert performances and is regularly hired as a guest speaker by singers and teaching institutions all over Europe. Daniel's methods are built on solid knowledge of what is known about the voice through physiology, anatomy and research and still totally true to the vocal ideals of a rock-, pop- and soul singer. Voice Centre is regularly consulted by the artist elite in Sweden. Including; record companies, production companies and a variety of education programmes around Europe, such as The Royal College of Music in Stockholm, Sweden.