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Welcome to the 2010 FALL SEMESTER at
Performers Career Center and Wickham Vocal Studios

In This Issue:

• Did you Know? - New Website, Student News, BELLEVUE, Audtions, Fall Detox
• Top 7 Warm Ups that Don't Require a Piano
• Jose Restrepo on the Importance of Vocal Performance
• Opportunities in our Emerging Professional Showcases
• Social Media Marketing Tools for every Performer

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Did You Know?...

Performers Career Center has Officially Launched!
Wickham Vocal Studios is now part of Performers Career Center, along with PCC Productions in-house production company (producing Emerging Professional Showcases and the annual West Village Musical Theatre Festival!).  What does that mean?  More programs and opportunities for WVS and PCC students!  Click HERE to learn more and browse the PCC website, which is constantly being updated with new information.

We have a NEW WEBSITE
A new website for Performers Career Center is now live!  Please check back often as new updates are still being added.  You can access it at www.performerscareercenter.com, and at our old link at www.vocalstudios.com.

The BELLEVUE SKETCHES Original Cast Recording has been released!
You can buy the downloadable version on Amazon, or purchase a CD at the school.  If you are a cast member, be sure to stop by and pick up your FREE copy!

WVS Student Trevor Kuhn is up for MAD MEN!
Click HERE to vote for him!  Vote until September 17th to get him a spot on the show and SHARE this with your friends so we can all help Trevor get more votes.

Justin Lopez is starring in the NYMF Musical, THE TENTH FLOOR
This high energy musical follows 16-year-old Victor Alvarez, a prisoner of the Miami-Dade Correctional Facility’s juvenile division, as he delves into fantasy  to escape the harsh realities of prison and his home life.Click HERE for more information and to buy tickets to see him.

Julia Hirsch is in HOLLYWOOD! HOLLYWOOD! with the Hollywood Civic Light Opera 
A happy, fun-filled musical journey through the lives of five actors all striving to become paid actors in the Hollywood film industry.  Click HERE for more information and to buy tickets to see her perform.

WVS Creative Director, Patrick Michael Wickham, will direct EVITA in February
Mr. Wickham directs musicals annually with regional production company Moore On Stage in North Carolina and casts his talented PCC and WVS students and professional performers in lead roles!  Audition notices soon to come!  Check the website for information on last years' production of OKLAHOMA!

WVS is starting a student-wide FALL DETOX PROGRAM
If you are like us and spent more time eating barbeque and lying around in the sun than hitting the gym, then this program is for you. EMAIL US to get more information, join the group, and get recipes to help you shape up for Fall auditions.

(want to be included in this section?  Email katrina@vocalstudios.com)

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"Top 7 Warm-Ups That Don't Require A Piano"
Use these exercises to get you warmed up for an audition or performance, no accompanist required!
 

Click on each exercise to hear and try for yourself:

1.  Extended breathing: Clearly this is an obvious one, but nothing is more important to prepare your body for the singing process than to instill differentiated breathing habits that allow the larynx to release!  Click here for Breathing Exercise 1 and Breathing Exercise 2.

2.  Panting: Most of you will recognize these exercises from lessons, but they also work perfectly for audition and performance situations.  We start with panting because it helps increase the body's metabolism and energy levels while optimizing flexibility and coordination of the pelvic diaphragm and pulmonary muscles.  Click here for the Panting Exercise.

3.  Downward Humming: It is a misconception in singing that warming the voice up (literally, as in singing high frequencies) is the best way to prepare for high notes.  The vocal folds' accuracy and efficiency are determined not only by how clear a signal they are getting from the brain, but indeed by how little they have to work.  Swelling is one of the major culprits for inability to "hit the high notes" because the body is forced to tense muscles near the larynx to "help out" (thus that "choking" you feel when the high notes aren't happening).  When we warm "down," we stretch out the primary muscles involved in range extension and warm up the vocal folds while not wearing them out and inducing unnecessary tension.  Click here for the Humming Exercise.

4.  Vocal Fry: The "creaking door" sound you made as a child may be one of the more useful exercises for opening up the pharyngeal cavity and relaxing the larynx at the beginning of a warmup.  This exercise has the advantage of only sounding fuller and louder in amplitude the more open and efficient the execution is.  Click here for the Vocal Fry Exercise.

5.  Lip Trill: While helpful in easing pressure on the larynx when used in siren exercises, the primary purpose of the sustained lip trill exercise is to regulate airflow throughout the entire breath cycle.  You may notice how "out of breath" you are at the end of long phrases and (Murphy's Law) before high notes. Click here for the Lip Trill Exercise.

6.  "Monkey Exercise": Now that you've done panting, we're going to add a tight [u] ("oo") vowel and begin the process of warming up the folds and taking pressure off of the extrinsic laryngeal muscles.  This exercise involves repeated bursts of air through a largely passive larynx.  Click here for the Monkey Exercise.

7.  "Tongue Stretch": Doubtless the tongue is the guiltiest culprit in the ongoing war against vocal tension.  Its inefficient neutral position only worsens while we sleep.  Stretching it out helps combat the natural tendency for laryngeal elevation and the aid of extrinsic muscles in phonation. Click here for the Tongue Stretch.

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Career Corner: Jose Restrepo from Broadway's Grease, on Vocal Performance

During last semester's WVS Professional Development Workshop, I sat down with Jose Restrepo to learn more about his professional career as well as his experience in the WVS Workshop on Vocal Performance.  What I found was a performer who, though he has enjoyed his share of successes, has also experienced setbacks, but throughout it all, has learned to turn any challenge into a true opportunity for growth.

Mr. Restrepo's story began as many actor’s stories do - with a stroke of inspiration that comes early in life.  He was unsure of what to do professionally until he was cast in his high school production of West Side Story.  During rehearsals one day, his mother pulled him aside and pointed out how much he was pushing himself, and it clicked.  "This is what I want to do," he says, remembering the moment he knew he wanted to be a performer. 

Straight out of high school, Mr. Restrepo auditioned for and was accepted into the American Academy of Dramatic Arts Professional Training Program in Los Angeles where he studied acting and theater. Once he graduated, he was invited to be part of the of the Academy's Company where he performed in styles ranging from classic to contemporary to avant garde. Mr. Restrepo would later be accepted on full scholarship to study dance at the EDGE Performing Arts Center in Hollywood, having no prior dance training or experience.  Grateful for the scholarship, Restrepo understood almost instinctively the importance of having a strong foundation of technique and began to train rigorously in dance so as to "never be at a musical theatre audition without being able to do a double pirouette."  Dance became an integral part of his performing and his life.  He also began voice training with different coaches and teachers, building his vocal technique, but always "acting through every song".

Restrepo was fortunate to work as an actor in Los Angeles while he continued to train and audition. His first National Tour was in Fame- the Musical as the class clown "Joe Vegas" and soon others followed including Saturday Night Fever.  He eventually landed in New York City and began doing many workshops of new musicals, which too often ended in disappointment.  Restrepo recalls when he was cast in the workshop of Good Vibrations, but was ultimately not cast in the Broadway run - an all too common occurrence in the world of Broadway theater.

Upon returning to NYC from working as a singer for Princess Cruises, he auditioned and was cast as Sonny LaTierrie in Grease on Broadway in 2008.  The show was a dream come true and Restrepo says it was "the best experience of his performing life."  Unfortunately, he seriously injured his back performing a lift with another cast member, but Restrepo kept performing every day in the show despite the injury.  The prolonged aggravation to his back, in addition to a torn meniscus, finally forced him to leave the run.  The show closed before Restrepo could rejoin. 

"I was very limited after the injury," Restrepo notes.  He could no longer dance as he once did, and that had become a big part of his identity as a performer.  Restrepo had been referred to Wickham Vocal Studios by his Grease cast-mate, Ryan Binder, and decided to check out the Professional Development Workshop to help rehabilitate and reinvest in himself.

Restrepo says that the Professional Development Workshop allowed him and others in the class to rediscover themselves as performers, noting that it was like "a good ballet class" - where students spend lots of time practicing simpler exercises on the barre before moving to the center to do more complicated routines.  "The class is more about marrying vocal work with performance and trusting that the technique will show up."  He says that the class allowed him to "let go" in performance, and to explore his abilities as a singer.  Restrepo went on to perform in numerous roles in the West Village Musical Theatre Festival, the performance requirement for graduates of the WVS PD Workshop, and also to host the Opening Gala of the festival at The Duplex. 

Restrepo will go on to do much more professional singing with WVS and in NYC, and it is because of his undying optimism as a performer.  His decision to participate in the Professional Development Workshop was about accepting where he is today instead of bemoaning what he lost from his injury in Grease.  Though he may go on to eventually teach a vocal performance workshop at WVS himself, Restrepo is proud to be a student - "[The class] is about getting a chance to incubate your talent, and to refocus on yourself.  To get your abilities white hot, and then go out into the world and audition with that fire burning.”

-Katrina Ylimaki, 4/13/10

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