#163: Caring for the Voice after COVID-19 (with Dr. Lynn Eustis)


Before we get to the meat of the episode today, I must mention that we will not have an episode of Ministry Monday for 2 weeks. I am headed to New Orleans for the 44th annual NPM convention, and I will be interviewing on-site. Look for me at the NPM booth! I’d love to interview you for an upcoming episode of ministry Monday.  

We’ll be back to your regularly scheduled programming on Monday, August 9. And now for the episode today.

It goes without saying that we, as pastoral musicians, have experienced a world of change in our ministries in the last year or so. The things that we never second-guessed, such as congregational singing, the incorporation of hymnals and choirs into our liturgies, became health risks. As we hopefully look towards a re-introduction of the elements that we so cherish in ministry, many of us are re-examining how we execute these elements. Now, we started this conversation 2 weeks ago when we spoke with Kelly Barth from Simply Liturgical Music. But today we shift the focus from technology to the physical, internal instrument so many of us value: the human voice.

As pastoral ministers, many of our cantors and choir members have not sung in over 15 months, at least not at the same level and frequency that they did pre-pandemic. How do we guide their voices with an even stronger sense of pastoral care?

SHOW NOTES

Bio: Dr. Lynn Eustis

Lynn Eustis, soprano, is currently Director of Graduate Studies in Music and Associate Professor of Voice at Boston University, where she joined the faculty in fall 2012.  From 1999-2012 she served on the voice faculty at the University of North Texas, where she was also Director of Graduate Studies in Music.  She holds the Doctor of Music degree in opera from Florida State University, a Master of Music degree in opera from the Curtis Institute of Music and a Bachelor of Music degree in vocal performance from Bucknell University, Phi Beta Kappa. 
 
She appears regularly as a soloist with numerous professional organizations which have included Chorus Pr​o Musica (Boston), Tulsa Oratorio Chorus, the Dallas Bach Society, and the Choral Society of Durham, NC, in works such as Gloria (Poulenc), Dona nobis pacem (Vaughan Williams), Mozart’s C Minor Mass, Carmina burana (Orff) and Knoxville: Summer of 1915 (Barber).  She has been heard internationally with the Americke Jaro Festival (Czech Republic), the Compania Lirica Nacional (Costa Rica), and the Guangzhou Symphony (China).  Dr. Eustis has sung over thirty operatic roles, most notably the title roles in Lucia di Lammermoor and The Daughter of the Regiment, Zerbinetta, OlympiaPamina, Susanna, Rosina, and Gilda. Recordings include Carmina burana (Klavier, 2003), featured soloist on Innisfree (GIA Publications, 2007) and Portraits: New Music for Soprano, Baritone and Piano (Capstone, 2007). In March 2010 she made her Carnegie Hall debut in Mozart’s Vesperae de Dominica.  With Westminster Williamson Voices she appeared as the title soloist in the U.S. premiere of James Whitbourn’s Annelies: The Anne Frank Oratorio, a work for which she continues to be in demand.
 
Dr. Eustis is the author of The Singer’s Ego: Finding Balance Between Music and Life,  Finding Middle Ground (two volumes of songs for teaching young voices), and The Teacher’s Ego: When Singers Become Voice Teachers, all published by GIA Publications in Chicago. She is a regular guest teacher at the Royal College of Music in London. Her students have been heard with Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute, the Salzburg Music Festival, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Opera Theater of St. Louis, Dallas Opera, Fort Worth Opera, Central City Opera, Des Moines Metro Opera, Ohio Light Opera, Opera North, the Beth Morrison Project, Concert Royal (NYC), Amor Artis (NYC), Chautauqua Opera, Toledo Opera, Brooklyn Lyric Opera, New Jersey Opera Theater, the Fall Island Vocal Arts Seminar, Music Academy of the West, the Vancouver Early Music Festival, and the Boston Early Music Festival.  She is a regular guest clinician at the Royal College of Music in London.
 
Dr. Eustis is a native of Long Island, New York.

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To learn more about her latest book, “The Singer’s Epiphany,” visit the GIA website.

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