Today’s episode comes as a listener request, and a very appropriate one at that. Allow me to read a portion of an email I received from a listener:
Dear Ministry Monday, I hope this message finds you very well! I am writing to you today as I feel you are the perfect person to receive this idea. I wanted to suggest an inclusion of Dr. Lynn Eustis’s Ministry Monday presentation about voice care somewhere in the agenda.
The reason I am forwarding this request is due to the hiatus several choirs have been on after Christmas. The strain of Holy Week can be damaging if voices are not “in shape” to sing the repertoire.
While I am just a volunteer musician at the Basic NPM level who joined the organization last May, I believe this topic is relevant to all.
We couldn’t agree with you more. Today’s episode is directed to all vocalists serving in the Church today: choir members, cantors and choir directors alike. We’ve been using our voices differently in the past two years, and our conversation with Dr. Lynn Eustis is a great reminder to re-condition our voices with care. For more information on this topic, check out the April edition of Pastoral Music Magazine, NPM’s quarterly magazine published for its members. Pastoral Music Magazine is available to all Standard and Premium members of NPM. Not a member of NPM, or are you a Basic member who would like to receive it? Check out npm.org/membership to join or upgrade your membership. Pastoral Music Magazine alone is a great reason to become a Standard or Premium member of NPM today.
And now to the episode at hand!
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 Pro 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, Olympia, Pamina, 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.
To learn more about her latest book, “The Singer’s Epiphany,” visit the GIA website.
Original Episode: #163 - Caring for the Voice After COVID-19 (July 19, 2021)
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