Solo singing and shared experience

Many aspiring adult classical solo singers tend to spend a lot of time working on their voice, their singing alone. Practice happens at home, repertoire is learned in isolation, and vocal technique is something you begin to piece together over time, often without quite knowing quite how you're doing ...

That is a completely natural way to begin.

But it does raise a question, sooner or later, and it is one I recognise very well from my own singing and from working with singers over many years: how do you know if what you are doing is actually helping?

The answer rarely comes from doing more of the same on your own. It comes from experience, and more specifically, from shared experience.

I see this every time singers come together, whether over a full weekend workshop or in a smaller setting, or even online. Something shifts, not because anything dramatic has been added, but because the context has changed. As a solo singer, you are no longer relying only on your own internal sense of things.

You begin to hear other voices. You notice how someone else approaches the same phrase. You recognise something in another singer that you have struggled to name in yourself.

And suddenly, what felt uncertain starts to come into focus.

It is not about comparison. It is about recognition. That moment when you realise that what you are experiencing is not unique to you, and that it can be worked with, is often the point at which things begin to move forward.

I remember this very clearly in my own singing life. Some of the most important shifts did not come from trying to perfect something in isolation, but from being with other singers, listening, responding, and gradually understanding what was happening in a much more complete way.

That is why I often say that you do not have to arrive ready. In fact, it is often better if you don’t. Learn by doing, instead.

There is real value in simply coming to observe, to sit within a session, to listen carefully, and to begin to understand how vocal things unfold. It takes the pressure away, and it allows you to see and hear what is going on without having to manage everything at once.

From there, the next step tends to feel much more possible.

And although nothing quite replaces being physically present with other singers, the same principle applies online. What matters is that you are no longer working entirely on your own, and that you are placing yourself within something where singing is happening regularly and with intention.

Over time, that begins to change how you understand your own voice.

It becomes less about trying to control everything in isolation, and more about recognising what is happening, responding to it, and allowing your understanding to grow through experience.

If you are at the beginning of this, or returning to singing after time away, it is worth remembering that you do not need to have everything in place before you take part.

You can begin by listening. You can begin by observing. You can begin exactly where you are.

Learn by doing, by joining in.

 If you would like to see how this works in practice, the Voice School Portal Notice Board is brimming with ideas and current workshop opportunities to take part, both in person and online, along with the overall shape of the academic year and beyond.