Lisa Rochelle Voice Teacher NYC Best Voice Teacher NYC NYC Best Voice teacher Voice Lessons NYC Healthy Belting Learn Broadway mix/belt Holistic Voice Teacher Musical Theater College Audition Prep Singing Voice Specialist Therapeutic Voice lessons

bio

Lisa Rochelle is a NYC-based Voice Teacher and Vocal Health Specialist (SVS*) training performers since 1993. Specializing in technique-building for versatility, optimal vocal health and longevity, Lisa helps actors and singers achieve one seamless voice that can move easily between Classical, Musical Theatre and Pop styles while meeting the demands of an 8-show week, rigorous tour or long studio hours. Lisa’s students are professional performers (Broadway, Off Broadway, regional, film, television, and voiceover artists), committed young performers and other professional voice users (voice teachers, music educators, public speakers). With specialized training in vocology (vocal pedagogy and habilitation), she often works as a *Singing Voice Specialist (SVS) in conjunction with medical professionals in the re-training of injured voices.

On a personal note...

Lisa’s extensive performing career includes leading roles on Broadway and Off-Broadway, national tour, regional theatre, featured television, commercial and voiceover work. With favorite roles ranging from Fanny Brice in Funny Girl to Amalia in She Loves Me, Lisa’s first-hand understanding of performers’ needs allows her to provide her students with real-world perspective and career support. Beginning her professional career at age 14 (Broadway, television), Lisa brings to her decades of pedagogical experience a unique and special affinity for working with young actors and singers.

Lisa’s whole-body approach to voice training encompasses aspects of many disciplines, providing a diverse toolbox from which she can tailor lessons to meet the unique needs of individual clients. These disciplines include a strong emphasis on the Alexander Technique and Lessac Voicework. Lisa’s lessons also integrate revelatory self-massage techniques that were developed by her early teacher and pioneer vocologist, Ron Clairmont. It was his mentoring that inspired Lisa’s subsequent vocology training while maintaining her acting career. Deeply influenced by her extraordinary early teachers (Clairmont, Stella Adler and Arthur Lessac), Lisa is a confessed life-long learner. Her ongoing work with leading voice therapists and specialists Shirley Tennyson, Joan Lader and David Jones informs her teaching on a daily basis. Lisa has recently codified Throat Tension Release (TTR), a series of vocal self-massaging exercises (developed by mentor Ron Clairmont) that have helped hundreds of actors and singers over the years.

Lisa’s tenure on the Board of Directors of the New York Singing Teachers’ Association as Co-Director of the Professional Development Program (2006-2011) established her as a mentor to esteemed colleagues, and she continues to guide and support other teachers in their own processes. Other Affiliations include National Association of Teachers of Singing, The Voice Foundation, Actors’ Equity Association, and SAG-AFTRA. Lisa is certified in all 3 levels of Somatic Voicework™/LoVetri Method for CCM Pedagogy, has completed the full core curriculum of NYSTA’s Professional Development Program, has completed hundreds of specialty/vocology coursework hours and internships (Mt. Sinai/NYC; Anat Keidar, NYC/Westminster Choir College, and others) and holds a degree in Vocal Pedagogy and Musical Theatre Performance.

Conservatory, College Faculty and Private consulting positions include Marymount Manhattan College (2003-2016), NTI National Theatre Institute at Eugene O’Neill Center (1999-2006), The Institute for the Alexander Technique (teacher training program), and Artsbridge Performing Arts College Specialty Consultants, among others. Lisa has been a Guest Presenter for the New York Singing Teachers' Association's Comparative Pedagogy Program, has taught Master Classes in NYC in Belting, Vocal Health and Audition Technique at Playwright’s Horizons, The Neighborhood Playhouse, The Broadway Experience, Marymount Manhattan College, The Chapin School, and others.

As the ‘go-to’ vocal consultant for Drama department musicals at La Guardia High School of the Performing Arts since 2010, Lisa’s continued work with LaGuardia students remains a great source of joy and is her way of giving back the cherished support she received as a young professional.

Lisa’s work is dedicated to helping performers achieve their goals by de-mystifying the remarkable act of singing. She empowers performers with the skills needed to master their unique instruments and render technique invisible, so that they can be free to be ‘in the moment’.

Lisa’s teaching draws from three decades of pedagogical and performing experience, vocology/rehabilitation training, extensive Alexander Technique, Lessac Voicework and ongoing work with leading NY voice specialists.
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We’ll discuss your goals, vocal history and any pertinent physical limitations. We’ll jump in with rep if you’re warm, or vocalize if you’re not. We’ll directly address the mechanics of singing; I’ll explain what I hear/see from a functional point of view and why we’re doing what we’re doing. We’ll integrate the technical exercises into phrases and/or full songs as part of establishing a strategy for your home practice. My goal is not only to provide the ‘how’ of getting you to the next place, but also to empower you; I’ll provide the tools for your gaining the physical control and coordination needed to get yourself there on your own.
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philosophy

Reliable technique is what paves the way to vocal freedom.

‍Vocal freedom emerges from a combination of consistent and dedicated practice, a free larynx and the subsequent letting go of the technical, allowing your unique voice to manifest as a result. My goal is to provide you with the tools for technical vocal mastery that are meant to be ‘thrown away’, become ‘invisible’, imprinted in your muscle memory, leaving your mind, emotions and muscles free to be in the moment of your performance. Compare this to a tennis player’s serve, a dancer’s pirouette, a pro golfer’s swing – all of which seem easy in performance, yet are the results of dedicated and consistent technical practice. The ‘magic’ occurs in the moments when something even better and more beautiful than what we’ve practiced has taken over; we have let go of mechanics. Martha Graham, the mother of Modern Dance, says it best -

“I believe that we learn by practice. It is the performance of a dedicated, precise set of acts, physical or intellectual, from which comes shape of achievement, a sense of one’s being, a satisfaction of spirit. There are times of complete frustration - then I need all the comfort that practice has stored in my memory, and a tenacity of faith. Practice is the means of inviting the perfection desired.”

That said, I believe that one of the most important aspects of my helping direct you through your process is to identify what, how and how much you need to practice in order to achieve your goals.

I also believe that if you understand the purpose of an exercise, it will allow you to participate more fully in your own learning process, enabling more productive practice at home and helping you to ‘own’ your technique. By empowering you in this way, practice becomes a huge confidence builder, particularly for those for whom singing technique has always seemed vague or for whom singing may not be the ‘first language’. It’s true that the racing car driver doesn’t need to be a car mechanic, but it sure helps while in the midst of a race when the car isn’t performing at its best.

The human voice is wondrous. It is exquisitely personal, yet it is capable of evoking universal emotions that create powerful and often thrilling experiences for singer and listener alike. As human beings, we crave these experiences. As professional voice users, it’s our job to create and re-create these ecstatic experiences on demand.

It is my life’s work and great passion to de-mystify the ‘how to’ of helping you create these experiences.

approach

‍In order to meet the unique needs of individual clients, my teaching draws on multiple disciplines and sources that have been integrated over decades of experience. I’m always learning and developing ways to help my students, particularly as vocal and performance demands change over time. My goal is to provide an arsenal of tools for helping you master the aspects of voice and auditioning that you can control.

We’ll directly address the mechanics of singing - no vague concepts, no mystery

You'll sing something for me. I’ll identify what I hear and see from a functional point of view and explain why we’re doing what we’re doing; any imagery I use will be consistent with fact-based pedagogy. Rooted in both classical ideology and therapeutic strategies for contemporary singing, my work has evolved into a hybrid of vocal techniques; these have been shaped over time by the influence of my revered and eclectic group of beloved teachers and mentors and filtered through my sensibilities as teacher and singer. Each a master and exceptional in their arena, these include my earlier studies with pioneer vocologist Ron Clairmont, Jeanie LoVetri (Somatic Voicework) and Anat Keidar, and more recent work with Joan Lader, Shirley Tennyson and David Jones. My approach to all voicework is heavily influenced by an extensive Alexander technique background, Lessac Voicework (& related LMRVT) and core bodywork.

We'll approach technique from the inside-out; that is FUNCTION FIRST

Let’s get all the anatomical and mechanical parts of your instrument working well and working well together, then make aesthetic, style, period, genre choices from a well-coordinated mechanism. You’ll then have freedom to sing as you choose because technique provides you with skills to make choices.

We’ll approach your vocal goals from the standpoint of your WHOLE VOICE

We have one pair of magnificent vocal folds that create all of our singing and speaking sounds. The habits you’ve established in your lower range affect the way you set up your higher range, and vise versa. We’ll build strength, balance and flexibility throughout the whole voice; belters and CCM singers will work on their head voice, legit singers on their chest/modal voice, and all work to develop balance throughout the entire vocal range, enabling an ease and versatility to move effortlessly between styles.

Healthy vocal function is healthy vocal function. Even the most 'belty' theatre, rock and pop singers work on their entire instrument as a way of maintaining the health and stamina of their voices.

‍For more on Belting, Click here.

We’ll approach your vocal goals from the standpoint of your WHOLE BODY

Singing is a highly athletic, skilled activity with many simultaneously working parts. We can’t separate the voice from the body; proper training and coordination of the entire mechanism (your body!) is the key to developing reliable vocal technique and a long-lasting, balanced instrument. By asking you to be attentive to physical sensations while working technically in a lesson, we’re sharpening your body mapping (kinesthetic feedback) mechanism to help hard-wire the desired muscle memory until it becomes automatic and habitual. We’ll look at your workout and exercise regimens and assess what’s contributing and what may be counterproductive to your singing process.

You’ll be building stamina, strength, flexibility and new brain tracks all at once. ☺

You’ll develop a repertoire of multi-purpose self massage techniques

These techniques serve as tension busters, phlegm busters (…the favorites of allergy and sinus sufferers…), as pre-warm up stretches and impactful vocal exercises that help to line up your voice as you vocalize.

You’ll develop tools to master the audition room

I will teach you time-tested, nuts and bolts techniques that have helped students win callbacks and garner jobs on Broadway, National Tours, regional theatres and in television. Whether you need quick fix cold reading techniques, monologue technique or in-depth preparatory acting work, you’ll have reliable and methodical approaches to work on material in all genres. These step-by-step procedures are dedicated to elevating your material to performance level and can be used in role preparation, as well. Once you hit your marks with consistency, the emphasis on the technical is thrown away, leaving you free to ACT.

Conquer audition nerves by crafting repeatable performances

LEARN

How to establish the structure and arc of your pieces, aka the mechanics of creating a meaningful ‘journey'
How to make specific, compelling choices that directors and casting directors consistently ask for
Body language techniques that evoke and create honest emotional connections
How to free your expression through a disciplined approach to text

STOP AUDITIONING.

START PERFORMING.

Build technique so solid your voice will be there even on a 'bad day'

Female Belting

Most musical theatre females obsess about belting.

I find this to be the case with singers who haven’t been trained adequately in belting. Yes – trained. Many imagine they should be able to belt high and are mostly self-taught; it should be ‘natural’, and they can’t figure out why belt above C/D is not consistent for auditions or for all songs, why it’s tight or strained, etc.

Belters who have careers lasting more than 5 minutes are doing lots of
mixing that sounds like belting, and they have learned to pick and choose when to ‘belt’.

In the days of belting to C5 or D5, one could get away with minimal belt training and maintain 8 shows/ week. Musical theatre today demands that we sing with everything from deliberate rasp and breathiness for style to also singing with thrilling, open powerful sounds past the upper break . Nature intended our high ‘shouty’ sounds as cries for help while being pursued by lions, tigers and bears. Musical theatre now requires that particular laryngeal ’shouty’ function be made to sound thrilling and oh – for 8 shows a week, after six 7-hour rehearsal days for several weeks or months and while remaining vocally healthy during the run of a show.

This is a skill that requires technique and training.

Not to say that you won’t sound good or couldn’t get away with minimal high-belt technique for a job. But if consistent, reliable singing and maintaining longevity is a priority for you, consider learning a fabulous mix. In my experience as teacher and belter, all good singing employs some form of mix.

"I can say without any hint of exaggeration that Lisa Rochelle is a miraculous voice teacher. Having gone to a prestigious and competitive music conservatory years ago, I considered myself to have had solid technique before studying with Lisa. I had no idea of the potential for growth my instrument had or the unlocking that was possible through studying with her. Her knowledge of the vocal mechanism is limitless, and her kind but pragmatic demeanor makes her a powerful mentor; you can count on having a meaningful and dynamic lesson each and every time. I wouldn’t trust my voice with anyone else."

Jenna Dellacco - AEA Actor, Singer, Voice Teacher

"I have had numerous vocal technicians and coaches through the years. No one comes close to the expertise and talent of Lisa Rochelle; she is the most knowledgeable voice specialist I have ever encountered. As a Cantor and singer with a 20-year career, I sing for my living and I need to be in top vocal shape all the time. Lisa is freeing my voice and giving me the tools I need right now, as well as for my longevity as a singer. She is a consummate professional and a warm, kind, encouraging and loving soul; I trust her with my voice and my spirit and feel blessed to be studying regularly with her. , Lisa offers invaluable performance guidance when I have a specific song to work on for a concert. I am so grateful to Lisa Rochelle, and you will be too."

Deborah Jacobson - Cantor and Singer