This week’s guest is Shannon Coates.

This is part I of my interview with Dr Shannon Coates, who is an acclaimed voice teacher, international presenter and creator of The Vocal Instrument 101 Online Course. This is a candid interview with Shannon as she begins by sharing her earliest memories of how she discovered the joy of singing as part of a musical family and the journey that led her to a highly successful teaching career. Shannon tells us that she began her teaching career, as an independent studio voice teacher where she worked with a broad range of students. Shannon explains that her own professional and teaching experiences, inspired her to create training programs and resources for teachers outside of academia to equip them with the skills and knowledge that are most useful for them. Shannon had discovered that all the classical tuition received did not give her the tools she needed for contemporary singing. The other realisation for Shannon was that the majority of voice pedagogy classes were being taught by classical voice teachers who had never owned or operated an independent voice studio themselves. Furthermore, she believed that independent studio teachers, were unable to access the training they required without sacrificing time away from the studios, and losing income. In this episode Shannon also shares with us the qualities that she believes that a good teacher should possess, the core components of her training programs and how these are relevant and beneficial to the teaching voice community. Remember this is part 1 of a 2 part interview with Dr Shannon Coates and part 2 will be released next week.

Online Course: https://drshannoncoates.com/the-vocal-instrument-101-online-course/

In this episode

04:00 – Getting to know Dr. Shannon Coates
07:15 – Earliest memories of singing
12:12 – Musical education history
14:12 – Dr. Shannon’s work experience
15:42 – Being a Worship Leader
17:36 – Say ‘Yes’ and figure it out
19:48 – Choosing not to teach
20:46 – First teaching gig
23:09 – Obtaining a Classical Voice Degree
25:31 – Transitioning from Traditional to Online voice lessons
28:48 – Creating resources and working with Voice Teachers
30:39 – The Vocal Instrument 101
40:55 – Finding independent studio teachers
45:27 – Important things a Voice Teacher should kno

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