Experimental Group Voice, Keith Rowley
- 1.How will this activity attract University of Washington students? This activity will attract UW students by being experientially effective. That is, participants will not only know they have been through an exciting event, they will feel it. This course will expand their range of expression, emotion, feeling, and interrelationships, and in so doing, students will be so excited at their growth they will feel compelled to tell others about it.
- Why do you want to teach this class? Because I am excited by the expressive and connecting potential of the human voice. And I want to empower people to explore their humanity, their compassion, and their ability to connect the deepest parts of themselves with the deepest parts of others.
- What skills and/or knowledge do you hope the students will gain from the activity? Primarily, I hope students will gain trust in themselves and their classmates. I hope they will learn to trust their own ability to express themselves more fully, trust in their power to overcome any fear of expressing themselves, trust in their ability to share themselves fully with others, and trust in the effectiveness of both opening themselves to others, and being open with others. I hope they learn that by being open to others, by listening to others, and by being committed to the process, they will create something larger than they can alone.
- What exercizes will the students participate in? Exercises will include visualization (controlling their emotions), meditation (getting in touch with their emotions), breathing (controlling their voices), calisthenics (enabling a wider range of expression), communication and listening (opening themselves to others), and vocalizing, employing various musical elements such as rhythm, melody, harmony, dissonance, tone/timbre, volume/amplitude, texture (monophonic, polyphonic), etc.
- What supplies and/or equipment will the student need to provide? Just their self, their voice, and an open mind, heart, and ears.
- What supplies will the student receive? Perhaps some printed inspirational resources, and/or audio CDs.
- Please describe your background in this area and your teaching/training background. I have been singing since before I can remember. My family of seven sang rounds together in the car all the time. I have sung in choirs starting in seventh grade, and made the Texas All-State Choir in 1981. I have 20 years experience singing semi-professionally. I have also been teaching at the college level since 2000, and am currently teaching at Bellevue Community College.
