Jump to content

Estill/EVTS

Rate this topic


tenor19

Recommended Posts

Hello...

I'm new here--joined yesterday--and so far I've browsed a lot and am really glad I found this resource.

I'm just beginning my masters degree in vocal pedagogy and I know one day I'll have a terrific contribution to the world of singing, but for now I'm acquiring my knowledge and cultivating my craft as a teacher and pedagogue.

Currently I'm working on a paper on EVTS/Estill's methodology. It isn't a very specific focus yet. There's so little in print and I haven't had the benefit of attending a workshop (yet) so I look to you, my colleagues to help with any advice or opinions on the method. There's such a vast difference of opinion on EVTS between the UK and the US which I find interesting. Ultimately I hope this paper contributes to my thesis which I predict will be an attempt at reconciling EVTS, SLS, and more classical methods for musical theatre.

If you have any experience with EVTS, think it's brilliant or bogus, or have had success using elements of the technique or just have some pearls of wisdom, please share!

Always,

Jeremy Ryan Mossman

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Administrator

Jeremy, I have some experience with EVTS and actually have in posession an article on EVTS vs SLS that would be of great help to you I suppose.

First of all, I would not view EVTS or SLS as "classical". "Classical" is a genre' of music and you coach genre's, but you teach techniques. Techniques can be applied to multiple genre's. Case in point, although I am a rocker personally and many of my students who are rockers beneft greatly from my techniques, I am not teaching a "rock technique"... I teach a vocal technique that can be applied to any genre', but I am a rock vocal coach. Yes, I have many students that are folk, jazz and theater singers as well. I hope you understand the difference between technique and coaching.

The important thing to understand about EVTS is that it is not a vocal method in the sense that SLS is. It is not a set of vocal workouts, nor would an EVTS voice session look much like a singing lesson. It is really more about studying and understanding vocal physiology. Laryngeal configurations and "vocal qualities" that are characterized by unique physiological traits. These physiological or "configurations" all produce 7 different sounds, or vocal modes; speech, falsetto, sob, belt, opera, twang, ... and I believe the new comer, distortion should be added to this list, although EVTS does not yet recognize or appreciate vocal distortion. (might be an interesting argument to point out in your paper).

My question for you is, why are you limiting your paper to only EVTS and SLS?

In any case, my personal friend Klaus Mohler from Copenhagen, Denmark... is considered one of the world's leading experts on EVTS and he also happens to be a member of The Modern Vocalist. Go to his profile page and contact Klaus... let him know that I sent you and he may be able to give you a little bit of time or get you in touch with all the information you need for EVTS.

I hope this helps...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I love your designation between method and technique in regards to SLS and EVTS; I think that's really apt and useful for me.

Regarding why only SLS and EVTS is simple: those are two contemporary techniques that approach singing in a very particle way but and can be supplemented with more classical methods when needed. I'm sure there are other methods out there, but I am not as familiar with them at this point (I am nowhere close to my thesis so I've got time).

I don't think SLS or EVTS spend enough time on the importance of breath. I do agree that the body will adjust to the need for breath if you allow it to simply respond to the vocal demands, however I think a smart singer needs to understand the mechanism to be able to problem-solve if necessary.

What is this 'distortion' sound you're mentioning?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

tenor19,

If you are interested in EVTS, you might also want to look into Complete Vocal Technique(CVT). They are sort of an "advanced EVTS" though you really can't compare them completely.

Distortion is when the tone has a raspy or gritty quality.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Administrator

Martin, CVI was inspired by EVTS ... This is common knowledge with those that have been with EVTS for years and were there when CVI started to grow. EVTS has been around for almost 40-50 years. If you compare the CVI book to the EVTS materials you will see that one looks like a vocal technique book and the other looks like a serious medical journal.

I think the thing for you to think about is CVI is a great system, in part, because it pulls from EVTS the notion of vocal modes, but does it in a simpler... more popular way that more people can access.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Funny you should say that Robert :> I feel the complete opposite :P

Actually I found EVTS more understandable at first then CVT, and I had to reread the book of CVT several times to discover more and more each time. (part of it ofcourse has to do that CVT wants to kind of start w a clean slate and clear away all "clutter" from past terminology). And I do think infact that CVT goes further then EVTS in explaining the voice as a whole, in all it's atributes.

As for who is more scientific, they both spend a fair share of their time on research, and how to use the knowleadge generated from that can help them teach beter.

Maybe that can be seen as one of the biggest differences with SLS, SLS works more with the old way of teaching, through sound imitation, imagery, and so on...

Both have their merrit, my personal believe is that you should get the best of both worlds, and not limit yourself with those proclaiming one sound is right and the other is wrong, and at the same time don't limit yourself w those saying that anything but heavy singing is lol (control is a skill too :P)

Robert made some interesting points previously. I see the added value of CVT in the above. CVT kind of put in more practical language some findings of EVTS (and ofc their own findings).

It's important, that any vocal school keeps refreshing and growing though... I'm not sure about EVTS, but for sure that is a big issue for SLS, which might lead to it's downfall in teh future as one of the most popular vocal techniques.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Administrator

Funny you should say that Robert :> I feel the complete opposite :P

Actually I found EVTS more understandable at first then CVT, and I had to reread the book of CVT several times to discover more and more each time. (part of it ofcourse has to do that CVT wants to kind of start w a clean slate and clear away all "clutter" from past terminology). And I do think infact that CVT goes further then EVTS in explaining the voice as a whole, in all it's atributes.

As for who is more scientific, they both spend a fair share of their time on research, and how to use the knowleadge generated from that can help them teach beter.

Maybe that can be seen as one of the biggest differences with SLS, SLS works more with the old way of teaching, through sound imitation, imagery, and so on...

Both have their merrit, my personal believe is that you should get the best of both worlds, and not limit yourself with those proclaiming one sound is right and the other is wrong, and at the same time don't limit yourself w those saying that anything but heavy singing is lol (control is a skill too :P)

Robert made some interesting points previously. I see the added value of CVT in the above. CVT kind of put in more practical language some findings of EVTS (and ofc their own findings).

It's important, that any vocal school keeps refreshing and growing though... I'm not sure about EVTS, but for sure that is a big issue for SLS, which might lead to it's downfall in teh future as one of the most popular vocal techniques.

Good points...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

i think it depends on the person. for some people they get more from the experience of just getting down to vocalizing and others feel a greater benefit from having mechanical/scientific knowledge to back up or explain whats going on. personally i like a bit of both.

i also found CVT to be quite complicated or technical when first reading the book but i can see how that is beneficial for some students and to try to keep the exercises/sounds as exact as possible.

i think the thing with very scientific based teaching is that scientific findings are updated all the time and their is often dispute amongst scientists and scientific findings. whilst your getting so caught up in all that you can lose sight of the actual singing.

with SLS they do use and introduce different tricks and techniques now and then ( i certainly do different things now and then with my teacher that i havent tried before) its just that they dont update/reprint reading material very often, which is a shame. i think SLS has a very good grasp on the "sound" aspect so doest want to get too caught up in the scientific thing that can be so contrary (because at the end of the day so much of it, even in this day and age is theorizing). they just stick with what works (for them) with a " no need to fix something that isnt broken" policy. personally i would love to see more printed scientific research from SLS but i dont think they are as bothered about it as some. i can see the point of "back up what your saying/teaching with science" but i believe that the science bit can only take you so far.

as for the original poster i think your going to have to consider sound ideals as part of the paper, this of course could be studied with scientific analysis but then you would need to take a singer from both techniques and do voice analysis and such.

Robert, i would be very interested in reading that article on EVTS vs SLS :cool:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...