"Developing Healthy Vocal Habits in Young Singers" is part of the Sacred Music Colloquium Series. This particular colloquium will be given by Melanie Malinka.
As choir directors, music teachers, and voice coaches, we are entrusted with the care of our singers' voices. When those singers are ten years old or even as young as seven, our concern should not only be for their immediate vocal health but also for the longevity of their developing voices. The following curriculum focuses on setting the basis for healthy vocal habits in young singers. It highlights important aspects of vocal technique each young chorister or soloist should be introduced to.
Four members of the Notre Dame Children’s Choir will participate in the practicum to demonstrate how to work with young and changing voices.
Melanie Malinka, a native of Stuttgart, Germany, has served as Director of Music at The Madeleine Choir School since 2001. In this position she oversees the school’s rigorous choral program of four choirs for children ages 9 – 14 and the music curriculum for all grades. She leads preparations of all the choristers for their extensive concert season, regular service commitments, international tours, and engagements with leading local arts organizations, including Utah Symphony and Opera and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. She regularly conducts the Cathedral Choir on the Cathedral of the Madeleine concert series. Melanie has led numerous guest clinics with the Utah Symphony Chorus, whose singers she prepared for concert engagements during the summer 2008. She also maintains a private voice studio focusing on boy sopranos and young adolescent voices. Melanie received a Bachelor of Music in Voice Performance from Westminster Choir College of Rider University in Princeton, New Jersey. While there, she worked under leading conductors including Joseph Flummerfelt, Kurt Masur, Claudio Abbado and Wolfgang Sawallisch. She is currently finishing a Masters of Music in Choral Conducting at the University of Utah under the guidance of Dr. Barlow Bradford.