Meet & Greet

Hello everyone! I’m from Quito, Ecuador (right in the heart of South America and famous for the Galapagos Islands), but my heart is split between Argentina and Ecuador. I lived in Buenos Aires for 13 years, where I studied music, taught voice, and enjoyed some of the best steaks in the world. Naturally, my favorite food is a mix of Argentinian steaks and Ecuadorian veggies and fruits!
 

I’m a classically trained soprano, specializing in the Rabine Method of functional voice pedagogy, so anything related to science-informed voice training is absolutely my passion. I’m thrilled to find materials about this here on the Tonebase platform. I also enjoy early music, Latin American folk and popular songs, and I love playing guitar and bombo legüero.
 

Currently, I’m returning to some classical basics, focusing on coloratura arias. I feel very comfortable with lieder, particularly by Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, and Strauss, though I’ve realized that I somewhat overlooked oratorio arias and the vibrant world of baroque coloratura in my early years. I’m now working on:

• Piangerò la sorte mia
• Ombra mai fu
• Va godendo

And my main personal goal is to be able to sing Höchster, mache deine Güte from Bach’s Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen Cantata—without fainting by the end!
 

I’m excited to keep practicing, deepen my knowledge, and hopefully meet more like-minded people to share experiences with along the way.

Hi, my name is Manuel Provencal, Bass-Baritone and Vocal performance expert from the province of Quebec, in Canada.

I studied 12 years at the conservatory of music of Trois-Rivières and Quebec and completed with a price and a academic award an intermediate, bachelor and master degree in opera singing.

My best meal here would be breakfast. There are so many great restaurants that specialise in breakfast here that are great, but my 3 favorite one are the Egg benedict and salmon bagel from the restaurant Les 2 Copins in Montreal and the vegetables breakfast casserole in the restaurent Normandin in Drummondville. 

Hi, 

My name is Katrina. I'm 23 and at the moment I'm teaching/ assisting the music department in a school in Oxford. I come from Bristol in Britain, and my favourite food from this country would probably be sticky toffee pudding 😋.

I love to sing and engage with music- for me performing is a thrill like nothing else! I am between my undergrad and master's in terms of vocal training.  While studying for my music undergrad, I took singing lessons from a very good teacher from the Royal Northern. I have started with a new teacher in Oxford from the same conservertoire, and have found it a bit strange starting with a new teacher, and having far less time to practice- my current job is 55 hours a week, so I'm hoping tonebase will help me find some structure and direction. I feel like I've barely started with my singing journey- while I'm worlds away from where I began, I still feel like I have a shaky grip on some basic technique. I particularly struggle particularly with relaxing my throat- I am a very anxious person and I know this ties into it. I also know that I am not always supporting fully, and my upper register is not where I want it to be and is often tense. My other big problem is that I CANNOT stop thinking when I'm singing. When I find that sweet spot when I'm performing and I am totally in the moment and in character, most of my vocal issues disappear, but for 99% of the time my overthinking causes all sorts of problems.  At the moment I am working on Abendempfidung by Mozart which is one of my favourite songs of all time. I absolutely love this song and want to do it justice.  I would like to work on my legato and am thinking of doing a bit of bellini. 

In this group and with tone base as a whole I would like to solidify my knowledge of foundational technique, hopefully make some strides in releasing some of my tension, which is definitely my biggest problem, and learn to have fun with singing and not worry or think too much! 

Hello Everyone,

I am excited to be part of this community of people who want to bring joy to the world with their voices. I am an experienced opera singer, but it has been a while since I sang or performed. I was highly active in my 30is-40is as a classical singer in the UK and Israel but now I am 61 years old and lost a bit the desire to perform.  However, I am a busy singing teacher, mentoring young teachers and feel that it is time for me to investigate my voice for a change and see if I can still find joy in singing classical repertoire.

My favorite food is a good and rich salad (boring, I know) and some fish. I am a Mezzo Soprano or at least used to be although heard from very distinguished singers, that I am truly and soprano. I don't know about that. But it is true that I never found the right arias or roles for my type of voice and always compromise on what was given to sing. 

My aim is to sing again, enjoy my voice and the music I so much adore. I also would love to find out if my technique can improve in my age and help others with some ideas I learn here. Mostly, it's the feel of having a good reason to develop and go back to where I left behind.

Looking forward for new contacts and likeminded singers here.

Yours Ruti Halvani

Hello

My name is Rebecca.

I am still doing a lot of training and returned to classical singing in 2020, after pursuing other things musically. I have been in tonebase for awhile now and also play piano and beginning violin a bit. I have kind of always been a bit shy to put myself out there and never have here but elsewhere i do get positive and constructive feedback. i struggle with some anxiety that im never good enough but i have to say that we are all allowed to enjoy music. 

i would love to get into opera chorus at least and to become more confident. but i have been mostly been at home since 2020 (we all know why)

My name is Alex; I was born and raised in Germany. My favorite food from there is German bread! I moved to the U.S. in 2001 (a couple of years after graduating from medical school) and first lived in New York City, then in St. Louis, MO. Since 2017, I have been residing in Columbus, Ohio, where we have a wonderfully diverse food scene so that it's difficult to name a favorite dish from here... :-) My main instrument is the piano, and I've been an active member of tonebase piano for a couple of years now. I didn't start taking voice lessons until I was 38 years old, but I've always enjoyed singing (not solo, just in choral settings) and did grow up surrounded by and immersed in classical singing (my parents met at voice lessons). I very recently started studying with my third voice teacher - my first male teacher, and the first one who lives across the Atlantic such that our lessons are exclusively online, which is actually working really well. I'm a bass and am presently working on "O Isis und Osiris" (Mozart, Die Zauberflöte) and "Il lacerato spirito" (Verdi, Simone Boccanegra). I also sing in a very fine church choir (Anglican/Episcopal) where we devote ourselves to much beautiful and sometimes fairly challenging repertoire. I'm looking forward to meeting fellow singing enthusiasts here at Tonebase Voice! I hope to be inspired here to practice regularly, develop good performance habits, expand my repertoire, and fill in some of my many gaps (potholes, really) in skills and knowledge related to voice and singing.

Hello! 
My name is Michelle. I'm originally from the Southeast US, but after traveling around a bit, have ended up in Washington state. I really can't think of a favorite food. 

I grew up with singers in my family - my brother was quite exceptional. I was the "non-musical" family member and was told over and over again that I did not have a good singing voice so I kept my singing to myself because I really loved it! I joined band on a whim in high school and discovered that I wasn't as non-musical as I had been led to believe! I left music behind after high school, but now that my children are nearly grown I've decided to dust off some old dreams. It helped that my younger son (some of you may know Thurmond) began playing the piano 5 years ago and singing last year. So with a piano in the house, I started learning to play 2 years ago. I never thought I'd take vocal lessons, but in December of last year I wanted to help my son with the singing at church and thought I'd take a few lessons just to get some basics. I had no idea how much fun vocal lessons would be! So, I'm hooked, and have been taking lessons from a fantastic teacher (who was Richard Miller's research assistant at Oberlin) for the past couple of months. So here I am, somewhat advanced in age to begin vocal training, but enjoying it immensely and often surprised at the sounds that come out of my mouth!

I'm working on "Caro mio ben," and hope to learn alongside others who are passionate about music and singing.