A question I get asked a lot was how did you get into this field?

My path towards this work was not at all a linear one so let me tell you how it went!

I started learning to sing in my teen years and when I turned twenty, I started teaching others how to sing as well.

I taught singing for ten years and during that times I got degrees in physics, jazz, and songwriting.

In 2018, I made the decision that I wanted to focus on teaching singing to trans and/or disabled folks because I identify as both and my favourite teaching experiences were with students who identified as one or the other.

Because I was aware that these groups don’t traditionally have a lot of disposable income for singing lessons, I created a scholarship program called the Right to Sing Award where I raised money to be able to give free singing lessons to trans and/or disabled students.

During the marketing of the Right to Sing Award, one of my instagram ads caught the eye of the education coordinator at a trans youth group in Montreal called Project10.

They had recently held a trans voice workshop with an SLP who was cis and whose ideas about gender didn’t align with those of the organization. They wanted a trans person to conduct the workshop and they wondered if I would do it.

I had never taught this before but the idea was so immediately exciting to me that I accepted to teach the workshop and then got to work teaching myself everything I could learn about trans voice alteration.

I read every available book and watched every video and read every reddit thread. Between the information I gathered, and my own experience modifying my speaking voice for health reasons, I cobbled together my first trans voice workshop, which I called Trans Vocal Exploration.

Things snowballed from there. Project 10 hired me again to teach the workshop in English and French and sent me private students whenever they had inquiries. Then other organizations hired me to give workshops and more private students showed up and before I knew it, it was all I was doing. Now I sometimes get hired my Speech Language Pathology programs to come and teach future SLPs about this field.

If I’ve learned anything in my time in this field, it’s that we need a lot more voices contributing to our shared knowledge. That’s why I created a teacher training program aimed at singing teachers like me who are interested in pivoting into the trans voice field and putting their specialized knowledge to another use.

This program is called Learn to Teach Trans Voice Alteration in 5 Weeks and I’m running the third cohort of the program this November. If you’re interested in being a part of it, sign up to my mailing list on this page to be notified when registration opens again!