Vocal Freedom Episode 44 - Sarah Burston

My guest this week is voice and piano teacher and choral director Sarah Burston, who I invited onto the podcast to ask about her journey into music and to discover more about the world of beautiful, traditional choral singing.  Sarah directs many young voice choral groups at the Royal College of Music (Junior Dept) and leads the choristers at Peterborough Cathedral as well as teaching in schools and having Assistant MD roles in several choral societies.  I have to confess, although I am not experienced singing it myself, I completely appreciate the beauty of this music and love listening to it, especially live in a church or cathedral.   The acoustics seem to allow the harmonics of the singers to do magic in the space and the feeling this arouses is peaceful and heavenly.

I enjoyed chatting with Sarah about her ideas for developing a special sight reading app for singers and about her research for her MA in Professional Practice in Vocal Pedagogy.   Watch this space as we will definitely be speaking with Sarah about this more in the future!  Links and notes below.  Happy Friday Peeps!

0:00 - 1.55 - Introduction about Sarah and welcome!

1:55 - How would you describe the journey with your voice?

3:00 - Appreciating the beautiful acoustics of cathedral and church choirs

4:20 - A swift last minute change of direction for Uni

6:00 - How Sarah started conducting choirs

7:00 - Scary time for Peri singing teachers when work stopped March 2020

8:45 - What inspired the development of your sight-singing teaching?

10:30 - The importance of sight-singing skills

12:50 - Is there anything you know now, you wish you had learned sooner?

13:30  - How much we can do with the voice

16:00 - Lifestyle choice and the dedication needed by choristers

and how Music allows us to express ourselves and connect with others

17:40 - Would you ever say ‘you can’t join the choir?’

18:45 - Isn’t it exhausting teaching groups of children?

20:20 - lightbulb moment, the upside of lockdown! Online learning!

21:00 - Has all this lockdown time 'not singing' locked down the kids' voices?

25:00 - Using my voice to share my passion!

27:00 - Snakes and Ladders style

29:00 - Whose voices inspire you? Goosebump music?

30:25 - Bring Us, O Lord God - William Harris - Beautiful Voices - click to listen

31:25 - The feeling is palpable!

32:00  - Group cohesion, sharing the love of music

35:50 - Most ‘Unexpected Song’?

36:40 - The Influential teacher who helped Sarah shift to her Music Degree

38:00 - We will keep you all posted about the app!

To contact Sarah, please visit her website.  

To keep informed about future episodes as they are released, join the Vocal Freedom podcast community list here.