What I Do

The alexander technique

The Alexander Technique is a simple way of rethinking and redirecting attention in activity in order to re-pattern neuromuscular habits over time. This helps you do whatever you want to do with more ease, less effort, and less chance of injury.

With the help of a skilled teacher, you can learn to access the constant support and buoyancy of gravity, and awaken your own intrinsic coordination and balance. Whatever challenges you face, over-effort, stress, strain and tension probably make them worse, through your habitual patterns of response. Through the teacher’s gentle touch and clear verbal suggestions, you will discover how to enlist your conscious thinking to redirect your own attention - to take a pause, interrupt the force of habit, and gradually undo a lifetime of “holding on” and “pushing through” – the kind of extra tension and effort that leads to illness and injury.

The Alexander Technique is used worldwide by athletes, performers, desk jockeys or even air traffic controllers, and is extremely useful for anyone who lives in the 21st century. Although it is not a therapy, it has been shown to have therapeutic effects, particularly for those with chronic back & neck pain, Repetitive Strain Injury, Parkinsons, and other neuromuscular or muscular skeletal disorders.  I currently teach a group class in the Act 2 theatre program at Ryerson University.  

voice & SPEECH

Voice is used by everyone, every day. Breath moves freely in and out of our bodies, responding to our need for air, and feeding our desire for clear communication. However, habits of stress, silence or shouting can interfere with this easy reflexive process, and the heightened requirements for performance in acting, public speaking, teaching or work presentations can result in hoarseness and vocal strain, or limit our range and resonance in speaking.

Through vocal and breathing explorations, warm up exercises, and application to any words or text you want to use, you will learn to get in touch with breath and sound, and discover how your vocal apparatus actually works, resonates and articulates, to allow your voice its full range and power. Whether you wish to reach the back of the house in your theatre work, or rise above the din in your workplace, you will discover deep support for your own free, responsive voice, ready to communicate whatever you want people to hear, without strain or interference.

My Voice teaching is based on the methods pioneered by Kristin Linklater in the USA and Patsy Rodenburg in the UK, through my apprenticeship with David Smukler in Toronto. I have taught at George Brown Theatre School, Brock University Drama Program, the Centre for Indigenous Theatre & Injured Worker Speaker School.