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Gesture as a Tool of Communication in the Teaching of Singing

This article investigates the use of gesture as a pedagogic tool in the one-to-one singing lesson. A brief overview of the main approaches of vocal pedagogy exhibits the longstanding dispute between advocates of a purely factual teaching style and defenders of a more imaginative one and shows that imagery and metaphors have long played a role in the teaching of singing. Arguing that gestures are a vital part of human communication and have the capacity to visualize, illustrate and simplify complex matters the author suggests that they might also be used as pedagogic tools in the singing studio. A video recorded observation of a number of Conservatorium level singing lessons, given by five different teachers, was carried out in order to clarify if gestures were used in the communication of singing related concepts, if these concepts could be identified and if the gestures could be categorized according to their pedagogic intent? An analysis of the obtained video footage found that gestures were a vital tool for communicating singing related concepts and that the observed gestures could be categorized according to the concepts they communicated into Physiological, Sensation-related and Musical Gestures.