Just watching the Young dancer competition 2017 on BBC is making me think about how we need as singers to think about our performing space, movement pathways, using our vocal technique in challenging ways. It is so exciting seeing the different genres, ballet, contemporary, Asian and street dance and how they convey the music in dynamic ways.

As singers and teachers we must always be thinking of extending our boundaries. Learning from other genres is such an important lesson for us all.

We can do it with modern musics but the challenge is to take our pre-conceived ideas about ‘classical’ performance and refresh and renew. We can certainly use movement and visual space but we can also use our timbre, to change weight, to feel the sound in our bones, phrasing with the acoustic colours. However how do we teach that to our singers who feel so insecure at the best of times!

Make a sound out of the piece of crumpled paper.  Use colours and textures of mixed media, torch lights, pottery and clay vessels and of course dance movements.

The next difficult task is to create something as community singing, getting a group of singers to perform in an adventurous way.