Vocal Training
Bringing new rhythm to the local community
Vocal Training with Elena Dana
Elena Dana is a music educator and a vocal coach, specialising in the classical jazz singing technique. Skilfully breaking down Bel Canto, Speech Level and Estill Voice Training methods into comprehensive components, Elena creates tailor-made sessions, which are fun and easy to follow. Working with piano, guitar or backing tracks, Elena designs every lesson around students' learning abilities and their preferred singing material.
To enhance student's learning experience, each session is followed up with a written theoretical outline, a personalised vocal training programme, an audio recording from the class and a list of suggested external resources for systematic training. The aim of these sessions is to keep vocalist's voice in healthy condition while developing their singing ability to its full potential!
For the last ten years Elena has coached over a hundred of professional and aspiring singers throughout the UK via private sessions, group workshops and classes. Working for others, Elena conducted vocal coaching sessions for the British Academy of New Music in London; facilitated a number of vocal training workshops for the internationally acclaimed producer Dash Arts at the Latitude Festival, at the Rich Mix Dacha Festival & the Midsummer Festival in London; facilitated singing classes in performing arts schools around London, such as Bodens, Theatretrain, Make Believe, Spotlight & Stagecoach; held one-off workshops for the Arts Council's Johnston Sheard's Kunstraum project in London and ESMS junior school holiday club in Edinburgh; set up three pop-up schools of vocals consisting of over thirty individually devised workshops and masterclasses with five students' showcases; hosted an audition for the ITV X-factor in Edinburgh; and had produced and run jazz singing courses for the City of Edinburgh Council. Elena continues to teach the craft of vocal technique on regular basis in person and online and you can book your lesson via SJI platform which Elena has set up in 2020 here.
Vocal training sessions are available online and in person
Visit NEW Website for latest vocal training projects and to book your vocal training session
POP-UP SCHOOL of VOCALS Story
Pop-up school of vocals is Elena's initiative to encourage professional vocalists, actors, songwriters and musicians to share their knowledge on vocals with local communities and to remove access barriers by introducing affordable or subsidised workshops in a fun loving atmosphere. The school offers drop-in group singing workshops, masterclasses, courses and exclusive showcases devised for an adult learner of all levels and abilities.
The first pop-up school was set up in 2014 in the London borough of Tower Hamlets, as a result of Elena's teaching training as a music educator at the British academy of New Music. The school was a weekly, four months long venture, and featured the founder of She choir, Ellie Estbrook.
Years on and those who took part were very fond of the project and always asked for more! Hence, a year and a half later, during the winter & spring of 2016 & 2017, the second pop-up school introduced a series of Masterclasses dedicated to Jazz, Blues, Ballads, Romani & Balkan genres. With acclaimed songwriters, musicians and performers Norma Jean Martine, Adam Bridges, Allegra Shock, Meg Cavanaugh and Dunja Botic, the school was held at the legendary Premises Studios, London, UK.
The 3rd school was dedicated solely to Jazz Vocals and was run on during the summer of 2018, in Scotland, across the city of Edinburgh, featuring acclaimed jazz singer Lorna Reid, vocal coach Nicholas Franck, and a musician & a lead vocalist from a swing band Radio Pachuco, Sophie Adams. Our last showcase, to mark the end of this project, was held on Tuesday 18th Sep 2018.
The 4th, 2020 School of Vocals has started early and is dedicated to jazz vocals and dramatic arts! We have launched our first DramVocals (c) workshop of its kind in Edinburgh, Nov 2019, featuring an incredibly talented Chrissie Thornton who has recently performed in an inspirational musical Made in Dagenham dedicated to equal rights. The video footage from this workshop is now available on our Patreon page here.
A series of DramVocals workshops have now been launched in The Hague, starting with every second and fourth Saturday in January & February 2020. Joining us for the first workshop of the year is a renowned jazz musician Niels Tausk teaching us about jazz phrasing and more! Limited places so book early in advance!
Read more about Sing Jazz Project here
Edinburgh Council Courses 2019
With the much appreciated help from the Edinburgh Council we were able to offer heavily subsidised Jazz Singing courses in the heart of the city of Edinburgh from January to May 2019. The courses were sold out and during the duration of twenty weeks in total, the courses covered essential vocal training technique and introduced a new jazz standard each class. The courses featured a visiting teacher Sophie Adams and a visiting pianist Valentine Kulikov who were kind enough to offer their time and knowledge to the groups on voluntarily basis.
Vocal Training Online
From September 2019 Elena's has introduced online portal for vocal training powered by Patreon. The page is dedicated to a new unique material which is created based on subscribers comments, requests and questions for self-guided vocal training practice. It also documents Elena's work through video recording of classes, workshops and bespoke sessions designed with this project in mind. Patreon is a great platform to create a safe space for those who want to train online with Elena!
Join here and keep the requests coming for a fresh material to be created from scratch for you.
