Gender Stories

Letting your voice shine

March 31, 2018 Erik Peregrine Season 1 Episode 2
Gender Stories
Letting your voice shine
Show Notes Transcript
In episode 2 of Gender Stories, Alex Iantaffi interviews the wonderful conductor Erik Peregrine (https://www.erikperegrine.com/), artistic director of Ensemble Companio, music director of the Woodbury Chorus & Orchestra, assistant conductor for One Voice Mixed Chorus, and artistic consultant for Caritas Vocal Ensemble. They talk about the upcoming Transgender Voices Festival in the Twin Cities on April 13 and 14 2018 (http://www.onevoicemn.org/performances/season-calendar/events/transgender-voices-festival/) and why and how to include voices of all genders! Support the show

Instagram: GenderStories
Hosted by Alex Iantaffi
Music by Maxwell von Raven
Gender Stories logo by Lior Effinger-Weintraub


Lyrics from musical introduction: There’s a whole lot of things I want to tell you about. Adventures dangerous and queer. Some you could guess and some I’ve only hinted at. So please lend me your ear. 

Narrator: Everyone has a relationship with gender. What’s your story? Hello and welcome to Gender Stories with your host, Doctor Alex Iantaffi. 

Alex: Hi and welcome to another episode of Gender Stories. I am so excited to be introducing the person I’m going to be interviewing, Erik Peregrine and they are amazing! They are artistic director of Ensemble Companio, music director of the Woodbury Chorus & Orchestra, assistant conductor for One Voice Mixed Chorus, and artistic consultant for Caritas Vocal Ensemble.  And on top of that they are a guest clinician and lecturer pretty much all over the place, right Erik? I am not at all intimidated, yes that is sarcasm that you’re detecting in my voice I’m actually incredibly intimidated to be interviewing such an amazing person and the reason why I'm interviewing you is soon in April 13 & 14 of 2018 there is going to be a Transgender Voices Festival here in Minneapolis/St Paul which we’re both featured speakers at. And I thought that you as my listeners would be much more interested in listening to Erik rather than to me, but I promise I’ll tell you about my experience after the festival. So I know I’m super excited about this festival, Erik what are you excited about when it comes to the Transgender Voices Festival? 

Erik: Well I am so excited to bring together both transgender singers and the voice teachers, conductors and music educators that work with trans singers. It’s a pretty unique event and there’s not a whole lot of accessible pedagogy for trans singers around on the internet, etc, it’s a fairly recent, recent and developing area of study. So I’m really excited that we get to bring all of these people together to celebrate the diversity of voices in our community.  

So a little bit about the festival, like I said we have sessions for trans singers, including a festival choir that I'm running, some voice lessons that people can sign up for individual coaching with their particular voices, as well as just more general sessions on vocal health, as it relates to speaking as well as singing, etc and then on the other side of that coin we have a whole track for again voice teachers, conductors, music educators, etc who are working with trans voices about healthy vocal pedagogy, how to teach singers who are transitioning in any direction, and how to be more inclusive educators in your classrooms and ensembles. There are also some sessions that will bring the two groups together that I think Alex is leading at the beginning of things, so I'm really excited just to get all of the diverse people and bodies and voices all together and celebrate what we can do as a community. 

Alex: Yeah I’m super excited, I’m still not quite 100% sure what I'm doing but I'm doing something that is going to help bring people fully into presence and somatic presence and connect with our body and our voice is kind of part of our bodies. We need to use our body to be able to sing, to be able to speak and the festival it’s not just about singing, like you said it’s about storytelling, spoken word and both evenings there are performances right. I know because I’m doing a spoken word piece, which is terrifying... (laughs) stretching myself to actually read one of my pieces. So yes, a lot of it is really about people bringing all of themselves and their voice. 

Talking about voice, I would love for you to tell me a little bit more about the relationship between voice and gender and how you view that relationship because you’re really an expert in vocal pedagogy and gender and I would love to know more about your work and also that relationship between gender and voice. 

Erik: Yeah absolutely! Well our voices are one of the most primal ways that we communicate our selves to the world. That’s true in terms of speaking, that’s also true as it relates to the artistry of singing and at least in the Western choral tradition which I’ve been trained in extensively it’s what we think of as choir, the voice parts have been traditionally highly highly gendered. So sopranos and altos are women and tenors and basses are men in this tradition, which is rather confining because there are so many factors that go into the voice part that you sing. There are cis gender, or people who aren’t trans, cis gender men who are sopranos and altos naturally. In Handel’s time, Handel of Ye Old Messiah fame, one of the most popular voice types was the male alto. And so that kind of completely flips our established paradigm of voice and gender on it’s head to have male voices singing in high virtuosic ranges. And similarly there are plenty of cis gender women whose voices are low and that sit in the tenor, baritone, or even bass ranges. So even amongst cis gender singers there’s a huge range of potential voice types that it cannot be simply boiled down into your treble voices are women and your tenor bass voices are men. And that’s not even thinking about nonbinary people whose voices again may be anywhere on the map.  

So that said there’s a movement to be more inclusive in our choral pedagogies and to break down those expectations. One of the things that Jane Ramsey MIller and I, she’s the artistic director of One Voice, we speak to a lot of music educators and preservice teachers about ways to break apart those gender expectations in the classroom. And one of the easiest and sometimes hardest language shifts for teachers that have been teaching a while, but one of the simplest things to shift in yoru pedagogy is to simply refer to sections by their voice parts. If you want to hear the sopranos and altos, just ask for the sopranos and altos rather than asking for all of the women to sing. Little language shifts like that can make a huge difference in the experience of new students and singers. To bring it back more to what you were talking about, while I get off on my little tangent. 

Alex: (Laughs) No this is great, you can go off on all the tangents you want! This is fascinating. 

Erik: So voice as it relates to gender, when we hear deeper voices like mine for example, we assume that the person is male and when we hear higher voices we assume that person is female. And it usually exists within the binary system. Like most of Western society. But just as in choir, the pitches of the voice may not actually have any bearing or communication of that individual’s gender. The voice is often an element of great pain for trans folks whose voices don’t necessarily match what society’s expectation would be or what their own sense of what their voice and by extension their body should communicate. And that’s another thing that we as voice teachers and conductors working with the trans singers have to be really sensitive about. I’m thinking particularly of some of the trans women singers that I know.  

                Another vocal pedagogy, side tangent, everyone’s got a larynx that’s the thing in your throat that makes the sound of your voice. Air comes up through your lungs, goes through these two little flaps of skin that vibrate together much like the strings of a guitar or the reeds of a wind instrument and then the sound that comes out is your voice. So the length and the thickness of these folds, or cords they’re sometimes called, is what determines what that pitch is. So the larynx is very very sensitive to hormonal shifts. These can be subtle throughout your life or in the case of some people, I’m thinking particularly people who go through testosterone puberty, the effects can be quite dramatic. The thing to keep in mind though is testosterone’s effect on the larynx is permanent, so the lengthening and deepening of the voice, of the vocal folds themselves, that we typically attribute to our middle school boys in choir whose voice starts up here and ends up more down here, testosterone’s effect is permanent so for trans women who have gone through testosterone puberty, where their voices have landed typically in the tenor, baritone, and bass ranges, will continue to be the healthiest place for them to sing because of the physical structure of their instrument. And that can be really really challenging for trans singers to wrestle with, because they may want to be sopranos and altos, and sing in the high ranges that we have typically ascribed to female voices. But it for many singers isn’t a reality. So that's a point of sensitivity for voice teachers and I think we have at least one if not two or three sessions that deal specifically with navigating that sort of vocal dysphoria with your singers. 

Alex: Yes! This is wonderful yes. I’m happy to kind of jump in there at the pause because yes, all of this. Also I see in my practice as a therapist in terms of people dealing with dysphoria which is not just about, it’s about all of ourselves all of our bodies, so many people do struggle with vocal dysphoria and that can mean that they don’t like to make phone calls for example or that they used to sing and they stopped singing because maybe they don’t have enough support to manage those changes which can be quite stressful. If there are voice changes because people are taking testosterone or because they feel they would be misgendered or they would be seen not as feminine if they’re feminine folks like you said.  

                And so I’m curious about you talked about those small changes that people can make for example, that you and Jane teach choir directors and educators about and I wonder if you've seen kind of what difference does it make for people to be in choir that are more inclusive. And I’m thinking of trans folks but I’m also thinking about cis people especially I think there’s such policing of gender and especially femininity and masculinity. I’m thinking of a lot of folks who may be cis women or cis men who actually have a different range than what we expect in broader society and I know One Voice Mixed Choir really has cis and trans folks and allies and it's a really wonderful experience. I used to sing in the choir for a couple of seasons a few years ago and I wonder if you can say a little more about what difference it makes to choir participants and singers to be in a different environment where they’re not bound by their gender but can really make the most of their instrument like you said. 

Erik: It’s the difference between showing up as, what’s the word I'm looking for, showing up as an instrument, versus showing up as a whole human being. When we make the spaces in our ensembles for the full range of humanity we empower our singers to move into that through the way that their singing and the way that they’re connecting with the other singers in the room and creating something together. I’ve been in a lot of choral situations where I haven’t felt like my whole self was welcome. And it’s really really challenging. Music is something that is so - it goes straight to your heart, it goes straight to the core of who you are as a human being. And to know that you can only be partially present in it can be really damaging. Especially, because I think a lot of people come to choral singing because they’re looking for community, because they’re looking for a place to bring themselves, and because they’re looking for somewhere that they can take time out of their lives to be fully present in their bodies and their minds and their spirits. So for me it’s kind of a no brainer, it’s absolutely a moral must that we as conductors make space for everyone in our ensembles and that means language shifts. That means getting used to saying “Sopranos”, “Altos”, “Tenors”, “Basses”. Greeting people with “Folks” rather than “Ladies and Gentlemen”, it means thinking of adjectives to describe the music that aren’t bound to gender. If you’re asking your alto section to sing with “a more womanly tone” you’re excluding potentially so many people’s experiences. And what does that even mean? (laughing) 

Alex:(Laughing) What does that even mean? I can think of like fifteen different types of cis women and singers even. Pink versus Adele versus Beyonce all have different voices.  

Erik: There’s so many subtle things with language like that that can open up the world of possibilities for your singers. Your cis gender singers may not notice that you’re doing it, but I can guarantee your queer and trans singers will. Another thing that you can do is consider your concert attire. Are you a choir director that has tuxes and dresses? If so, maybe consider moving to something like a neutral concert black that allows singers to self determine what level of formal wear - not the level of formal wear but the particular expression of clothing that is going to allow them to show up and be most present in your room. If all your sopranos and altos are wearing dresses and all of your tenors and basses are wearing tuxes there is a good chance that someone if not more than some one is going to be uncomfortable. And I don’t use uncomfortable in a surface level  flippant sort of way, this comes back to that sense of being able to bring your full humanity into the music that you’re making. Those are some of the big bullet points we go through. 

Alex: Those are pretty wonderful bullet points I have to say! And I love what you said about really supporting people to show up in their full humanity because when I started this podcast that was one of the ideas that whenever I talk about gender and teach about gender. Everybody has a relationship with gender, everyone has a story about gender, and everybody has some pain about the policing of the gender binary, regardless of whether they’re trans or not. One of the things I love about the Minnesota Orchestra which I love to go see whenever I can is that not all of the people, the feminine folks in the orchestra wear dresses for example that’s one of the things I really noticed. And Sarah Hicks is one of the conductors and wears pants very often and fabulous shoes, amazing shoes. If she was around when I was studying music as a teenager I might have continued and become a conductor even traditionally I’d only seen male conductors. I’m in my 40s I had the privilege to be brought up in Italy where I got exposed to a lot of classical music and opera but they were definitely very gendered domains. And conducting seemed to be a very male domain when I was being brought up. So this idea that we can have practices that help people show up as fully human no matter what their identity is or their expression it’s just what I live for really, so this is very exciting.  

I would love to hear just a little bit more about those are the kind things that you talk about and you teach - how are they received? Because you travel so much and you go to all these different places, what difference do you see in how the information you’re giving is being received by people who then go on to put those practices in place in their communities? 

Erik: Well by and large it’s been very well received everywhere I’ve been. I think teachers want the best for their students, that’s why they’re teachers. And usually the types of teachers that come to sessions about supporting their queer and trans singers are the kinds of teachers that really deeply want to learn. So I haven’t gotten any negative feedback, knock on wood, now that I’ve said that I’m sure there will be someone (laughs). But yeah, teachers genuinely want to help their students. And I think as we see more and more trans visibility students are coming out earlier and earlier. And teachers are looking for help because they want to do it right. And they want to honor the experiences of their students. And it may not be something that they’ve had to walk through before. So I think it’s really wonderful to see the light bulbs start to go off in educators eyes when they realize all these little things that they can do. And that it all comes back to the same sort of work that they would do with any student is building a trusting relationship, getting to know who is in your room, being able to be in relationship with them. 

Alex: Yes, when you were talking I was thinking about what I was saying earlier about how many people struggle with their voice often regardless of their identity, so I wonder if you had a piece of advice for people that do struggle with their voice range maybe not matching and maybe either not sharing their voice with the world because of the pain that it might bring or trying to force their voice into a range that's not healthy for them. If there was something that you could say to folks who are struggling with their voice because of their gender what kind of advice would you give, if any or maybe words of support or encouragement? 

(laughs) I know sorry just an easy question from there without you knowing it was coming! Sorry about that! 

Erik: No that’s ok wow. Um! It is hard. It’s something that I struggled with. I through my undergrad I took four years of voice lessons I was training as a contralto which is this really low, deep, rich alto voice. I was assigned female at birth but I’m a non-binary trans person, and for me exploring that sort of ambiguous range was really what started to open the door for me of understanding my gender in more nuanced ways. And being someone who was on the path to professional musician and professional conductor I was absolutely terrified of losing my voice that I’d been working so hard to build. And it took a long time for me to be comfortable with the idea of starting any sort of hormone therapy that would make changes and you don’t know what your going to get on the other side. It’s probably going to be lower, but there was such a dearth of resources that I was very very afraid. And I'm sure that if you’re listening to this, then maybe you’ve experienced some of that fear as well.   

I will say, in terms of words of advice - knowing yourself and knowing what is truly at the core of your being will carry you a very far way. You have, by nature of having a larynx you have a unique instrument. No larynx is like anyone else’s larynx, it’s like snowflakes, but inside your throat! (laughs) You have something that no one else has. It’s complete unique to you, it’s completely unique to your gender and that’s really wonderful. It can be really hard to wrestle with that not fitting your expectations or society’s expectations, but it’s still yours. And I think there’s something really really magical in that. One of the things that we as voice teachers work with students of any gender history and whatnot on is just being able to use your voice, the voice that you have in the body that you have in the healthiest and most sustainable way possible.  

                 For me, that practice always comes back to rooting in the body and allowing the body to be both strong and open to make space for the air to make space for the voice. So I would caution you listening friends, to not push your voice where it doesn’t sit naturally. You can do long term damage to your instrument in that way either by trying to speak or sing to high for too long or speak or sing to low. There is a possibility of permanent damage because you're pushing your larynx into a place where it doesn’t live naturally.  

                 So on your own, take time to come into your body. Let your center of gravity be nice and low. Let your back and your chest open so your lungs can expand as they will.  If you're binding try this sometime without your binder on so you can feel the full expansion of your ribs. And breathe in through your heels as if you’re breathing in through the earth. Letting your whole rib cage expand nice and low and just sigh, and feel where that sits for you. I think for us trans folks there’s so much held in the voice and the body that sometimes coming back to these primal moments of embodiment can be hugely healing and hugely helpful in releasing tension, releasing energetic tension or whatever you want to call it. Take time each day to check back into your body. And I think that over time, your voice will hopefully start to feel more like a part of you. I mean I hope that that’s the case. And if it’s not, that too is worth honoring. 

Alex: Thank you, that is so beautiful. I was going to say if there was anything else that you wanted to talk about that I hadn’t asked you about. There was a lot that resonated there and just knowing my own struggle and knowing so many other people’s struggle with voice, just coming back to our body and then our body’s connection to the earth and to gravity and just letting ourselves be fully present I can’t think of any more beautiful advice and so wonderfully given. So thank you for that!  If there is anything that you wanted to add beyond that I would love to know if there is anything I haven't asked you about that is important for people to know, either about the festival or about gender and voice. 

Erik: Yeah well if you’re in the Minneapolis/St Paul area, we will have the festival chorus for the two days of the festival. We’ll rehearse together, we’ll sing together, hopefully we’ll laugh together too. But then there will be a weekly chorus trans-specific chorus that will continue on Thursday evenings until the middle to end of June. I’m forgetting the date right of the top of my head. But we’ll be joining One Voice Mixed Chorus for their thirtieth anniversary concert. If you’re in the area and you’re a trans identified nonbinary, gender nonconforming person I would love to have you join us for a couple months of rehearsals and fellowship. 

Alex: That sounds wonderful! And if you are interested in coming to the Transgender Voices Festival you can live anywhere and come visit us in the beautiful Twin Cities. It’s probably a cheap time to get flights in April, the weather is not that great but the people are wonderful. You can go to the One Voice website which is www.onevoicemn.org and look for the Transgender VOices Festival. There is a wonderful sliding scale fee that starts at $0 don’t let cost deter you from attending such a wonderful event with amazing people coming from all over the US really to share their knowledge and expertise and their voice and their song with one another. And you don’t have to be trans, non binary, or gender nonconforming to attend. Cis people are welcome, especially if you are teachers or music educators or choir directors there is probably a lot of knowledge there for you if you are interested in this area. And if you’re interested in the area of gender in general, there is a book that Meg-John Barker and I have written which is called “How to Understand Your Gender: A Practical Guide for Exploring Who You Are” which is published by Jessica Kingsley Publisher and I invite you to check it out and yes that is a shameless plug. (both laugh) 

So before we finish I just want to thank you Erik for sharing not just your knowledge and education that you have in this area but also really sharing so vulnerably and generously of yourself. And of your own experience because I know it’s always kind of a vulnerable thing to do and so I just want to express some gratitude for being just the most wonderful guest that I could wish for in my early days of the Gender Stories podcast. Thank you. 

Erik: Thank you so much for having me, Alex. 

Alex: And thank you all for listening. The next episode will be out by May 1st and I hope that many of you will check out the Transgender Voices Festival and I hope that you keep listening. And if you have enjoyed this episode please tell your friends about Gender Stories! You can find the podcast on iTunes you can also find it on FM Player and on your favorite podcast listening platform. So thank you for listening and until next time keep using that wonderful voice that you have. Thank you!