About Rachel Willoner
I’ve been involved in music for 20+ years. I learned music by playing the flute for 16 years however, my love for music was always coupled with the theater and I tend to lean towards the musical theater realm strongly. I was a double major in college B.A. Musical Theater and B.A. Music Primary Instrument Voice. So I got to live out the best of both worlds for several years.
I am classically trained. I like my voice students to choose what they work on so we both work towards both their natural sound and the genre of music they want to sing. For me, musical theater style songs tell a story that’s interesting and or fun/funny and often times relatable for many.
I take their music and teach them classical style singing with it, so that we can then end up creating a sound that is based in solid technique and naturally created before we sound like any genre in particular. I teach using three pillars of voice, breathing, vowels and musicality.
I start with breathing as the breath is the life force behind singing and we work on songs with that in mind to start. For flute and piano I largely stay inside books to guide learning in order to not overload the student with too much newness at one time up until they demonstrate a level of proficiency in note reading, counting and rhythm where they are ready to handle whatever songs come at them.
