Archive for the ‘Seminars’ Category

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Residency at BASOTI

Tuesday, July 12th, 2011

Last week I took up residency in one of the most beautiful places in the world: San Francisco. I had spent a formative summer in San Fran during the internet boom, working with a web page design firm called Adjacency. The three founders ended up selling ADJ for $67 million in stock to Sapient. The stock proceeded to triple in value allowing these entrepreneurs to buy a few fancy cars then start other businesses.

And so I felt quite the buzz to fly into SFO and take the BART up to Mission Street and get set up for a three day residency with Sylvia Anderson’s stellar program: BASOTI. In addition to being deeply appreciative of the work they prepared for me, they gave me a great shout-out on their newly redesigned website. It is maybe not quite as slick as the Range Rover or Tag Heuer websites I worked on in the 90′s, but it will give you a great taste of just how cool this program is.

During my stay, I provided my business plan seminar to several different groups, and did countless one-on-one meetings in the stunning San Francisco Conservatory of Music. We worked a lot on resumes and out of that work I was able to develop my resume tips and templates. Interestingly, that resume-tips page seems to have caught some eyes. Every day, more and more singers keep finding and clicking that link, according to my Google Analytics web traffic reports. How fun is that?

I also had the opportunity to hear some musical rehearsals and watch staging. They were in the final throws of putting together an ambitious production of Clemenza di Tito, a work I performed with Chicago Opera Theater. The mezzo who took Sesto by the proverbial operatic horns brought such power, grace and intensity to her work. And the soprano that undertook Vitellia’s demanding role had such range and color to her performance. I was thoroughly impressed.

    “If you’re going to San Francisco / You’re gonna meet some gentle people there”

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CoOPERAtive Makes a Statement

Saturday, July 9th, 2011

I had the pleasure of revisiting The CoOPERAtive Program this past week, but a few things were different this time — 1) I was able to hear all of the CoOperative Fellows (ages 23-30) sing before we worked together, 2) I had worked with many of the seminar attendees previously and 3) CoOPERAtive is now offering a Young Artist level (ages 21-23).

CoOPERAtive 2011 Mission Statements

At the culmination of our day-long seminars at CoOPEAtive, several singers volunteered to share their new mission statements with the world.


1) Listening First

I was completely blown away by this performance. Laura Brooks Rice and Dr. Christopher Arneson continue to expand what this program offers and the quality is empirically impressive.

First off, there actually was an audience! It is quite often that I will pop into weekly recitals or operas at summer programs that I visit to find talented singers performing for very small audiences. Somehow Ms. Rice and Dr. Arneson are able to rally the community to support these singers, and it makes all the difference. And that very evening, one of the community members, unprompted by any direct appeal, approached Ms. Rice with a significant check in support of the mission. That is superb.

Second, the singers really have what it takes. I have heard many a master class teacher refer to “the whole package” — does the singer have the vocal product, look good, move well, interpersonal, some extra charisma or compelling back story? In the case of the CoOPERAtive Fellows 2011, yes all around in many cases. I think of the young tenor that closed the evening with such a compelling full-lyric sound singing an aria from L’arlesiana, and of the very young mezzo who presented Cherubino as if she were skipping rope. She doesn’t even quite know, I don’t think, how few of “her” there are out there. Brava.

Lastly, I looked through the program to find that the coach / accompanists are all professional musicians with significant accomplishments under their belt. Check out the bio on these guys: Thomas Bagwell and Anthony Manoli. Whoa, that’ll dress up a concert!

2) Second Time’s a Charm

It was very neat to start the seminar the morning after the concert with names memorized and insight into what types of performers I was working with. And it was also nice to have many repeat seminar attendees, so we were able to dig deeper into the topics and build on our previous work.

We carved out an entire day to work together on our business plans. It was a fairly hefty undertaking because these topics can be quite exhausting mentally and emotionally — what are your strengths and weaknesses, what kind of support do you have, what type of lifestyle are you looking to / willing to lead? That can be a lot to digest. I was impressed with how this group stayed with it, and I think that is a testament to the tone than is set at the program.

3) CoOPERAtive is Growing

It was also lovely to work with the Young Artist level (ages 21-23) singers and to see how CoOPERAtive is expanding what they have to offer. Adding younger singers into the program seems like an excellent move — these select group of singers have so much to gain just by being around and watching the older group, and likewise the older group is spurred on by the younger group’s energy, passion and zest. Certainly that was how things played out in my seminar, and I was delighted to have been a part of it!

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LA Classical Singer Convention 2011

Sunday, July 3rd, 2011

Velvet Singer Bill Bennett awarding copies of Velvet Singer Software to Classical Singer Convention Professional Track Finalists in LA, 2011.

It was a total thrill to come straight from a service trip in Mexico up the coast to the beautiful City of Angels and the Classical Singer Convention 2011. The impressive CS team of Alex, Jo and Dane had everything all ready for me to hit the ground running and begin making genuine and interesting connections with so many singers.

Coming swiftly on the heels of Classical Singer Magazine‘s excellent Article on Velvet Singer, the singers all knew who I was (flattering) and had started to digest some of the principles of my Business Plan seminar. And they had begun to talk things up at their custom page on Facebook.

These things were so important in terms of setting up a fruitful dialogue: singers had read the article, become familiar with my software and shared their resumes with me! That is such a service to singers, to set the tone appropriately and make sure that they got as much out of their convention experience as possible.

I was privileged to present several awards as part of the Classical Singer Competitions (or click here for info on Facebook). As part of presenting this award, a talented young woman from Richmond, VA named Victoria Williams joined me on the platform. She was only one of seven National Finalists in the undergraduate competition, and she absolutely slayed the audience as she described why Velvet Singer is so cool. Thank you Victoria!

The highlight for me was the ability to teach my Business Plan Seminar for the Professional Track. These topics are not the most exciting, fun topics to present — especially compared to a masterclass with the likes of Jane Eaglin. And so I was absolutely blown away with the amount of people that enthusiastically attended my session (large audience mostly off camera in this video). This is a testament to the convention overall and the type of singers this draws — hungry, earnest and passionate young professionals.

Classical Singer 2011 Business Plan Seminar

A few clips from the seminar at Classical Singer Convention including: what is a business plan, why do we need one and what do you do with it.


After the seminar, I ran many one-on-one meetings where we were able to dig deeper into artistic Business Plans and Resume Feedback. This is something I am going to start doing much more of. It seems that this is a very effective way to connect with people. Following a group seminar, these one-on-one sessions allow singers to digest and come with their individual questions and thoughts. It is quite demanding work (requires tons of energy), yet is equally fulfilling and rewarding.

Naturally I also had a booth on the floor, where I was charmed by countless young singers. I truly enjoy absorbing some of their energy and ambitions! What a blast. It was also an opportunity to show people Velvet Singer — and it is always a delight to watch people light up when they realize all of the things this solution can do for them. I suppose that is not dissimilar from performance!

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Roosevelt Assignment: Develop and Share Business Plan

Saturday, June 25th, 2011
    Roosevelt Business Plan Seminar

    A few clips from the seminar at Roosevelt including: seminar lesson #4 “knowing is half the battle” (© 1985 by Hasbro, Inc), strengths & weaknesses form, strength areas discussion. See the bottom of this of this post for images of the E-Workbook.


I had the rare privilege of creating an entirely new approach to artistic business planning this spring. What a blessing to start from a blank slate like this and dream up what would be the most effective method of helping fourteen highly-talented and motivate singers developing a plan for their futures!

Where do you start? How do you bring structure to what can be an amorphous pile of worries and stress? Also, these students are already highly informed and charged up. What can I offer that will really challenge them?

This was part of the spring semester of Dr. Dana Brown‘s Graduate Seminar, “Topics for the Professional Singer” at Roosevelt University, Chicago College of Performing Arts.

I had already connected with this group of singers earlier in the fall semester. They completed several homework assignments using Velvet Singer Software to quickly generate a database of professional contacts, repertoire lists and audition history reports. So coming back in the spring to talk about the planning side of the business was a treat.

We spent a fair amount of time discussing what the purposes and benefits of developing a business plan might be. I was impressed with their ability to take this so seriously and to generate many good uses for having a written plan. Before we decide what a plan should contain, let’s make some commitments to how we intend to use it and who we are going to share it with.

Among the purposes of a business plan that they came up with were:

  • To help organize your thoughts and gain clarity
  • To involve stakeholders in furthering your career
  • To persuade others to support you

That is powerful stuff!

So who are we going to share this with, and when? These students were busy singing graduate recitals and preparing for graduation. What a perfect time to make a plan and share it with your stakeholders!

Here are some of the folks with whom they committed to share the business plan executive report:

  • My voice teacher
  • My parents
  • My girlfriend / boyfriend
  • My director from last summer

How powerful and rich might those experience be?

Imagine that you are a director and you receive a courteous email from a young singer you had worked with the previous summer. Attached to the email was a nice report outlining that singers plans, strengths, weaknesses, priorities, mission, values, vision and strategy. Holy cow, that could have a profound impact!

Now imagine that you get to know this young singer better and she includes you every year with an update. When you need a last-minute Despina, who is going to get the call?

Click here to learn more about Velvet Singer Seminars.

During this seminar, we rely heavily on the E-Workbook. In this video clip, we mention the Product Strengths & Weaknesses Forms and then generate the “Strength Areas” bar chart as a result. The E-Workbook has been a great framework for meaningful conversation.

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Integrating EEP After Longy – A Goals-Centered Approach

Tuesday, March 22nd, 2011
    Preparation for Longy EEP Seminar

    A few thoughts before the EEP morning seminar.


Longy School of Music‘s Experiential Education Program is the picture of collaboration. We had a condensed 90-minute session, but it did not take long for this group to begin sharing. Kudos to Dr. Judith Hill Bose and this class for bringing their energy and intelligence to earnestly consider how EEP will play a role in their lives going forward.

“Turning what the students have learned from this project into goals and action items for their future is really important – and I like Bill’s thoughtful and systematic way of going through the goal setting process and learning how to make priorities. It is important for young artists to encounter lots of ways to think about things.”

– Dr. Judith Hill Bose, Director of Education Studies at Longy School of Music.

As I wrote in my blog post from February titled “Longy’s Experiential Education Program”:

Many students choose to tie in a service aspect to their projects. This is a great way to generate an audience and seems like a very natural transition to post-graduate life, where many musicians go on to serve the community professionally and semi-professionally.

I was blown away by the creativity and drive behind the projects: one singer worked with an elementary school group and was already contracted to return to this same school after EEP, a collaborative pianist created an avant-garde vocal recital to be performed in bars and restaurants, a young conductor built off of his previous work with vocal ensembles in working in the community. Service, execution and creativity. This class should be a model for other schools around the county.

Our discussion focused around four questions supported by discussion, small break-out groups, slides and workbook exercises:

1) What new experiences did EEP bring you?

  • List three new business skills / experiences
  • List three new performance / presentational experiences

2) What did you learn?

  • Entrepreneurship strengths / weaknesses, indicating which you discovered through EEP
  • Professional Values checklist, indicating which you discovered through EEP
  • List three key take-aways / lessons learned

3) How would you like this make you different?

  • 5-year plan, broken into six sections (performance, teaching, artistic development, collaboration, financial, life/family)

4) What are you going to do differently?

  • Priorities, indicating which you emphasized during EEP
  • Goals for the next year
  • Action items for the next month

I tried out our new Values checklist for the first time and found that it really fostered an interesting conversation. Most, if not all, arrived at unique lists of their top five values. There were some favorites such as “Improvement” and “Learning,” yet even in these cases, each student derived different connotation and meaning from these words. For example, for one student valued “Improvement” in the context of their instrument performance whereas another saw “Improvement” as a value to pass on to others through teaching.

      Creativity abounds in Cambridge, even on the transit signs. Creativity is a "treasure," to be sure.

This was also my first full seminar with instrumentalists and I was delighted to have Dr. Hill’s support in putting together a meaningful session, and appreciative that these students were able to jump into such deep, structured thinking. Bravo Longy EEP!

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At Longy, E-Workbook and Conversation Flows

Monday, March 21st, 2011
    Preparation for Longy Seminar

    A few thoughts before the seminar.


Each Wednesday afternoon, Longy School of Music‘s Chair of Vocal and Keyboard Studies, Brian Moll gathers a talented group of singers and collaborative pianists together. Of the many seminars I have given, this group was one of the most diverse in their experience, interests and backgrounds that I had ever worked with.

I think that diversity of perspectives, combined with a highly-supportive environment created just the right recipe for what was, I believe, my best seminar to date. So much of the impact of these seminars is determined before I even walk in the door. The academic season, the interpersonal climate or even the timing of the event during the day play huge roles.

I was also delighted to have several distinguished guests participate in the seminar: Brian Moll, Karyl Ryczek and Sarah Bellott.

“It was excellent! All that Bill is offering is so helpful – especially the direction to let life teach you to act!”

– Brian Moll, Chair of Vocal and Keyboard Studies at Longy School of Music.

“The seminar is well-organized, well-presented and offers optima organizational information for the performer / artists. Terrific!”

– Karyl Ryczek, Conservatory Chair of Instrumental Studies at Longy School of Music.

    Sarah Bellott on Longy Seminar

    A message from Sarah Bellott, Student Services Coordinator at Boston University School of Music. Sarah and I had met at the NETMCDO conference in January in NYC. She is a very intelligent, energetic and creative counselor; we were all fortunate to have her insights.


Our new E-Workbook may have also shaped this dialogue to be just a bit more focused that normal. Students downloaded and began tinkering with the workbook before the session. In addition to saving time, perhaps this pre-install helps prepare the participants, giving the session some context.

I also reviewed resumes before the session, which helped us jump right in to deeper conversations. My feedback and edits seemed to be very valuable for the singers and pianists alike. We were able to review some patterns that I noticed, such as alignment issues, too many fonts, too many font sizes, too creative with colors and lines, significant experiences not highlighted well, multiple page resumes, and wasted space with wordy section headers.

Several students had such genuine interest and earnest curiosity about my approach that we continue follow-up conversations over phone and email even now, weeks following the seminar. Longy School of Music is a gem and I am excited to continue work with them in the years to come!

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