Content area
Full text
Judith E. Carman, Yoga for Singing: A Developmental Tool for Technique and Performance. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012. Paper, xix, 292 pp., $27.95. ISBN 978-0-19-975941-5 www.oup.com
While singers and their teachers have always been aware of the fundamental importance of the body to their art, it has only been in the past several decades that voice pedagogues have begun to incorporate disciplines of body use-such as the Alexander Technique, the Feldenkrais Method, Body Mapping, and Pilates-into their teaching. The oldest of these is yoga. Yoga, which has been practiced for centuries, is an experiential tool that addresses physical, mental, and spiritual states. Judith E. Carman, who has taught singing for forty years, and practiced yoga for half of that time, offers both an explanation of the connection between singing and yoga, and a systematic approach to incorporate the two.
Carman begins with an overview of the elements of yoga and correlates it to...