This workshop explores the singing voice as a site of democratic engagement, identity, and empowerment in music education. Based on experiences from Swedish teacher education programs, we address how students’ vocal insecurities, reflect broader issues of exclusion, normativity, and silencing.

The Silenced Voice: A Democratic Concern

When students do not feel entitled to use their voice, it becomes not simply a pedagogical issue—but a democratic one. This has long-term implications. Future educators who lack vocal confidence may struggle to create and lead inclusive musical activities based on a variety of voices. The music classroom must therefore become a space where students are supported in reclaiming their voice- both on an individual level as well as on a reflective level when it comes to repertoire.

The workshop draws on Nick Couldry’s concept of voice as a value—not merely the capacity to speak, but the recognition that one’s voice matters in shaping social and political life (Couldry, 2010). It also builds on Gert Biesta’s notion of subjectification and education as a space for becoming, where the purpose is not only to learn but to exist meaningfully in relation to others (Biesta, 2017).

Format

We invite the participants to a 45-minute interactive voice workshop where we together explore how different sounds and singing ideals can be acknowledged and valued in the classroom. We will work together with a versatile repertoire and experience examples of how a plurality of vocal sounds can be explored and discussed with the conference participants. As a way of working practically with the voice, we take our starting point in Janice Chapman´s thoughts on Primal Sound as described in her book Singing and teaching singing (Chapman, 2017).