The Perspective of Intent.

What does it mean, to view singing from the perspective of intention? How is it supposed to help?

In short, intention offers you a perspective to improve your singing, and the singing of others, quickly and profoundly.

Intention is a thought-frame for your learning and teaching that is built on principles of motor learning and embodiment.

Intention offers you a coherent and comprehensive approach to singing, clarifying terminology and removing confusion.

Intention is respectful of all “methods” and “techniques”, and can translate between them, helping you understand the differences and similarities between them.

Intentional Singing is powerful and clear-sighted, evidential and effective. At least I hope you find it so.

The perspective of intention can perhaps most readily be understood by contrasting it with “functionalism”.

If a functional approach listens to a singer and suggests how their bodily use might be improved, an intentional approach listens to a singer and asks how their intention might be improved.

The desired result in both cases is the same: “better” singing from the singer. However, the approaches are quite the opposite. Functional teaching aims to teach the singer to use their body more effectively to improve their performance: intentional teaching aims to change their mind, to the same end.

Intentional teaching asserts that movements of the body are complex, coordinated responses to the intentions of the mind. Rather than attempt to change those complex coordinations directly, the intentional teacher prefers to change the intentions that created them.

Functional and intentional are two ends of a broad spectrum. It is unlikely that any particular singing teacher is a hard-functionalist, although I know some that speak as if they might be. On the other hand, being a hard-intentionalist is…hard, especially in a scientific age. It is hard to resist the temptation to “look under the bonnet”; to ask the singer directly to alter their bodily use. Anatomic and functional language implies authority and certainty. However, there is evidence, that, nevertheless, functional approaches are not as effective as intentional equivalents.

This evidence I have corralled into a principle called, rather grandly, The Principle of Preservation of Intention in learning. We’ll look at this in a separate post, and, in more detail, in a later book.

Put simply, it asserts that learning a skill (a motor skill) is more effectively achieved if the intention that motivates that skill is preserved in the exercises and instructions designed to improve it.

The Principle of Preservation of Intention is a key component of Intentional Teaching.

However, it is not the only, and probably not the most powerful, component.

Inspired by, or reminded of, the idea that every movement of the body is motivated by an intention (known or unknown), the singing teacher is empowered to solve problems.

The perspective of intention, applied rigorously, unlocks problems big and small and empowers the singer to make changes. A change of intention is profound and long-lasting, offering the singer autonomy.

For the teacher, the perspective of intention offers a complete thought-frame; structuring questions and crafting instructions to transform someone’s singing.

However you want to change, Intentional Singing can help.