LESSONS AND MASTERCLASSES
In addition to her performance schedule, Ms. Danton offers voice and acting lessons in her private studio.
She is also available for master classes for singers, actors and choral groups.
Ms. Danton welcomes all levels of training and focuses on developing a healthy vocal technique for classical, musical theatre, and pop/jazz styles. Basic acting skills are taught so that each singer has training in communicating their text and becoming a complete artist. Lessons are focused on the needs of the performer and freeing the instrument to discover each singer’s unique voice. Training as a singing actor includes monologue work, stage presence, staging of pieces, audition techniques, and college and recital preparation. She also teaches online voice and acting lessons with singers outside the Boston area across the country.
Ms. Danton is also a stage director for Opera and Musical Theatre performances.
She presently co-teaches both the Opera Scenes and Musical Theatre Courses at New England Conservatory - SCE with Mark W. Lee. She is also a frequent Masterclass Presenter at New England Conservatory and other colleges and organizations.
Other directing credits include the Rising Stars Program with Mark Morgan for New England Light Opera, and directing and running the Opera Workshop Program at the University of Lowell. Ms. Danton also taught Acting and Dramatic Presentation at the Longy School of Music at both the Undergraduate and Graduate levels.
She is currently on the voice faculty at New England Conservatory-SCE/PREP, Boston College, and Salem State University.
Ms. Danton holds a B.M. in Voice Performance with a double-major B.F.A. Musical Theatre from S.U.N.Y. Fredonia School of Music (summa cum laude,) and a M.M. in Opera Performance (Full Scholarship in Performance) with extended study in the Artist Diploma Program from the Hartt School of Music (summa cum laude).
For lessons or classes,
please email Ms. Danton at info@jeandanton.com
Testimonials
Jean Danton Voice/Acting Studio
I studied voice with Jean Danton throughout elementary school and high school. During that time, Jean has become a true confidant who is always there to support me and offer advice when I need it. Jean Danton enlightened my world of singing. Although our voices are quite different, Jean worked with me as an individual to find and develop my unique sound. She stretched my boundaries in repertoire, as well as range and vocal quality, and truly helped me learn how to discover and enhance musical lines in my singing. Jean sat me down to discuss the anatomy of singing and always emphasized the importance of vocal health. In addition to working on technique, she brings acting into every song and values the importance of having emotion behind each note. She also makes sure her students are fully versed in theory as well as piano.
Jean worked diligently with me when preparing for college auditions. She made sure I was prepared well in advance so we would have time to make it my own and release the nerves of an already stressful process. She was honest with what she thought were the best songs to suit my voice and show off all of my abilities. Jean guided me through the whole operation and helped me get into a dream program.
Not only is she an incredible vocalist and acting coach, but also she goes out of her way to attend as many of her students' performances as possible. Jean is genuinely interested in everything her students do and makes her students feel like one-of-a-kind.
Abigail Bohn, B.F.A. in Musical Theatre, Rider University (2021)
Although I've been singing for years, taking private lessons with Jean has filled in a lot of gaps I didn't even realize I had. We have worked on all sorts of genres of repertoire. I particularly love working on jazz rep with her. Jean's method of bringing together acting and music have completely changed the way I sing. I'm looking forward to continuing to develop my musicianship as well as performance skills with her. She has really helped me find the full potential of my natural voice.
Hannah Emmert, Mezzo-Soprano, New England Conservatory SCE (2021)
Brilliant, kind and highly effective, Jean shows me true vocal beauty that is possible for my instrument and how to move in that direction each time I try, whether I’m in great voice or not. Before meeting Jean, I had been a 3-5 hour a week amateur singer for 20 years, thousands of endeavor hours and still plagued by problems with pitch and clenched sound, with no confident repertoire of my own and a criticize-myself-as-I-sing learning style. That much was obvious to any competent voice teacher, but the genius of Jean is that she actually helped me heal this when five other professionals couldn’t. It’s not an exaggeration to say 雪中送炭 (gift embers in blizzard) or desert oasis.
There’s no space in a short testimonial to elaborate on Jean’s vocal ability, expertise in classical voice and musical theatre, command of Italian, French and German, artistry in teaching actual stage acting, bringing characters to life and gift for accepting people and communicating how to learn and correct without judging.
Yue Zheng, Baritone, New England Conservatory SCE (2021)
I have been taking voice lessons with Jean Danton for years, and I just keep learning and learning! In my weekly or biweekly hour-long lesson, we generally spend around 20-30 minutes singing vocalises and working healthy technique. Jean has really helped me undo old bad habits of tongue and jaw tension and find more balance in my breath support and resonance. We work on different kinds of vocal motion--scales, arpeggios, crescendi and decrescendi, trills, thirds, triplets, chromatics, octaves and double octaves, and other varieties. Jean picks exercises that help support the technical work we will do in our arias/songs. The work is focused, aware, and fun! We spend the rest of the lesson working on repertoire, working to improve my technique, musicality, expression, and performance/acting. This work is equally focused, aware and fun, three aspects that are equally crucial to help a singer achieve his or her potential.
My voice lessons help me sing with greater ease and beauty, and I've noticed wonderful improvements in my performing and practicing, plus expansion of vocal range (a fun bonus!). My repertoire mostly consists of operatic and classical repertoire, my favorite music. I have learned so much about true embodiment of vocal styles, especially true Baroque singing, and it's a real delight to learn to sing pieces with stylistic integrity.
Jean also has really helped my jazz and pop styles. We also spend time doing trill exercises and chromatic scales to find precision and excellence when using these ornaments in classical music. Working with a right fit voice teacher like Jean is so important because every lesson the teacher meets the student where he or she is at, intuitively helping to unlock tensions/blocks and teaching and informing in ways the student can understand and internalize. The learning goes on and on! I keep improving and keep learning, and it's an absolute blast!
Laura Proctor, Soprano, B.M. Voice Performance Ithaca College (2021)