Katherine L.
About
Hi!
I'm Kat! I'm a voice/acting teacher based out of New York and a Music Theatre and Film performer. I have been the lead in feature films, short films, international tours, and Off-broadway shows. As a teacher, many of my students have performed roles in regional theatres, been in films, led their worship groups, and even had one-person shows and solo concerts.
Teaching Style
I love teaching! My goal as a teacher is to help my students get to the next level whatever that may be, whether it's singing higher notes, finding a richer sound, becoming a better actor, building confidence, or simply becoming the ARTISTS they already know they are! I really try to instill my students with the tools they need to trouble-shoot their problems. I'm always here for my students, but I want to supply them with the tools to think critically about their art, and a technique that is reliable enough for them to be able to to grow their art and think creatively beyond what's right in front of them.
Curriculum
I've studied under a wide variety of teachers for fifteen years so my method is a mix and match of the things that worked best from each teacher. With singing, I really believe in setting up a strong breathing foundation for you to make any sound on top of that. I also like to teach control over airspeed and compression of sound. That's how you build flexibility of style, by not only taking a sustainable breath, but then discovering what you do with that breath. With my actors, I think acting comes from a place of "What do I have to say about this character," and what are my lived experiences that help inform this. I spend a lot of time helping people open up their emotional life and build their flexibility on what emotions they can pull out. So there is a lot of focus on how do I pull this emotion out of myself and I use a wide variety of tools from Meisner and Uta Hagen's method to do that.
For Actors I would highly recommend these books:
1. Acting: The First Six Lessons by Richard Boleslavsky
2. An Actor Prepares by Constantin Stanislavsky
3. The Stanislavsky Technique: Russia by Mel Gordon
4. Stanislavsky in America by Mel Gordon
5. Toward Mastery: An Acting Class with Nikos Psacharopoulos, ed. by Jean Hackett
6. The Method: How the Twentieth Century Learned to Act by Isaac Butler
7. Real Life Drama: The Group Theatre and America, 1931-1940 by Wendy Smith
8. The Fervent Years: The Group Theatre and the 30’s by Harold Clurman
Credentials & Affiliations
I attended the University of Texas at San Antonio for Vocal Performance where I studied both Singing and Acting. Afterwards, I moved to New York and began performing. Since then I have done Feature Films including "Grounded" which premiered at Dances With Films, San Diego Asian Film Festival, and Manhattan Film Festival, I lead the international tour of "One Starry Night" playing Lena, I have also starred in several regional productions including "Little Women," "The Secret Garden," "South Pacific," and many more, I performed in the ensemble of an off-broadway show called "It Came From Beyond," I have also been in the TV show "Evil Lives Here," and last year I was a semi-finalist in the international Lotte Lenya voice competition. This summer, I will be filming two feature films and a national commercial.
