My favourite heavy duty reference books on the voice are Sataloff's "Vocal Health and Pedagogy" and Miller's "The Structure of Singing", but I also keep Baxter's "the Rock and Roll Singer's Survival Manual" around for non-classical singers to see. For performance technique, I go to Emmons and Thomas "Power Performance for Singers", and Wesley Balk's three books. My language books are pretty standard too. I've already mentioned the Skinner "Speaking with Distinction" for English (I also refer to Marshall "the Singer's Manual of English Diction" and Uris "to Sing in English", but find that some of the ideas presented now seem out of date); French is represented by Bernac, Grubb and Gartside; German by Odom; Italian by Colorni; Russian by Piatak and Spanish by Castel "A Singer's Manual of Lyric Spanish Diction" and Wilson "The Art Song in Latin America". Miller's "On the Art of Singing" is a present to any of my students going on to study voice at university or college.
Right now I'm reading "Our Marvelous Native Tongue" by Robert Claiborne, a lively history of the English language. My favourite food and gardening books (my other two passions!) are not so standard ;-)
Cheers Craig, Burnaby BC
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