Yap Sesh S2 E1: Back to School Episode

Anna: Welcome to Yap Sesh with Voice Pro Ed. We're your hosts. I'm Anna Diemer.

Maurice: I'm Maurice Goodwin.

Anna: And we are back after a little summer hiatus. Welcome back, Maurice.

Maurice: Season 2. Here we go.

Anna: Season 2 — I guess you’re right. We have seasons now. We’ve actually not seen each other. It’s been a while.

Maurice: We have seasons. It’s been a while.

Anna: Yeah, we had a true little break there.

Maurice: July break, July break. How was it? How was your July?

Anna: It was… well, I took two weeks off of my teaching, which was not enough. I wish I’d had a full July break. I was so glad to see all of my clients again, but I showed up and was like, “Y’all, I’m still tired. Bear with me.” And they were like, “I totally feel ya” — very understanding about that.

Maurice: Mhm.

Anna: But more rest always seems to be required.

Maurice: Yeah. I left my job in July and then immediately went into private practice and had some other life things happening in July. So I worked… and worked on making work work better. There were moments of it that were really nice. I took about a week off.

Anna: Yes.

Maurice: Between leaving the hospital and jumping into things. So it was nice. A week is nice, and then the rest has just been building, yeah.

Anna: That makes me feel so luxurious for my two weeks, and you’re like, “A week is nice,” and I’m like, “Two weeks is not enough.”

Maurice: I think the thing that I like most — and will continue to look forward to most — is that being in private practice, I work when I work and I don’t work when I don’t work. I’ve always liked sometimes working in the evenings and on weekends and not working at all before noon if I can help it. So having that autonomy alone makes it feel a lot less like work.

Anna: Yeah, you have had a big shift.

Maurice: For sure.

Anna: For sure. Yeah. So you have not been at what previously was work for you?

Maurice: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It feels really good. Feels good. Thank you. Did you do any travel?

Anna: Yeah, I’m so glad.

Maurice: What were you up to?

Anna: We went to Myrtle Beach. My family’s been going there since I was a kid, so it has a lot of nostalgia for me. And also it’s nice to hang out with my parents and literally do nothing — except Dad wants to get out on the beach at like 8:00 AM. And I’m like, “Dad, I don’t even wake up that early for work. Why do you think I’m gonna wake up that early while I’m on vacation?” So Dad went down, set up the umbrellas, he’s reading. We stumbled down to the beach after 10 AM — a normal human wake-up time. And it was nice to relax with them. The weather was beautiful. And, you know, we’re at the age of skin protection now. Instead of being at the beach to get a tan, it’s like, “Oh, I did not get sunburned. I was at the beach for a week and I did not get sunburned,” which I think is a great triumph.

Maurice: You’re about to start becoming an influencer for your sunscreen brand.

Anna: I am an avid user of Korean sunscreen. We don’t need to get into that here, but if you are a skin care person and happen to be listening to Yap Sesh, hit me up because I love talking about skin care.

Maurice: That’s perfect. I feel like this is good.

Anna: I mean, that’s appropriate for summer, right? Like, y’all let us know what sunscreens you use. How are you taking care of your skin in this heat, in climate change?

Maurice: Leave a post in the comments, yeah. I got to spend a week in Mexico City, which was really nice. It’s one of my favorite places in the world — top three.

Anna: What do you like so much about it?

Maurice: It’s got a lot of humans. There’s a lot of people. I like big cities to visit — and probably to live in for the rest of my life — and it’s gigantic. There’s just a lot of different things to do there. The food is great, the people are fun, the music scene is cool, a lot of great bars and restaurants. I just always have a good time. We got to go with friends that we hadn’t been able to travel there with yet, and it was a good time.

Anna: That is awesome. I know that PAVA is coming up in Mexico City in October. We will not be there in person, but let us know if you are going, let us know if you’re presenting. We’ll shout you out. We had a lot of fun at PAVA last year in Houston, so Mexico City has the Maurice E. Goodwin endorsement.

Maurice: Yeah. Yeah, for sure.

Anna: So you are going to have a good time.

Maurice: I’m pretty sure PAVA has a pretty significantly reduced virtual registration as well this year. I’m looking at the price right now so I can tell you, but I think it’s only maybe a little over $100 USD currently for early bird registration — which is great.

Anna: So maybe we’ll see you virtually. I think it’s my birthday weekend though, so I don’t know if I’m going to be doing voice stuff on my birthday weekend. Love y’all, however.

Maurice: Actually, you know what? It is not that cost. But they do have a really accessible student registration fee, it seems. Anyway, cool. We had a really good time at PAVA. And I think if it fell at a different time and in a different location, we would be there. But I hope everyone has a really good time in Mexico City. It’s one of my favorite places, so it’s great.

Anna: And you got to go for fun and not have to worry about working too — always a bonus.

Maurice: Correct, correct. Big, big, big bonus. Anything else over the summer? Any good books, any music you got into, any concerts? You were performing a bit, no?

Anna: Yeah, I had some performances — some drag performances. Some Atlanta Kings did a little North Carolina tour, so I got to meet some performers from Atlanta and that was a lot of fun. I do some of my operatic singing in drag, so I did a little bit of that. I’m actually hosting and producing my first drag show this month.

Maurice: Woo woo woo — program!

Anna: So if you are a local, come check us out. It’s called The Tool Shed.

Maurice: How has it been producing?

Anna: So far so good. I like being able to hire my friends and people that I know are reliable, accountable, and great performers. It’s really easy to do all of the little administrative things to back those people up because I know that they are going to deliver and it’s going to be a great time.

Maurice: Good, good, good, good, good.

Anna: I am always reading. I know some folks do more reading in the summer — like, “Oh, what’s your summer reading?” — and I did, for the month of July, only read romance novels. So again, if you are skincare fam, if you’re romance novel fam, hit me up. But I think my favorite…

Maurice: OK.

Anna: …of the summer so far is called Rules for Ghosting by Shelley Jay Shore. It is a romance novel, but it is also about a trans man who can see ghosts.

Maurice: Mhm.

Anna: And it’s more about that storyline, his family, and issues of transness than the romance part. It’s a very well-ended read and was very nice to enjoy during my relaxation.

Maurice: Good, good, good.

Anna: Do you read during the summer? Do you read?

Maurice: I read all the time. I read all the time. So I do a little bit of work reading and then a little bit of for-me reading.

Anna: I know you read work stuff all the time.

Maurice: I just pulled up… you know what I use? The Libby app from my library. I have two library cards, so I always forget that it takes the books back and I honestly cannot see what I read. I am currently reading — let me pull this up — Demon Copperhead, which is just a fiction book I’m enjoying. I like that type of fiction book. And then I’m reading two nonfiction books, both work-related. One is a book called Nobody Cares About Your Career: Why Failure Is Good, the Great Ones Play Hurt, and Other Hard Truths. It’s good so far. I’m not too far into it, but it’s good. And then the other one is a finance book that feels helpful to read now that my finances are different in private practice.

Anna: Yeah. So I’m actually doing some work reading as well — surprise, surprise. A friend of mine and I are doing a little two-person book club on Great Singers on Great Singing.

Maurice: What are you reading?

Anna: It’s very interesting because it’s got interviews with Pavarotti, Plácido Domingo, and all of these singers from the 50s, 60s, and 70s, asking them about their vocal technique. It’s so interesting to look at the ways they talked about their voices and how you can see that era of pedagogy reflected in the way they spoke about things — the language some of them chose, and the undercurrents of language that stayed the same between all the singers. Also, some folks knew way more about pedagogy and could explain that, while others were like, “No, I don’t think about the larynx at all when I sing.” And I’m like, well, I’m not surprised by that. Then you have folks who say, “I understand this is going on with my voice while I sing.” It’s interesting, with the science and pedagogy we have today, to read about what it was like back then.

Maurice: Sure. For you, in the next version of Great Singing by Great Teachers or whatever it’s called, when they ask you to contribute a chapter, do you think your contribution would be more based in your physical experience and how you imagine or think about the voice? Or would you take a fully physiologic approach — talk about muscles and tissue? How does it make sense for you?

Anna: Yeah, this is interesting because I feel like I’m way better at pedagogy than singing. So it would depend on what they were asking about. If they were asking about, “What’s your understanding of the voice? What’s your understanding of the function of the voice?” — that is completely different from how I experience my voice, which I feel a little topsy-turvy about right now. I’m still processing — and by still processing, I mean I have not even gotten to some of the stuff from that last internship about my own singing and voice. I want to get back into voice lessons. We had that Teachers Teaching Teachers event right before our break, so I think I need to rethink the way that I think about my own voice. And so I have no idea what would be in that chapter. It’s interesting you ask me that right now, because actually this is all over the place. So, what about you?

Maurice: Hmm… there. Lord, then maybe it would be a little bit of this and a little bit of that, which would be helpful in its own way too, you know? I think for me, singing at this point is almost purely academic — which feels OK. That’s an OK relationship to have with it. I’m interested in how it functions and also just the person-first aspect. I feel heavily impacted by our ability to make singing, singing training, and understanding singing as easy — not “easy” easy, but at least reasonable — for people to access where they are. That would probably be most of it. I think great singing can be the result of many different paths.

Anna: Yeah, I think that’s been the most interesting thing about reading it — seeing all of these different paths of people who all had very illustrious careers.

Maurice: Yes.

Anna: There was a quote from someone that sums it up pretty well: “If this guy has been singing with a high tongue his whole life and making loads of money, are you going to make him stop singing with a high tongue?” Or whatever the technical aspect was.

Maurice: Right, right.

Anna: That’s very much the person-centered aspect — is it working for them?

Maurice: Great.

Anna: Yeah, they’re making money, they’re doing the thing.

Maurice: Sure, sure, sure, sure. Yeah, so that would probably be my contribution. I’d want to write whatever the close-to-last chapter is, where we just reflect on the fact that ten different teachers describe the same thing in nine different ways, and seven of them think the other eight are wrong. You know — it’s OK, it’s fine, and everyone’s fine.

Anna: Yeah. And it’s still like that, and that’s OK. I think it’s fun to be in a place of holding space for all of this being true about singing.

Maurice: Yeah.

Anna: There is no “one true way.” I actually had a client say that to me a couple of weeks ago: “With Anna, it’s like there’s no bad.” And I thought, “Oh, I’m doing a good job.” That was a moment of, OK.

Maurice: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Anna: I’m living out my values in my teaching. I’m communicating good things about the voice.

Maurice: Yeah. I caught myself recently when working with a client — I used the word “bad singing.” It wasn’t in relation to their singing, but just describing singing in general. And I thought, “Man, it’s been so long since that slipped into my way of describing voice.” It wasn’t an attack toward something; it was a description of something they produced. But I still thought, “Oh my goodness, I hardly ever say that anymore.”

Anna: Yeah — I hardly ever say “good,” too. I love how we started out talking about the summer, and of course we are back to our…

Maurice: Of course. I mean, that’s the point.

Anna: Nerdy.

Maurice: It’s the app, it’s the app.

Anna: Yeah, it always comes back to this.

Maurice: Any music you’ve been playing?

Anna: Yeah, I haven’t made it to any concerts, but I have been listening to Ke$ha’s new album.

Maurice: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah — the listen.

Anna: I haven’t seen any tour clips, but I think you do this too — I make playlists by season. “Red Flag” and “Boy Crazy” are the tracks that have made it onto my Summer 2025 bops playlist.

Maurice: Mhm. Love that, love that, love that. Mine is still a mix of random stuff.

Anna: What about you?

Maurice: I will probably continue to return to Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter, just because the tour ended in July — and, again, the internet of it all. So I returned to that for a little while. Renee Rapp just came out with a new album — I like hearing good pop singers sing pop music. Cynthia Erivo put out an album maybe back in June; I think it’s pretty good and fun to listen to. And then I try to challenge myself to find new things, so I’ll put Apple Music or Spotify on shuffle and listen to things, even if it’s a style I wouldn’t normally choose — just to keep my brain going.

Anna: I love that. I listened to Renee Rapp’s album in the background, so I need to sit down and give it another go.

Maurice: Yeah.

Anna: Any favorites from that?

Maurice: No — but that’s not because it’s bad. I think I’ve had a similar relationship to it, where it’s just been playing and nothing has really stopped me in my tracks yet.

Anna: I’ll give it another go.

Maurice: I will say I got pretty stuck on K-Pop Demon Hunters. I don’t know if you’ve listened to this soundtrack yet or watched the movie.

Anna: No. Have you seen it? I’ve been wanting to — it keeps popping up in my algorithms.

Maurice: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, these singers are squelching for their life. We’re talking G5s, A5s, full voice on the song “Golden” — full voice, whatever we want to consider that. It’s pretty intense. It’s good singing. It’s fun. It’s well-written music, and it’s well-animated.

Anna: I just love that that’s the name of it, too, because it pulls you in with exactly what it is.

Maurice: Yeah. That’s the whole movie — K-Pop Demon Hunters. It does feel like a Mad Libs prompt where you throw out a noun, a job, and a style of music: K-Pop Demon Hunter.

Anna: But you know, people love K-Pop. And I play a lot of D&D too, so I’m like, great — demon hunters, yes.

Maurice: It makes sense, yeah. And then to do it well — it’s just a perfect combination. I think that’s been fun. Engaging with pop music and pop culture in that way is good too.

Anna: Wonderful. Feels very summery. Those are our summer bops. Get in the comments and let us know your summer bops. We’re going to blow up on social media like, “We’re back — tell us everything about summer!”

Maurice: Summer bops. The whole episode is K-Pop Demon Hunter-focused. How are you feeling heading into the fall — just for yourself, your studio, the stuff you love, things not related to work?

Anna: K-Pop Demon Hunters, yeah. It is going to be busier than I thought it would be. I think with spring being so busy, I told myself, “If I can just make it to July, the rest of the year won’t be that bad.” Then I came back, sat down, and looked at my calendar… and thought, “When did I plan all of these things?” It’s stuff like my choir having two concerts — one weekend of rehearsals, one weekend of performances. Pride here is in September, and I may be participating in two different weekends of Pride festivals. I’ve got a little bit of travel coming up, and of course my birthday weekend, which I always set aside. I’m one of those people who loves my birthday — I love having an excuse to have people over, cook, and celebrate.

Maurice: Yeah.

Anna: So, although it’s busy, it’s also busy with fun things I’ve set aside time for — like putting on my first drag show. It’s been a little daunting coming back and thinking, “Oh my gosh, I’m so busy,” and then realizing the day-to-day is actually exciting. Like, “What am I doing this weekend? Oh, I’m getting a tattoo.” And that’s why I didn’t plan anything else. I can live with that.

Maurice: Nice, yeah.

Anna: What about you? What’s your first thought for fall?

Maurice: My first thought is just looking forward to continuing to enjoy the freedom of private practice — that feels good. I’m doing lots of different things, but what feels good is that so much of it is in line with what I enjoy doing. Even if some of it is work-related, there’s also a lot of fun — hanging out with friends, seeing my family, traveling a bit. I’m starting a new adjunct position — I can talk more about that later — and developing that content will be fun. I’ve taught adjunct before, but I was a different person and clinician when I developed content back then. Now I’m looking at it with new eyes. It’s a new program, so there’s a lot to look forward to.

Anna: Yeah — and having different capacity, too, with your new schedule.

Maurice: Sure. Yes, yes. Capacity is a thing I can now have, and not just over-capacity like before.

Anna: Yeah, it must be nice.

Maurice: Yeah. It must be nice.

Anna: To have capacity in your life.

Maurice: LOL.

Anna: Couldn’t help it — my brain just went there.

Maurice: I used to describe my work life as non-stop — like from Hamilton, right?

Anna: Yeah.

Maurice: Constantly, “Why do you do voice therapy like you’re running out of time?”

Anna: The man is non-stop.

Maurice: Yeah, that was me.

Anna: This is no longer K-Pop deep talk — it’s just Hamilton references now.

Maurice: We have to stop. No, no. We are taking the wheel. We are no longer going down this road. Happy Hamilton to everyone who celebrates.

Anna: Otherwise, Yap Sesh just becomes a song battle — like in Pitch Perfect.

Maurice: Oh goodness. Cannot, cannot, cannot.

Anna: Well, we at VoiceProEd have some things coming up this fall as well. Of course, you can always get our evergreen courses — our asynchronous courses Achieving Competence as an SLP Working with Singers and Voice Notes — on our website. But we’ve got some new stuff coming up for you.

Maurice: We do. And exciting news — VoiceProEd and I will be presenting at the ASHA Convention this year in DC, the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Convention, in November. We’re excited! We’ll be presenting twice on two different topics, and we’ll share more about those later — but we’ll definitely be there. And then our flagship live course, Singing Voice for the Speech-Language Pathologist, is coming back for the third or fourth time.

Anna: Fourth.

Maurice: I think this is the fourth.

Anna: Yeah. Are we ready to announce the date? We can at least tease it.

Maurice: The fourth time we’re doing this course…

Anna: …a little save-the-date.

Maurice: Sure. Do you have it in front of you? I don’t.

Anna: I do. It is going to be Sunday, November 9th — save the date.

Maurice: Sunday, November 9th.

Anna: For SVSLP: Singing Voice for the Speech-Language Pathologist, our flagship course. It’s five hours, jam-packed with content. I’d call it a beginner-level course — perfect if you don’t know anything about the singing voice but want to get into this work. It’s a blast. One of my favorite parts is getting to do a live teaching demo during it. We use a lot of recorded material for time’s sake, but it’s always fun to work with one of the participants and give them a little voice lesson right in the middle of things. It’s one of my favorite things we do. We’ll have registration opening soon, but you can go ahead and save the date.

Maurice: Save the date, save the date. I’m thinking in a far-future version we send out the wedding magnets — the save-the-date wedding magnets — but for SVSLP.

Anna: And it’s just our little logo. We should do magnets. We’re going to have stickers. If you’re going to be at Fall Voice or at ASHA — I won’t be at Fall Voice, but I will be at my first ASHA. Very excited about that. But we will have VoiceProEd stickers, so come see us and…

Maurice: …get it?

Anna: Stickers! Come get some stickers. What else is going on? You maybe have more access to dates than I do, right?

Maurice: For… yeah.

Anna: We’re cooking up some more asynchronous offerings for you so that you can get us anytime. We love that. And I think we are bringing back our course on vocal fold lesions this fall, which is in September — September 20th. So you can save the date for vocal fold lesions on September 20th.

Maurice: Ah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Perfect, perfect.

Anna: What is the name of that one? Building Balance — I was like, it’s not on the tip of my tongue there.

Maurice: Building Balance, yeah. Yeah. So we’re looking forward to seeing you all. We’re looking forward to continuing to contribute to the blog and social media and just being active as voice clinicians. We’ve really loved getting to know more about y’all, and we hope to see you very soon in a future course and continuing to yap with us here on Yap Sesh.

Anna: Yeah, if you have any ideas on things that you’d like to hear us yap about — things you’d like us to give courses about — skin care, or K-Pop Demon Hunters, we want to hear from you. We want to be in conversation with you. That is literally the whole point of Yap Sesh, and the whole point of the work that we do.

Maurice: Ah.

Anna: Teachers teaching teachers is connecting all of us. Get in our DMs, get in the comments, let us know what you want to see. We are here for you. We are here with you.

Maurice: Teachers teaching teachers.

Anna: Let us know.

Maurice: Yeah. We will yap with you soon.

Anna: Bye.

Maurice: Bye.