Draft:Harriet Bennish

About

Harriet began singing at the age of 5 by imitating her mother who was a naturally gifted soprano. Her first performances were for the neighborhood children, lining them up along the street curb to sing to them. At age 14 she began studying with a professor of voice at a nearby University, preparing for the rigorous auditions required of prestigious music conservatories. After being accepted at the Peabody Conservatory of Music (currently operated under Johns Hopkins University) in Baltimore, she studied with Wayne Conner.

In her last year at Peabody, Saul Lilienstein, a music conductor who happened to be in the audience of a Peabody opera production, noticed an outgoing personality in the chorus on stage. Harriet was playing a flirtatious Gypsy girl, and was the only one in the chorus with a blouse lowered far enough to reveal a naked shoulder. Mr. Lilienstein approached the precocious Gypsy girl backstage after the performance and invited her to join the Harford Opera company which was producing 4 operas that summer.

A visiting opera director from West Virginia University heard Harriet that summer and encouraged her to apply to WVU. The transfer to WVU created opportunities to sing operatic leading roles and to be a soloist with the Pittsburgh Symphony. After receiving her Bachelors, Harriet moved to Los Angeles where she began studying privately with the well-known voice teacher, Kathleen Darraugh, and enrolled in the University of Southern CA’s Opera Workshop under the direction of Natalie Limonik and Frans Boerlage. She also became a quarter-finalist in the Los Angeles Regional Metropolitan Opera Auditions.

Although she never stopped singing, motherhood temporarily diverted her from pursuing a performance career. Her interest in children and families prompted her to enroll in a Masters in Social Work program. After working as a social worker and therapist for several years, she returned to teaching voice and performing. With her social work skills intact, her approach to teaching voice became more holistic. Children began leaving their lessons with a strong boost of self-esteem. And her more mature students marveled at being able to recapture the voice they thought was long gone. Harriet enhances her teaching skills and abilities by attending Performance Master Classes and seminars on the “Care of the Voice”. She practices yoga on a regular basis, and when necessary incorporates yoga into lessons to help calm and relax students.

Voice Lessons

Harriet's approach is holistic. She believes the whole body is your instrument and your voice is the result of how well you take care of that instrument. Other factors (both psychological and physical) also contribute to your ability to sing. Using the assessment skills she acquired as a social worker, obstacles that prevent some voices from being released are identified, addressed and then removed.

She shares the belief of many great teachers, that learning to sing starts with good posture followed by the importance of learning diaphragmatic breathing. Having studied with some of the best teachers in California, she has acquired an ability to pinpoint a student’s vocal problem and immediately know how to fix it through the correct vocal exercise.

Harriet continues to enhance her teaching skills and abilities by regularly attending Performance Master Classes and seminars on the “Care of the Voice”. She practices yoga regularly and has found that a little relaxing yoga at the beginning of each lesson tends to calm and relax those students coming straight from work.

She is not alone in recognizing that yoga, combined with vocal exercises, can and does help students find a healthy singing voice.

Tears, Joy, and Hope: Yiddish Songs Written in the Jewish Ghetto

During a time when millions of Jews were facing death, music found a way into their lives. Jews composed music as they lived, fought and died in the ghettos across Europe. She presents this music to you in a unique concert entitled, Tears, Joy and Hope: Yiddish Songs Written in the Jewish Ghetto. The songs she sings were written by Jewish poets and composers who perished in the Holocaust. Everyday life in the ghetto is revealed through the rich, colorful and complex language of Yiddish. A PowerPoint presentation of translations for each song is projected onto a screen, giving audiences a rare insight into ghetto life—the suffering, fears, even the hope. A professional musical ensemble of accordion and cello creates the mood of a people living in desperate times. Because every song has a true story behind it, she offers brief, well-researched talking points, accompanied by historical photos projected onto a screen. Learning the history of each song allows the listener to experience what it was like to live in a Jewish ghetto.

Musical and Vocal Performances

THEATER

• Downey Civic Light Opera, Marsha Moode, Dir.
  • Carousel, Nettie Fowler, Ensemble
  • Fiddler on the Roof, Grandma Tzeitel / Shaindel
• Inland Valley Repertory Theater, Terre Gunkel, Dir.
  • The Most Happy Fella, Marie
• American Girl Place, L.A., Scott Harlan, Music Director
  • American Girl Revue, 5 roles
• Bellflower Theater Company
  • “Working” the Musical, Housewife

OPERA

• Hartford Opera Company
  • Marriage of Figaro, Countess
  • Ballad of Baby Doe, Augusta’s friend
• Long Beach Opera
  • Jacob’s Ladder, Chorus
• West Virginia University
  • The Magic Flute, 2nd Lady
  • Madame Butterfly, Suzuki
  • Old Maid and Thief, Mrs. Todd

CHORAL

• Over 20 years experience as both section leader and soloist

TRAINING

• Acting Class
• Meisner Method
• Fred Ponzlov
• South Coast Repertory
• Acting Class
• Martin Noyse
• Musical Theater Workshop
• Beverly Hills Playhouse
• Gary Imhof
• Acting Class
• Meisner Method
• Mark Piatelli
• Viola Spolin Theater Games
• Improvisation
• Viola Spolin

VOCAL TRAINING

• Dr. Katharin Rundus (current)
• Elisabeth Pehlivanian
• Marvelee Cariaga
• Kathleen Darraugh
• Peabody Conservatory
• West Virginia University