Lisa Barksdale
Lisa Browne Barksdale, B.M. (Vocal Performance), Furman University; M.M. (Vocal Performance), Northwestern University; M.C.D. University of South Carolina; CCC-SLP, Greenville ENT with Prisma Health; CMVT-MT (Certified McClosky Voice Technician- Master Teacher); soprano
A native of Macon, Georgia, Lisa has been teaching voice and performing more than 25 years. Nine of her teaching years were spent as the Junior High and High School Choral Director at Pace Academy in Atlanta. Lisa was heavily involved in Atlanta’s music community, singing with Robert Shaw in the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Chorus and Chamber Chorus for 10 years. She also directed youth and children’s choirs in Atlanta-area churches. Lisa’s voice teachers through the years have included Gail Schoonmaker, Elizabeth Fisher, Jeanné Brown, and Bonnie Pomfret.
Since moving to Greenville, South Carolina, Lisa has presented solo recitals and has been featured frequently as a soloist at Furman and with the Greenville Chorale and Chamber Choir, performing in such works as Handel’s Messiah, Dan Forrest’s Requiem for the Living, Francis Poulenc’s Gloria, and Vaughan Williams’ Hodie. Currently, she is a Lecturer in Music at Furman University where she has taught vocal pedagogy, private lessons, and voice class for non-majors for over twenty years.
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Lisa holds membership in the National Association of Teachers of Singing, Choristers Guild, American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, Omicron Delta Kappa (leadership) and Pi Kappa Lambda (music honorary society). She became a Certified McClosky Voice Technician in 2006, and served as Vice President for the McClosky Institute of Voice from 2007-2011. She became a Master Teacher in 2018. Since certifying, Lisa has taught workshops in Boston, MA; Greenville, SC; Hilton Head, SC; Rock Hill, SC; Lawrenceville, GA; Columbus, GA; Atlanta, GA; Las Vegas, NV; Asheville, NC; Redlands, CA; Cleveland, TN; at the 2019 Classical Singer convention, the 2019 SCSHA convention, and at the South Carolina National Association of Teachers of Singing. She has given demonstrations of the McClosky technique at NATS and ACDA conventions in Nashville, Salt Lake City, and Oklahoma City.
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Lisa’s desire to learn more about healthy voice use prompted her to earn a degree from the University of South Carolina in Communication Disorders in 2014. In January, 2015, Lisa joined Greenville ENT as a Speech and Language Pathologist to complete her Clinical Fellowship, and has since earned the Certificate of Clinical Competency with ASHA, the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. She enjoys working with the voice team at The Greenville Voice Center.
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Frequently, Lisa reaches into the community to offer tips for maintaining good vocal health. Excited to educate people about how to care for their instruments, Lisa recently presented “The Care and Feeding of the Voice” at the Metro2Music conference for church musicians with CMVT, David Parker. Her team effort with fellow SLP, Andrea Storie, “Vocal Spa: Care of the Voice for SLP Educators” was presented at the 2018 SCSHA convention. In 2019, Lisa received a grant from the Metropolitan Arts Council in Greenville, SC, to join her fellow Master Teachers in the Philippines in teaching the first international McClosky CMVT training class, and to share, upon returning, her experiences in classrooms around Greenville. For the 2020 NATS National Conference, Lisa’s poster presentation “Modules for Nodules: Patient-driven Strategies for Vocal Budgeting” was selected and submitted virtually.
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Lisa lives with her family in Travelers Rest, South Carolina.