Stanton Davis is the Voices of the Millennium Professor of Voice and Speech Education, 2011. He will teach the Fitzmaurice Voicework classes each day and the following two hour collaborative session in text reading.

Stanton Davis is acting head of BFA Performance in the Department of Theater and Dance at Northern Illinois University.

Before coming to NIU, Stanton served as speech and dialect coach for the graduate and undergraduate actors as well as teaching speech and acting at Temple University's Theatre Department. Before that, he was at SUNY New Paltz where he taught voice, acting, Shakespeare, dramatic literature, and stage combat.

Stanton has worked professionally as an actor (stage, film and TV commercials), fight choreographer, stagehand, director, stunt man, voice coach , dialect coach and education director at theatres throughout the country. Stanton is a member of the Independent Fight Director’s Guild, and was among the first certified Associate Teachers of Fitzmaurice Voicework in the US. (http://www.fitzmauricevoice.com/about.htm)

Valerie Blair, pianist, holds a Bachelor’s in Music Education and a Master’s in Piano Performance and Pedagogy from Northern Illinois University, where she studied piano with William Koehler and Don Walker and accompanying with William Goldenberg.  She has accompanied in voice studios, and played for small opera and musical theater productions in Chicago and suburbs, in Buffalo, NY, and most recently at Rockford College.  Currently she is collaborative pianist for the Rock Valley College Chamber Singers and Women’s Choir, and the professional choir, ElysianVoices, under the direction of Paul Laprade.  She accompanies voice students in recitals and juries at Rock Valley College, Rockford College, and Northern Illinois University, where she relies on a good working knowledge of German to assist singers.  Valerie has been selected to be a collaborative pianist for the American Choral Directors' Association (ACDA) National Convention in March 2011.  She attended Voices of the Millenium 2010.  She is a licensed teacher of Musikgarten, an early childhood music curriculum, and has taken training with The Center for Music and the Young Child, of Princeton, NJ. She has taught Suzuki and traditional piano, and teaches early childhood music at the Music Academy of Rockford College.

Voices of Summer NFP (Not For Profit) and its subsidiary, Voices of the Millennium, are incorporated under the Illinois State Not For Profit Corporation Act. Tax exempt status has been granted by the State of Illinois Attorney General. The application for 501c3 status with the United States Internal Revenue Service is pending. Donations toward the 850 IRS application fee through this website would be appreciated greatly! Please contact us for more information about donating.

We would like to thank the following for their continued financial support: Patricia Deckert, Ke-Yin Kilburn (Federation of Mid-American Chinese Academic Organizations), and Cheryl Porter (http://www.cherylporter.com).