Jamie Wigginton: Vocal Coach, Creator of The Vocal Edge

Jamie Wigginton is a performance and vocal coach who works with some of the biggest voices in the music industry. He is well-known both across the US and internationally for his exceptional ability to quickly assess and aid vocalists in all aspects of vocal performance and extending vocal range. He has done over 50 international tours in 11 countries – appearing in concert and presenting Master Classes on performance and vocal technique.

Jamie authored The Karaoke Singer’s Guide to Greatness, The Pro Singer’s Warm-up, and co-authored Singing Success – which was the biggest-selling self-improvement program of any kind on the entire internet for many years. He is the creator of VocalEdge, and his Vocal Edge Studio is located here in Nashville on historic Music Row. He also serves as full-time Instructor of Commercial Voice Performance at Belmont University. His prestigious elite singing group Phoenix – Belmont's best of the best – performs annually at The Schermerhorn with the Nashville Symphony.

Jamie is the only student in Belmont's history to graduate with a double major in both Vocal and Piano Performance. He has been a background singer for music superstars such as Garth Brooks, Trisha Yearwood, Ray Stevens, Vince Gill, Donna Summer, and many more. He is also an ASCAP songwriter and composer/arranger whose orchestrations have been feature in over 500 broadcasts, and is the Musical Director for Musico A Musico, an international music education organization geared towards artists who use their gifts in the church.

Episode Highlights

Embark on a vocal odyssey with Jamie Wigginton, where triumph over physical adversity harmonizes with a passion for melody and teaching. Our conversation leads you on a path of discovery, as Jamie reveals the early challenges that carved his vocal prowess and his journey to becoming a vocal coach par excellence. We demystify the myth of tone-deafness, offering hope and technique to those aiming to hone their vocal skills, and we delve into Jamie's approach to making complex vocal concepts accessible for aspiring singers.

Jamie navigates the delicate balance between classical and commercial vocal training, dissecting the act of performance coaching where voice, style, and substance collide. You'll hear about the transformative impact of vocal coaching across cultures, the art of crafting an artist's stage persona, and the intricate role of a vocal coach in shaping an artist's career. As we engage in this melodic conversation, Jamie shares his expertise in sculpting not just voices, but also the future of music through his mentorship at Belmont University and leadership of the elite Phoenix vocal program.

In this episode, we cover a lot of ground including:

• His upbringing in a “hillbilly Partridge family”

• How his personal physical vocal problems led to becoming a great coach

• The reality of tone deafness, and how it could be corrected

• Becoming the first and only person to graduate from Belmont University with a double major in Piano and Vocal Performance

• Working with John Michael Montgomery, Mariah Carey, Jessica Simpson, Luke Bryan, and others

• What it takes for a singer to make a great bandmate

• The challenges of voice coaching in other countries and languages

• Creating a successful business, the best advice he ever received, and SO much more!

Listen

Read the Complete Transcript

 Shane

Hello, everyone! Welcome to the official Live2cre8 podcast, coming to you from Nashville, Tennessee. I am your host, Shane Almgren, and I am joined today, also from Nashville, by performance and vocal coach—and one of my dearest friends in the world—Jamie Wigginton. Jamie works with some of the biggest voices in the music industry and is well-known both across the US and internationally for his exceptional ability to quickly assess and aid vocalists in all aspects of vocal performance and extending vocal range. He has authored The Karaoke Singer’s Guide to Greatness, The Pro Singer’s Warm-Up, and co-authored Singing Success, which was the biggest-selling self-improvement program of any kind on the internet for many years. He is also the creator of VocalEdge, and his Vocal Edge Studios is located here in Nashville on historic Music Row. He also serves as a full-time instructor of commercial voice performance at Belmont University.

So, Jamie, welcome to the show. Thanks for joining me today.

Jamie Wigginton

My honor, sir.

Shane

I want you to tell me why I should be talking to you. Why am I talking to you about vocals?

Jamie Wigginton

Well, I have a passion for inspiring other people to do what I do—that's what they are called to. I like teaching other teachers how to teach, whether it is mixed martial arts or whether it's singing. I love to break things down and put them into little edible, swallowable bits so that just about anybody can take it up and do things that they never thought they could do. So that's my calling. It's my passion.

Shane

What's your background? How early in life did you start out doing this?

Jamie Wigginton

I started coaching my sophomore year in high school. Now I grew up singing in kind of a hillbilly Partridge family and toured around the country doing bluegrass and southern gospel stuff, and I always had trouble with my voice. Hated singing. Singing hurts. Turns out, I was allergic to planet Earth—everything. So I never felt good. My cords were always swollen, and I was in and out of doctor's offices. But we never could afford specialists, so I was always having to figure out ways to just make it work. Then I found out that I have a couple of things wrong with me that should make it to where I could not even physically sing. I'm not supposed to be able to sing at all. My thyroid cartilage is abnormally narrow. My uvula hangs way too low, and I have chronic anemia.

So all those things together should have made me think otherwise, but I was already so deep into it. I had already developed a passion for it, so I thought, “Well, I'm just going to figure this out and figure out a way to do it.” So that is a huge testimony to how I can listen to just about any voice and figure out very quickly what is wrong with it and then figure out a way around it.

I started teaching my sophomore year in high school because my high school had absolutely no choral vocal program whatsoever. They put their money into the football program and even the band. They built a concession stand to raise money for the band, and then they changed it to where all that money went to the football team, anyway. So I started a choir, and I picked my friends. I taught them how to sing. I arranged the music, and my mom played for it. We went to competition, and we won regional and state my sophomore, junior, and senior year. And to this day, they still have a choral program. So that was my big start. My friends were my guinea pigs.

Shane

And you had a ragtag bunch that you just threw together, told them—were any of them—like, could they sing already, and you just had to coach them on technique? Or were these people that had to learn do-re-mi?

Jamie Wigginton

Well, here's the thing. Unless you are tone-deaf, you can learn to sing. But tone deafness is a real thing. It's just, honestly, very rare, and being tone-deaf is not a talent problem. It's an actual physical disorder. That means you’ve got something wrong with you if you have this thing where your ears cannot match vibrations. So that aside, yeah, anybody can sing, but no, none of my friends actually sang. No, no, no. There were some soccer players, and some guys on the wrestling team, and then some really hot girls that I was friends with, and we got together and learned how to do some stuff.

Shane

That's actually one of the questions that I had written down—was about tone deafness, if that was a real legitimate thing, and if it's correctable. Let's sidestep for one second instead of hitting it later. So what is the actual physical condition that's going on there if someone is legit tone deaf?

Jamie Wigginton

Absolutely, and I can use my poor dad as a prime example. He wishes to anything that he could sing, and he can't. He's a great musician. He actually plays bass really well, and he can tune the bass guitar. But when it's coming out of his own face, he cannot tune it. But here's the thing: He doesn't just sing random pitches. He is usually a third above, so he matches it, usually a third above.

Shane

He was accidentally singing harmonies.

Jamie Wigginton

Well, he's inadvertently singing harmony, but not good harmony, you know, because that's not the complete rule. So he's usually about a third above, and he's not, like, out of key. He's in the right key; he just cannot find the right pitch. Now, is it correctable? Yes, it is, but it is never going to be like it is with somebody who does not have that issue because they're having to constantly overcompensate. Now, if they started correcting it early childhood, they could probably get to where they don't even notice it anymore and be able to be fine. But most are immediately discouraged by adults saying, “Oh, you can't sing. Do something else.” And they don't do it. So then it's too late.

Shane

So get them before they get discouraged.

Jamie Wigginton

Get them before they get discouraged if you want them to do it. Should you really push somebody to go into a vocal career who is tone deaf? No, not really.

Shane

I should stop doing that, then?

Jamie Wigginton

Yeah, you should probably stop doing that. It's just going to make them hate you in the long run.

Shane

So you had your hot girls and your soccer guys, and you put this choir together. You guys went off and won regionals, and then you left high school. And what happened?

Jamie Wigginton

Left high school and auditioned for colleges, and I ended up getting a free ride at the University of Louisville. And my parents were really relieved because we didn't have a dime. We were really poor. And then, I did this really bad thing. I auditioned for Belmont University, and I got in. And I got every scholarship that they had available, and it was still thousands because Belmont just simply does not give scholarships. But much to my parents’ dismay—but with their amazing support—I went to Belmont, and I don't regret it a bit. Yeah, it was expensive. I took out a bunch of loans. My first job out of college, however—they liked me so much that they wrote a check for it and paid for the entire thing. So, you know, thank the universe for that, or whoever you want to thank, because it must have been supposed to have gone that way because I never had to make a college payment.

Shane

And your major was in vocal performance, and did you also major in piano performance?

Jamie Wigginton

Piano performance and vocal performance. I was the first and only ever to do it. Basically, I got two degrees in five years.

Shane

And so you got out of college, and you started—how did you start drumming up clients because you started teaching fairly recently after graduation, didn't you?

Jamie Wigginton

Well, I took a job with a great big church in Florida, and that ended up being another really great place for me to hone some skills. It happened to be a very wealthy church, and they treated me so well in so many different ways, but one of the ways was I had carte blanche to do just about anything. So if I wanted to have an orchestra or a boy choir or a rock band, they said here it is. They gave me a credit card pretty much to do anything I wanted to do because I was piloting a program for them. So I was giving voice lessons there to the people that were in my ensembles at varying degrees of skill. Some of them were horrible, and some of them were absolutely world-class. So you actually become a better teacher by teaching the worst clients, because you have really got to pull it out of the thin air sometimes, and you find that balance between lying and bullshitting, and there's a difference. There's a difference. Some call it motivation, others call it manipulation.

I prefer motivation, but you have to limit the number of negatives that come out of your mouth when you're teaching anything from sports to music because as soon as the person's ego starts to sink, the lesson's over. So you've got to figure out quickly how much can the client take and push them as hard and fast as they can because they're paying me a lot of money. And when I am with a client, I like telling people—I even tell my students this. It's like a game show to me—a reality show. So I want to diagnose what the real issue is, and I want to see how fast can I kill this. So it's fun for me, but it's very beneficial for the client because they don't want to keep paying me for the rest of their lives. I want to fix their issues, and they can get on with their tour, or get on with their album—or whatever—and then come back as they need to.

Shane

And you've gotten so adept at that that you were—I mean, you pretty much guarantee a miracle by the third lesson.

Jamie Wigginton

Third lesson miracle. Yeah, nobody has learned how to levitate as of yet, but you gain about an octave of range from the bottom to the top. Quite honestly, you don't even have to be that skilled to do that. If any teacher runs you through scales and keeps the larynx stable, you're going to expand your range. The way I do it is more powerful because I can give you more power at the top rather than just floating up in falsetto and head voice. But yeah, it's a pretty easy sell, and I can pretty much guarantee that without hesitation.

Shane

Yeah, I did some classes with you, and you made my voice do things that I couldn't ever get it to do again in the car or the shower.

Jamie Wigginton

Right? You did very well, very true.

Shane

So you were in Florida working at a church. Then you decided to come to Nashville and jump into the music business.

Jamie Wigginton

Immediately. Yes, that was really—my passion was to get to Nashville and start up vocal coaching.

Shane

And give us a list of some of the names that we would recognize that you've worked with.

Jamie Wigginton

Let's see. John Michael Montgomery, whom I absolutely love. I worked—I don't mind telling people I did work for Mariah very briefly, but I have to say she was very lovely. They flew me to Vegas. I got to meet her, and she had a couple of questions, and that was the end of it. But hey, I can technically say I worked for Mariah, so that was nice. Let's see. Jessica Simpson. Working her Star-Spangled Banner up. Who else would you know? Luke Bryan. I am currently working for Ryan Griffin, who signed to Sony, and he's got his first song—praise God—coming out really soon. And Cale Dodds, who is already released. He's another one of my favorite boys that I'm working for.

Shane

Now, how did you get started doing the international coaching stuff?

Jamie Wigginton

Okay, this is really cool. Working at Belmont University, there was a lady that worked in the office who was involved in it, and she played saxophone for this group called Musico A Musico, and what they do is they're basically a touring music arts university, so they go to places that can never afford really good quality training, and we do it. So it was everything from—even church architecture to dance, to how to run a band rehearsal, to how to write a chart, even how to use finale, which, if you don't know, is how you get your music from your brain into sheet music, purchasable form. We would do concerts every night and classes all during the day. So I went with them to Peru and then, I think, to Guatemala, and by the third tour, they had made me the musical director, and we've been doing it ever since. So I've gone to over 50—I think 53 internationals now.

Shane

What's your favorite place to visit doing the tours?

Jamie Wigginton

As a tourist, I'm going to have to say Prague. Prague was a spiritual, out-of-body experience.

Shane

What about it?

Jamie Wigginton

I'll tell you what about it. First of all, the first thing you notice is it is really—it's not like anything that we have in the US because the US is so young. You go over there, and you have buildings all around you that are literally built in the 1600s and are just gorgeous. They call it the City of Spires, so you just look up in the air, and the whole skyline is full of spires instead of skyscrapers, like you see here in the US.

The people are extremely friendly. They know we can't speak Czech. Even German people think Czech is too difficult to learn. The people are happy that you're there. The food is fantastic. I hate beer, but I love Czech beer. But here is the main thing: In Nashville, you can go and see country and jazz and even some rock every night of the week, and we also have fantastic world-class classical here with the Nashville Symphony. Well, in Prague, seven days a week, any time of the day, you can go hear a symphony, or an opera, or a chamber music orchestra, or a chamber music concert.

I was in a bookstore that is in Old Town—they call it—next to the Astronomical Clock, and if anybody's been to Prague, they're going to know exactly what I'm talking about. There's a little coffee shop there—a bookshop—and I was sitting at a desk. I looked down, and I saw carved into the desk “Einstein,” and then, underneath it, it said “Chopin.” So I was on a walking tour, and I asked around about that, and they said, “No, they actually carved those names there themselves.”

Shane

Einstein and Chopin.

Jamie Wigginton

So, as it turns out, George Sand, Liszt—everybody that we know from the Romantic classical era went to that bookshop, and the history is just so rich there. In fact, that's where Einstein developed most of his theory of relativity—in Prague.

Shane

How do you teach when you're working with people who don't speak the same language?

Jamie Wigginton

Well, here's the thing. If it's one of the Romance languages, it's not that hard—French, Italian, German, and Spanish as well. When you're teaching somebody who has a tonal language—if you're doing Korean, you're doing Chinese, not so much Japanese—they get it a little bit easier. But teaching the tour vowels, my usual methods—all of my tricks—most of them don't even work because those sounds don't sound right to them. And if I say, “’u.’ Repeat ‘u.’” A Chinese person is going to go, “Uhh.” Some unusual noise. I can't make that noise, so let's do something else. So that's the most difficult thing.

When I am in foreign lands, I can get by. Spanish is fine. In Germany, I'm fine. But if I have to teach in other languages, I always have a translator there for me, and I've gotten very good at using only phrases with no idiomatic words in them. That means no things that could mean other things. Just say what you mean in simple, simple English so that the translator isn't constantly asking, “What does that mean? What does that mean?” So that's how you do it.

You’ve got to make sure that you're working for the client—number one. Figure out why they are giving you money. What is it they want to do? Very often they have an agenda, and sometimes they just come in, and they say, “I don't know. Just work me out, I just want to see what some vocal technique can do for me.” So that's what you do. Once you get the hang of it in a different language, it's really not that hard, and it's funny in your mind's eye when months later, when you think back on the lessons, you forget the translator because the humanity of it really comes through. The music comes through, and you forget that you're even talking through somebody else. It's beautiful.

Shane

When somebody comes in and they say, “Listen to my voice,” and they sing something for you, what are you listening for? When you hear problem areas, are you visualizing the internal mechanisms of their larynx, their vocal cords? What are you thinking about?

Jamie Wigginton

Very often, if it is a classical singer, it's more important that we get a pure and healthy tone. But here's the deal. Usually, the case is that somebody coming into me that's singing commercial music, which is going to be country, jazz, rock, something like that, popular music. I'm listening for something that's commercially viable. So if I have a young girl—let's say—come in, and here's a very common problem: She'll come in, and she's been taking voice lessons since she was four years old. And she comes in, and she's trying to sing an Ariana Grande song, but it sounds like she's singing, like, an art song—everything is too taught. It's too perfect. The vowels are too pure. Her vibrato is too much; it's on every single note. That's when voice lessons suck because a lot of teachers—and this is actually going away now—but we were plagued with all of these teachers frowning upon commercial singing period, so they made them sing “Caro Mio Ben,” or all these Italian things, and had them singing in a more lyrical, classical style. And they would tell their students, “If you can sing classical, you can sing anything.” Well, that is hogwash—absolutely hogwash. Have you ever heard an opera singer try to sing Aretha Franklin? It's disgusting. And a lot of them try to do it, and they think they're singing commercial music. They're not. They sound silly. Their licks are chunky. They have no style. They have way too much vibrato. There's no soul. So that is what I'm listening for.

Number one: I am thinking, “Can this person make a living with the sound that is coming out of their mouths at this moment?” If not, they're paying me to fix it. So the phrasing—I would say—is the first thing I'm going to go for. We'll do some vocal technique to warm up the voice, so I'm sure that I'm getting the most out of them. But what we really want is a sound that we can sell—a sound that is relatable. And I have so many artists that come in and say, “Well, I have something to say.” I ask them, “Why are you an artist?” “Well, I have a message.” “Okay, that's cool. What's your message?” They usually say, “I don't know,” and I make them go home and do some homework. But if they do have a message, the next comment that I have to tell them is: “That's great. But unless you put this message in a form that anybody gives a crap about, the message does not matter. No one's going to hear it. You have to be relevant.” So, beyond technique, I go for style.

Shane

And at this point, you become more than just a vocal coach, and you're actually a performance coach. I mean, you're fixing all aspects. You're working on image. You're working on message. I imagine you probably help with lyrics, and melody, and stage presence.

Jamie Wigginton

Absolutely, I do. I have a space here at my home where I work on the stuff with the artists, and then we rent a space at SIR when we're putting shows together with the big band. But yeah, man, you have to wear a bunch of different hats—everywhere from psychologist and then finally to vocal coach. So it's not like teaching any other instrument, and that's why a lot of people ask me to teach them piano, and I just hate it. I hate teaching piano because it is a mechanical thing, and teaching voice is a much more personal, intimate, scarier thing. When you push a chord on the piano, when you hit a C chord, that's what you're going to hear. When you open your mouth, you’re flesh and blood. So it depends on your hormones, your mood, what you've had to eat, your vocal health, your ego—which is crucial. So all those things come into play. So, yeah, you're a cheerleader, you're a psychologist, and finally, you're a vocal coach.

Shane

Do you have any tools or tricks when somebody comes in and they're just terrified to sing for the first time? What do you do to loosen them up?

Jamie Wigginton

That is a pretty common thing—I would say—with my young girls, and usually they want to sing really badly, but they're just shy, and they put up an immediate wall, right? And this is a teenager, pre-teenager type of thing, and I think all teenagers go through it. But it's more difficult for the girls because they feel like there's so much pressure on them. So what I have to do is I have to see how quickly can I get to her? How quickly can I make her laugh? Can I make her feel pretty? Can I make her feel good about herself so that she can let down that wall just enough for me to get my hand through and grab her by the throat and say, “You're okay. We're going to do this.” Now, if they simply don't want to do it, I usually will not work with those clients, and that happens occasionally too.

I do fire clients, but usually that's what the problem is. They have a wall up, and there's a psychology that you have to bust through. If it was a flute lesson, she would not have that trouble. She would push the right keys on the flute, and she would blow, and we can work on tone, but because it's something personal that's coming from her heart, that makes it a lot more difficult and a lot more challenging, and, for me, a lot more rewarding and fun. Because at the end of the day, if I break through to that teenage girl and make her trust me to where at the end of her lesson she's actually laughing and feeling like a million bucks, that is success to me.

Shane

How often does it happen where somebody comes in that you've not met, you've not heard before—they open their mouth, and you sit there and kind of go, “Oh my goodness, where did this come from? This is amazing.”

Jamie Wigginton

Oh, it happens a lot. I'm blessed at a point in my career where I do get some world-class, amazing vocalists, and I'll tell you what—like I said—one of the first things I said: You learn more from teaching the bad clients. I think it's another extreme. You also learn a whole lot from teaching the world-class people, where you're thinking in a cold sweat, “Dear Lord, they just paid me a lot of money. What can I do for this person because they're already perfect in every way?” But then, the truth is: No, they're already perfect. There is something—there's a reason why they're here, and there's something that I can give to them. So that's the challenge with the world-class, natural singer that's just flawless.

Shane

What is somebody like a Mariah or like a Brian McKnight—when you hear them and you go, “That is what a perfect singer sounds like.” But those people are doing constant vocal lessons. What is it that they're working on?

Jamie Wigginton

Longevity, I would say, because I have a couple of those. And I will say that I have two in mind right now. And if they're listening to this, you know I'm talking to you, and I'll just about say your name because I'll call you out, but I won't. They're paying me every week because it's a security blanket, and when I start to feel that happen, I really call them out quickly on it. Sometimes they're afraid to get out in the real world and actually start singing, and every week I'll be like, “Do you have a show scheduled? Do you have anything scheduled? Are you writing some stuff that we can get in the studio and actually work on?” And it's always, “Yeah, I'm close. I'm close.”

But really paying me is like paying gym memberships to a gym that you never go to. At least you feel good, you know. Your bank account is automatically withdrawing that money. So you feel like, “Okay, I belong to a gym. I'm a step closer to my goal.”

Shane

I’m a gym member.

Jamie Wigginton

Yes, I'm a gym member. That's right. That's exactly right. So they're paying me with that mentality. So I have to be very careful about that and keep an eye on people, and I spend some time in every lesson quickly discussing: What are the goals? How are you using me today? And the first question I ask in every lesson is: What's my agenda? Because I want them to tell me: What are you paying me to do with you today?

Shane

Where did you learn—or did you learn—your particular teaching technique from anyone? Is this your own sort of craft, or is this—did you have mentors that guided you a little bit?

Jamie Wigginton

I had some great mentors that I love to brag on. I would say my first mentor is my mom. She did not know the science behind it, but she sure knew voices, and she sure knew when I was faking it. She’s still one of the greatest vocalists and the best gospel pianist you'll ever hear. But she made us sing, and I don't remember a day when I could not sing harmony. I don't remember not understanding that. So when I went to public school and I realized, “Wow, everybody can't do that,” I thought, “Well, that's interesting. I thought everybody could sing and sing harmony.” So there's that. My mom—number one. I would say number two is Richard Miller, whom we just lost a couple years ago. He wrote The Structure of Singing, which is the science bible of singing. He was a vocal scientist first and foremost, and I was very blessed to have been able to work under him, and to accompany a bunch of his lessons—well, hundreds and hundreds of lessons—and to watch his teaching style. He had an amazing ability to diagnose quickly, get right to the root of the problem, and get a singer to make an absolutely beautiful noise quickly.

Then, when I first moved back to Nashville, I actually signed up with an agency who you know—Sharon at Talent Trek. I was on a gig for her, and I had some outfit on. I don't remember, but I saw a sign on a post, and it said, “Seth Riggs, Master Vocal Coach.” I tore it off the post, and it turns out that it was at Belmont University. They were doing a conference there. So I barged into this thing that I did not pay for. And here's another lesson in life, kids: You've got to know when to be ballsy.

And this was me being ballsy. I didn't pay to be there. I had never even heard of this man. So during a break, I walked up to him, and I said, “Sir, I've not paid to be here. I don't really know what's going on, but I really want to do what you're doing.” He sat down with me for 45 minutes. He spent his entire break—all these people around who had paid hundreds of dollars to be there—for some reason, he picked me out, and he talked to me for a long time. It turns out that he's the most infamous and most famous vocal coach alive. He toured with Michael Jackson for years.

You can't name anybody, from Diana Ross to Stevie Wonder, that he does not personally work for. But what he also did for me was he directed me to Brett Manning, and we have a huge, and long, and beautiful history. But I started taking lessons with Brett. Within three months, I was his first associate, and then within six months, we were roommates.

Shane

Mm-hmm. I remember those days.

Jamie Wigginton

Yeah, you remember those days. Those were some hard-and-awesome-at-the-same-time days. So Brett has been nothing but so kind to me and has really just let me do anything I wanted to with singing success and really pushed me out to start VocalEdge. We still talk just about every day, and he's still one of my best friends. So those are my big vocal mentors.

Shane

And you and Brett—you co-authored Singing Success, did you not?

Jamie Wigginton

Yeah, that's very true.

Shane

And now I got to brag on you because that was what? The biggest selling…

Jamie Wigginton

The biggest selling self-help program of any kind there for quite a while—like, for a few years. So, yeah, I did very well.

Shane

And did you use that—that was a co-authorship. Did you write your own after that?

Jamie Wigginton

I did, but I never wrote a full CD program, and the reason is I realized that everything's online and making things by selling physical copies—it's kind of a bum deal anymore because no one respects intellectual property and, honestly, we're still figuring out a way to do it. But the best way that we've made money is to give stuff away for free. Unfortunately, the program is more effective, but people don't see that. They want things that are free, and immediate, and right in front of their face. So, actually, I still plan on doing it. It's just a dreadfully expensive endeavor. It's about 80 grand to record a program like that, and you just can't expect much ROI anytime soon. I think, just out of just conscious, I feel like I need to do that and get my entire technique on a CD program and get it out there.

Shane

Let's talk a little bit about what you're doing at Belmont University these days.

Jamie Wigginton

Yep, what do you want to know?

Shane

Did you approach them, or did they approach you? How did you end up back at Belmont?

Jamie Wigginton

Funny thing about that. A good friend who was a teacher there for many years, Janet Kenyon—and she's also another fantastic vocal coach in town, and she's one that I recommend. She quit to start Kenyon Artist Development, and when she quit, Belmont needed somebody quick. So the School of Music called me, and they said, "'We need you to help us out for a semester because we're looking for a full-time faculty.”

Now, I do not have the correct credentials to teach at a university like that because, technically, they require that you either have your doctorate or have everything but your thesis finished to work there to get your doctorate. So I went there and taught there for a semester. They liked me, so they said, “Can we keep you for another semester?” So I did another semester, and that was 14 years ago. [Laughs]. So apparently, they liked me okay. So now I am the director of the top vocal program there called Phoenix, which you can get online and scope that stuff out. It's absolutely incredible, and I do a lot of the orchestrations for the big concerts as well. I teach the graduate program for career development and also pop styles, which is a really fun class to where we can do what we were talking about earlier, where you can find a sound that really makes you commercial. In addition to that, we do all the private lessons as well.

Shane

And your group, Phoenix—that's an invitation, tryout, or open invitation, but it's a very rigorous, very select elite group of singers.

Jamie Wigginton

Yep. About 100 students audition for it every year. For instance, this past year, there was one spot. So that was a really tough decision, but out of the 100 that auditioned, it was 98 or something like that—mostly live auditions, some video submissions. I had to pick one. So there's 10 vocalists and then 6 permanent band members, and then for the shows, we bring in full string, full brass, and anything that we need, really.

Shane

How did you narrow it down to one?

Jamie Wigginton

That is a wonderful question, and I hope all of the people that did not get into the group understand this as well. I usually make this very, very clear. It's not a singing competition. It's casting a group. It's casting almost like a TV show. I want who is marketable. So if you can get up there and sing flawlessly but you don't have anything interesting about you that makes you care that your voice is good, then it's not for you. Here's another little caveat, though.

If I were casting a group that was supposed to get on a tour bus and tour the world, my selections might slightly be different—not always, but often—and here's the reason. Let's suppose I have one space. There will be a couple of singers who are absolutely flawless. They are road ready, she's absolutely hot, she's gorgeous, she writes all of her own music, she can produce, she sings, she dances, and she's got a unique look, a unique sound, everything. She's a senior. Now, I have this other girl who is a junior. She's almost there—not quite, but I see that she's an absolute goldmine if I can get her in early. I put her in over the person who is already ready for a bus because what am I going to do for that person? Maybe a little bit, but I can take that person who is a diamond in the rough, and I can spend the next two years—her junior and her senior year—and I can really be effective and make a huge difference in somebody's life. So that's who I choose.

Shane

What kind of things have your Phoenix singers gone on to do after they graduated?

Jamie Wigginton

Oh, lots of cool stuff. Well, you know Daya? That [sings] “where all the good girls go to hideaway?” That was written by Brett McLaughlin, and he was in Phoenix for two years, years ago when I first took it over. Of course, you know who Melinda Doolittle is. She was American Idol's number two, I think. And the world now knows who Rayvon Owen is because he was number three, wasn't it, on American Idol this past time?

Shane

Oh, yeah. That boy’s bad.

Jamie Wigginton

Yeah. Oh yeah, he's amazing, absolutely wonderful. So we've got Phoenix members who—especially our band members—are touring with just the top—a lot of country acts and some pop acts. One of my drummers was out with Shania for years before she decided to sit up at the house and not do anything anymore. So we have actually a very good success rate of performers, and writers, and people who actually stay in the music industry.

One of the most desirable things of being in Phoenix is that you learn how to do everything from the ground up. The singers, for instance, learn how to write a chart. They have to learn how to write a chart. They're graded on it, so they have to turn in a chart. I, or my teacher's assistant, grades the chart, gives it back to them, they make the corrections, and then they come in with their assigned time, and they have to teach the chart to the band. They can change anything they want to change. They can make the production any way they want to do it. Then they have to take the background vocalists, which are—if you don't know, that's the harmonies—and they can select anybody they want—two guys, two girls. They can have nine backup singers. They can have a gospel choir—anything they want. But they have to know every part so that they can go in and teach every part to the background vocalist.

So when you're watching Phoenix, the really neat thing about it is it's all that artist. They did everything. They wrote the chart, they taught the band, they did the rehearsal. They have to know how to run a rehearsal. So by the time they leave my program, they're ready. They know how to do everything, and we don't have any what we call “chick singers,” which are—you know, that's a derogatory term, but unfortunately, it’s very true. It's a singer who doesn't know how to do anything about music except sing the damn song. “What tune are we in?” “I don't know.” “What's the tempo?” “I don't know.” “Count me off.” “How do you do that? Count you off. I don't even know what that means.” Well, Phoenix people know how to do all of that. So when they graduate, they're highly respected, and they're ready for the real world.

Shane

You mentioned a few minutes ago one of your colleagues there who is a vocal coach that you recommend. What makes a coach a coach that you would recommend, and why would you not recommend someone?

Jamie Wigginton

Sure, there is a plague of vocal coaches in Nashville, and it has been happening for the past, I would say, five to seven years. A lot of people have found out, “Hey, I can sing. I can make some money while I'm trying to make it in my real career.” There's nothing wrong with that. But just because you can sing well does not make you a good teacher, and the vice versa is very often true. Somebody may not have a beautiful voice, but they know how to teach and break down the pedagogy. I prefer both because there are people like Janet Kenyon who sing their butts off and can break it down, and they actually know the science of it. They're not going to say, “Just sing from your heart, open your mouth, breathe more.” No, they know the actual science of it.

Shane

Feel the music?

Jamie Wigginton

Yeah, exactly. They can make that person—they can make a difference in one lesson. I don't recommend one lesson for any teacher because you need three before it starts to sink in. But if you can only afford one lesson, those teachers are worth it, and that would be, I would say, Brett, Janet, and, in town, I have a couple of teacher’s assistants who are almost ready for that recommendation, but they need a little more experience.

Shane

Let's say a person doesn't want to go into the Phoenix program, but we've got a million singing contests going on, either nationally or American Idol or the Voice or whatever, and people stand in line for hours and hours. Other than shyness, what types of flaws fail to make an impression? What kind of stuff do you see the most often that gets in the way of a person’s success?

Jamie Wigginton

Okay, are you saying, like, if they were to audition for American Idol or something like that? What is a red flag?

Shane

Yes.

Jamie Wigginton

Okay, cool.

Shane

Yeah. Assume they can sing, but you know somebody's...

Jamie Wigginton

They can sing. Sure. What's going to get a no? Is that what you're asking?

Shane

Yeah.

Jamie Wigginton

Okay, that's great. That's a great question. There are so many things that can raise a red flag that's going to make a judge tell you no. Sometimes they are completely subjective, and it can be only that person's opinion. But many times, they're not, and they’re things that you can fix. The impression. Shyness is not a red flag, because sometimes shyness can really work for you, especially for the guys. If you play the shy card right and it's sincere and it really is who you are, the girls love it, and it makes you immediately marketable, and it makes you endearing. You don't even have to sing that good, but if they think that you have that puppy-dog thing about you, then that's great. So shyness, eh, that's fine.

I would say that the biggest thing is that there's nothing there. There's no life. The eyes tell everything. They are truly the windows to the soul. So when people are auditioning for me, their eyes are vacant or they're shifty. They're not trying to entertain me. They're not trying to convey any message whatsoever. All they're doing is trying to sing a song well. That's not an artist. You're a singer; you're not an artist. So these shows and me, we are looking for artists. So that's why we keep saying it's not a singing competition.

Yes, it's wonderful if a voice can absolutely wail, but you and I both know a lot of people—we would probably name some of the same ones—who have world-class voices, but their careers never went anywhere. Why? There wasn't anything there. Yeah, she was hot, but there wasn't a message. Yeah, he had talent, and he could play guitars, but no one cared. Why did no one care? There wasn't the X factor. And yes, the X factor is mysterious, but there are some things that you can put to it. It is: Are the eyes solid? Do you have a message? Does the voice match the image? That's a huge thing. You don't want to be a walking contradiction.

Shane

Hmm.

Jamie Wigginton

What do you think?

Shane

I like that. I think that's good. So what advice would you give somebody who is going to go audition—try out for whatever it was? Now we know what not to do. Give them something positive.

Jamie Wigginton

Okay, here's something that you need to do. You need to approach with confidence and not cockiness. There's a big difference. Cockiness is very off-putting. Confidence says, “Hey, I got this.” You need to be socially engaging immediately. Some people have it naturally; some people need to learn it. So, whether you have an outgoing personality or you're more introverted, you can still engage. And if you don't know what that means, you need to learn. Engaging people means let's have a personal connection immediately. The first time you walk up and they hand you your sheet of paper, you should be able to make some sort of an impression where you walk away and that person goes, “Wow, he's really nice. Oh, wow, she's really nice.” How can you do that? That is the biggest thing you can do—even better, more so, than sing well.

Shane

What kind of advice do you have for somebody who's coming to Nashville, and they're not going to Belmont? They're not doing Phoenix. They're not going to come and get the entire program that turns them loose, ready to go. They just come here, and they want to sing, and they got a voice.

Jamie Wigginton

I think that is very admirable, and college absolutely is not for everybody. In fact, there's a lot of people who a couple of our professors have gone to and said, “You need to quit school because you're a fabulous student, but you don't need this. You don't need to graduate with $160,000 debt because you're ready.” There's one person in particular I can think of, and he's on the road with Nick Jonas right now and wrote two of the songs on the last album. He was in Phoenix as well, and we were like, “You just got to go, dude. There's no guitar teacher here who can play as well as you play, so you just need to go.”

Now, those people aside, if you come to Nashville, you need to have your BS detector on. You need to learn how to differentiate between a compliment and somebody kissing your butt—quickly. That's not as bad as it used to be back in the day, but it still exists. If people promise you the moon, you need to smile and say “thank you” and then move on. Be as self-sufficient as you possibly can. Do not wait on other people to do everything for you or your big break, because you are your big break.

You don't know how to program, and you need programming, and you can't afford it. You know what the answer is. You get on Lynda.com, and you learn how to do it. You pay the monthly fee, whatever. I think Lynda charges $20 a month. Completely worth it. Learn Pro Tools. Learn Logic. Learn how to do programming. Learn what mic you need to use in the studio so that when you get in there, you're not wasting money experimenting, and then you're going to leave there with an $8,000 project and three songs, and you hate it. The more you know going into it, the more time and heartache that you're going to save. So educate yourself.

Now, you're not spending money on Belmont. Good. Good, it's not for everybody. You don't need to. Spend your money wisely, but it's not free. That's a big mistake that I see. People coming here, and they're like, “Well, I don't have money for this.” Well, then, you need to sell papers. You need to drive Uber. You need to do something because it's not free. You need to get good voice lessons. You probably need to take guitar lessons. You probably need to pay somebody to teach you how to read a little music so that you're not a dummy when you go in the studio and you're dependent on everybody else. The less you can be dependent on everybody else, the better you are.

The best example of that—watch Tori Kelly's video “Confetti.” The best part of that video is the rolling credits, because you know what it says? It says “Confetti,” written by Tori Kelly, recorded by Tori Kelly, guitars by Tori Kelly, engineered by Tori Kelly—every single thing. She's the only name on the entire thing. She did 100% of it. Hunter Hayes—same thing. If you see him in concert, he’s playing loops that he programmed in that first album. He played every instrument on it.

Shane

We hear stories about how Celine won't sing at all before a show, or she won't talk. She'll write stuff on paper. How often do you think singers should be singing to get the proper amount of exercise for their voice?

Jamie Wigginton

Sure, now, Celine is a perfect example of a thin voice. Now, thin does not mean weak. It's laser-sharp. And if you've ever seen her live—I've seen her live twice—it's unreal.

Shane

Yeah, I have.

Jamie Wigginton

Yeah, right? It's unbelievable. Her live is better than the recording, like she does more fireworks and more vocal acrobatics live, than she does on her recordings. But she will say—you can actually get on YouTube and look at her interviews. There's so many of them, and she talks about her vocal technique. She even demonstrates some of her vocal warm-ups that she uses with her vocal coach. Yes, Celine Dion still has a vocal coach, believe it or not—all the greats do. But she gets tired very easily, and when she's working at the Coliseum, that's a very rigorous schedule. So during the day, she will warm up, but then she won't speak. And even when Renee—rest in peace—when he would call her, she would tap on the phone once for “yes” and twice for “no,” or something like that, and she would have other people talk for her on the phone if she absolutely had to, but that's not that uncommon. Even Mariah—she was talking about how fragile her voice was, and she gets pretty eccentric with it, but I do understand. She sleeps in a sauna, basically, under a tent of humidifiers.

Shane

I remember you telling me a long time ago that women's voices tend to break down with age and men's kind of don't, or they get stronger sometimes, even.

Jamie Wigginton

Mm-hmm. Yeah, this is true.

Shane

Did I remember that correctly?

Jamie Wigginton

You remembered that very correctly, and it doesn't necessarily have to be a breakdown. But what happens is men's voices don't really mature until the mid-40s, perhaps. With women, they don't have testosterone. Sorry, ladies.

Shane

Look out, world, I’m coming! [Laughs].

Jamie Wigginton

But yeah, what they have at about 26 is what they're going to have. Now, we call it bronzing for the ladies, and it's actually a beautiful effect. But when a woman's voice ages, she starts to get a darker quality. She does lose her top because she loses collagen, and that's why we get wrinkles. But she loses collagen in her vocal cords, so she doesn't have the agility, and she doesn't have the range that she used to. But, you know, you just learn to work with it. Every woman doesn't experience a terrible degree of that, but the ones who push really, really hard—like Mariah—definitely experience that.

Shane

If somebody came to you and said they wanted to be a vocal coach, kind of like the way that you went and said that to Seth, what's the best piece of advice you would give them?

Jamie Wigginton

Do you really want to do this, or do you want to be an artist? That's the first question I always ask. Are you looking to help people and make a difference in people's lives, or are you looking to pay some bills? Yes, it can be both, but the former is the most important. If you're looking to really make a difference in somebody's life, then okay. I'll give you some advice, and I'll work with you.

But just being a great singer does not make you a good teacher. I have had countless of these people talk to me about this, and I would loan them books to read. I'd be like, “Did you read the chapters yet?” And they'd be like, “No, but I've been singing a lot.” Well, that doesn’t make you a good teacher. You have to know the mechanisms. You have to understand the science—the pedagogy. That is the science of teaching, if you didn't know that. Pedagogy is the science of teaching anything. You can be a bicycle pedagogist if you're a pedagogue. So that is what I tell people, and in fact, I usually try to discourage it. And then, if they're persistent and they’re like, “This is really what I want to do with my life,” then I'll push them.

Shane

Well, that’s what my next question was. If you were trying to discourage them, what would you say to them?

Jamie Wigginton

If I'm trying to discourage them?

Shane

Yeah.

Jamie Wigginton

I would tell them there's too many vocal coaches in this town whose passion is to make a difference in people's lives, and if you're just trying to pay some bills, you're not going to make it.

Shane

All right. Well, speaking of bills, that brings us to the end of the scripted interview. I've got 14 final questions. Are you ready for this?

Jamie Wigginton

Go for it.

Shane

All right. So if your job only did pay the bills and not a penny more, would you still continue to do it?

Jamie Wigginton

Absolutely, because I did it for years. Yeah, you just got to keep on going. This is my calling. It’s what I do.

Shane

What talent or skill do you not have that you wish you did?

Jamie Wigginton

I wish I was better at media. I wish I could program my WordPress better and do techie things a lot better. I put some time into it, and I can get by, but it's a skill I don't have. I have to work at it. So, yeah, that would be the one.

Shane

Fill in the blank. I'm a success if I _____.

Jamie Wigginton

I'm a success if I can support my family by doing something that really makes a lasting and dramatic result in all of my clients. That's success for me.

Shane

And fill in the blank again. I'm a failure if I _____.

Jamie Wigginton

I'm a failure if I make a lot of money and have no lasting impact.

Shane

What's the single best piece of advice you followed to get where you are today?

Jamie Wigginton

The best piece of advice I followed was you have to double your rate, and let me explain. Back when I was X amount of dollars, I had a huge problem with cancellations, and it was so bad because, listen, musicians are flaky people. If anything better comes up, they cancel the thing that they don't want to do, and they'll go do the other thing. Or if a paying gig comes up, they will cancel the voice lesson, and they will go do something else.

Brett told me, “Double your rate, and that will be over.” And I fought him for a year on it because I thought, “Who can afford that? It's so much money.” And he said, “Just do it.” So I bit the bullet, and I doubled my rate. It was rough there for about a month, I would say, and then it was over.

Everybody was like, “Okay, well, that's what it costs. I'll pay it.” And people took it more seriously because of its perceived value. It's not how much do I charge; it's how much is your career worth. And that makes a world of difference. At the end of the day, another reason why it's good that I doubled the rate is because it's not like teaching piano. Your voice wears out. My voice wears out. I teach long, long days, and those days are numbered. So if you're doing this, if you're wondering why vocal coaching is so much more expensive than taking a guitar lesson, it's because you're getting flesh and blood. You're not getting a pick or you're getting hands on a keyboard. You're getting someone's lifetime experience of flesh and blood. So anyway, long story short, double my rate is the best piece of advice I've ever followed.

Shane

What's a piece of well-intentioned advice you're glad you ignored to get where you are?

Jamie Wigginton

Well, I go back and forth on this one a lot, but advice that I got in my younger days was, “Why don't you do something more practical, like business, or do something that you know will have a solid future with a—what's it called—a 401k?” Is that right?

Shane

Oh yeah, that's exactly what I got. [Laughs].

Jamie Wigginton

Yeah, one of those things. [Laughs].

Shane

The advice, not the 401k. I didn’t get that.

Jamie Wigginton

Well, I have a 401b, actually, so I am in that boat. I do have it, but, yeah, that's the piece of advice that I am glad that I did not take.

Shane

What character trait do you like best about yourself?

Jamie Wigginton

I like best about myself, you say?

Shane

Yes.

Jamie Wigginton

I'm obnoxiously determined, and that's sometimes to my discredit, I would say. But if it's from anything, from getting a Cheerio out from under the chair of my truck [Laughs}, or if it is learning a new skill or something, I am shamelessly determined, and that has—so far—paid off well for me.

Shane

Is that why the driver's side chair of your truck was in the swimming pool?

Jamie Wigginton

That's a different thing.

Shane

That was a fruit loop.

Jamie Wigginton

That was a fruit loop. No, that was my cellphone. [Laughs].

Shane

What character trait do you like least about yourself?

Jamie Wigginton

I'm scattered as hell. If anybody has ever seen my office, it's the one place that I don't like my housekeeper to go. She can clean up under my bed, but I don't want her in my office because it's hideous. So, yeah, and it's not even in a good way. It's just too scattered. I wish that I had a little less ADD and was able to focus and not multitask, because multitasking is the crappy way of getting things done, and I still try to do it.

Shane

Okay, fill in the blank. I believe every child should have the opportunity to _____.

Jamie Wigginton

Every child should have the opportunity to explore music. And even if I wasn't a professional musician, I would still say that because I do see it taking a back seat. And even, you know, 30 something years ago, when I was a kid in elementary school, it was starting to take a back seat then. And we know, factually, that it opens the mind to so many other things other than just music. It rewires the brain. It helps kids to focus. It helps kids to even do math. So I would say, explore music.

Shane

All right, fun one. If you could have any superpower, what would it be?

Jamie Wigginton

Levitate. I've said that for years. I would levitate because I can find so many immediate uses for that.

Shane

If you could have dinner with anyone, alive or dead, who would it be?

Jamie Wigginton

This is a weird one. I think it would be Pink, quite honestly. I mean, some days I'm like, “It should be Jesus because I’ve got lots of questions for you, dude.” But alive—I think it would be Pink. She inspires me. I think that Pink goes so far beyond what is expected of her, that she really cares about her audience and she cares about art, and she really tries to bring an experience, not just when she's flying through the air but even in her music videos and her lyric writing. She brings something very, very different that—I don't know of any artist that does that, so I would love to pick her brain and just shake her hand and say, “Thanks.”

Shane

Yeah, I love her.

Jamie Wigginton

And maybe make out. Yep. [Laughs].

Shane

All right. A hospitable nearby planet has been discovered, and you've been recruited to help colonize it. You can take any three items with you that you wish. What are they?

Jamie Wigginton

I think it would be my iPod or something that I could play music on because I think that that is going to be crucial—playing or learning how to do music. And my iPod would have a little keyboard on it because I don't want to waste one item on an actual piano. First Aid Kit, of course. And my dog, Sparta.

Shane

All right. Finally, you have just won a lifetime achievement award in your field, so give us your acceptance speech. There won't be any music to cue you or rush you off the stage, so you can get to all the “thank yous” that you need. Or if there's any personal cause that you feel you need to champion, this is your soapbox, so let her rip.

Jamie Wigginton

Okay, cool. Well, first of all, I would definitely like to thank my parents for not accepting those. See, here's my soapbox. Here we go. Parents are pushovers anymore, and I see the special snowflake—the millennial generation—being given things that are not earned, and I want to thank my parents for making me work for things. I am thankful for growing up in complete poverty because I had no idea I was poor. I am very grateful that we never accepted a handout from the government, that we worked for it, and if we needed food, we went in the woods and we shot it because that has made me thankful and resourceful. It has helped me in every facet of my life.

I would definitely love to thank my close friend group—you being one of them—and my extended family, which is here in Nashville, for really knowing all the ugly things about me and still loving me anyway, because I think that is crucial. If you don't have that kind of support group, then you better get busy looking for it because you can't do this alone. You need people.

Other soapbox—I would say it needs to be you need to go for what you know is in your heart because I do see people going for the low-hanging fruit a lot, and there are times in my life when I also did that, and it was some immediate gratification, meaning I was able to pay more bills. But in the long run, if you don't love what you do, you're doing it wrong, and I see so many people getting old and hating what they do, and we call them the fluorescent light people. You know that, and they live in their cubicle. All they do is they live for five o'clock, and they live for Saturday. I cannot even imagine functioning in that way.

Do yoga. I would tell everybody to do yoga. Take up some sort of an athletic event that can get your body going and keep your mind straight. I guess that's it. I would say everybody just needs to claim what is theirs and go for it.

Shane

I think that was very well put, sir. Good job. Well, Jamie, that is all I have for you today. Let's tell everybody where they can go to find out more about you. It is VocalEdge.com, correct?

Jamie Wigginton

Sure, sure, and from there, you can follow me on the social media stuff. Don't do it if you're easily offended, but you're welcome if you're cool with it.

Shane

Yeah, we will link from our website to all of your channels, so that will be there.

Jamie Wigginton

Yeah, get on VocalEdgeTV. VocalEdgeTV, I would say, on Youtube is the most beneficial, and it's all free. So go there. You can watch some teaching videos, some seminars, and see some fantastic performances of people using great technique as well.

Shane

All right, well, so glad to have you on the show today. This was fantastic. Thank you one more time for joining us.

Jamie Wigginton

Absolutely, my honor, sir. Thank you so much.

Shane

Once again, that was performance and vocal coach and creator of VocalEdge, Jamie Wigginton. For more information, visit VocalEdge.com and check out his YouTube channel, VocalEdgeTV, for hundreds of free instructional videos. I'd like to thank everyone for joining me today. You were listening to the Live2cre8 podcast, and this is Shane Almgren reminding you to dream big, be inspired, and live creatively.