Teaching singing has introduced me to hundreds of interesting people. The woman who assigned jobs to inmates at the Trenton (N.J.) State Prison; the audiologist who left Maine at age forty-one to make it on Broadway; the woman iron-worker who hung by day from the 59th Street Bridge, welding it back together; the nurse who warns that "people die in hospitals;" the television technician who has been with "Good Morning, America" from its first broadcast, longer than any of the on-air personalities; the psychologist who was petrified of getting lost in the long hallways of the Ansonia Hotel, site of one of my studios; the call girl who grossed $300 a trick (1985), but longed to get a $75 a week job, tap-dancing in a summer stock musical; the clown, the comics, the waiters and waitresses, the cab drivers, the tap dancers, the tapless dancers, the topless dancers, and the working actors.

Some people I've worked with you may already know: comedienne Elayne Boosler had long hair and sang Laura Nyro songs in the early seventies; Dee Wallace, a dancer and dance teacher, auditioned as a replacement in the Broadway production of Pippin before she moved to Hollywood to star in Cujo and E.T.; Barry Manilow auditioned as my replacement for an accompanist job in a gay steambath (where he later met and accompanied Bette Midler); Mr. Greenjeans (Captain Kangaroo's personable sidekick), with whom I toured Vietnam as a musical act; Joanne Woodward and Sandy Dennis, to whom I taught the same song; Broadway and TV legend Phil Silvers (Sgt. Bilko), to whom I taught the score of an entire musical, for which he won his second Tony Award. And a younger generation -- of performers, writers, and producers, Emmy winners and nominees and Tony nominees and prolific TV show runners -- from my work with the Princeton Triangle Club.

Celebrities and civilians, they've come to me. To each and everyone of them I've said, "That was great! Now try this." Their common needs I can readily identify and meet; in their unique differences I find challenge and inspiration.

Hundreds of brave and talented (and some not-so-talented) people have gotten to me before you came along. Many of them join us as we explore together and attempt to solve the mystery of song. They've each and all trained me so that I can now train you.