Wildwood’s Mission
Wildwood Home for the Arts strives to be a font of and support to creativity, lifelong education, and innovation for singers, poets, musicians, and writers of all ages. Wildwood is rooted in the experience of direct, interdisciplinary engagement with the arts; supported experimentation; creative expression through self and community; and respect for the arts and the creative self.
Our Location
Wildwood Home for the Arts is located at the beautiful and historic Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, CA. Originally built in 1947 on Montecito's oceanside, the Academy plays host to world-class summer festivals, masterclasses, instrumentalists, and singers. Wildwood houses a room for private lessons, a quiet practice space for students complete with Steinway grand piano and study station, and a spacious workshop and recital room.
Wildwood’s Philosophy
Wildwood Home for the Arts holds the practice of art as an ongoing experience and an end in itself. This engagement unlocks in us an expansive perspective on life, its joys and challenges, applicable to the arts and beyond.
This philosophy centers around two, interconnected principles: 1. creativity, expression, and communication as fundamentally valuable and necessary; and 2. that everyone is born with the intrinsic capacity for these.
It is good to write a poem or sing a song, to forget these in a folder, to come to the recital for the cupcakes — being engaged with the arts is meaningful. It is also good to understand the poem or the song. This takes time and focus. But Wildwood holds that proficiency in the arts evolves not only from repetition, rules, and materials, but fundamentally and directly from the exercise and exploration of expression and communication. The habit of this perspective and approach is the key to our deep comprehension and potential.
As the ancient Greek's explored through their mousike and the composer, Carl Orff, revived and brought to the forefront of music education nearly a century ago, Wildwood seeks to open up and include all pathways into creation and comprehension: a trifecta of music, language, and movement. Through this trifecta, Wildwood nurtures in its students the assimilation of language and song so that they might become its living embodiment. That the listener is moved, something inside both of them unlocked, expanded into new possibility, rendering the listener and themselves transformed.
This is the adventure of a lifetime, and the one we embark on at Wildwood. It's for the insatiably curious, the persistent, the courageous, and for those who are but don't know it yet.
Where that journey begins can be anywhere, so come as you are. Start where you are, that is the perfect place to begin. You don't have to have answers, check boxes, or know where you want to go, all you need is to show up and be open to discovering new things. Working in this way will propel you forward no matter your personality or goals, because it is the kind of work that expands possibilities, opens doors, emboldens the heart, engenders self-respect, gives voice if the voice has been timid to speak.
Come find your voice. Tell your story.
Wildwood’s Founder & Educator
Learn more about Alyssa Morhardt-Goldstein
Why Study Music And Poetry?
Learn more about the benefits of arts education.
memberships and Student Resources
Music Teachers' Association of California
Singers should have access to the a thorough education, and the musical training traditionally offered with instrumental lessons. Wildwood is a certified member of the Music Teacher's’ Association of California, taking advantage of wonderful opportunities for examinations, certifications, and competitions.
Association: “The mission of MTAC is to pursue excellence in music education and advance the music teaching profession through innovative programs that foster artistic growth and achievement.”
Certificate of Merit: “The Music Teachers’ Association of California® (MTAC) sponsors the music study program Certificate of Merit® (CM). The program provides a standard of curriculum that requires students to strive for focused musical excellence in performance, technique, ear training, sight reading/singing, and music theory.”
VOCE Competitions: “VOCE is a prestigious competition for vocalists, strings, winds/brass, and chamber music at the Branch and State levels.”
*Excerpts taken from the MTAC website
Click here for Certificate of Merit Information
Wildwood Student Resource Library
Playlists, links, curated materials, and more.
“Wildwood offers its singers and poets practice space complete with a Steinway grand piano, our personal library of music anthologies and poetry books, digital resource libraries, and more.”
Educational Approaches
Heart Based Singing Technique
“Heart Based Singing is your connection to a cutting edge strategy of classical vocal technique which enhances and refines all types of singing including pop, musical theater, and classical singing.
Heart Based Singing is rooted in science and anatomy, while taking into consideration natural energy patterns and flow. Its foundational and straightforward presentation is accessible for amateur and professional singers alike.
It is subtle as well: it fine-tunes and suggests ways to enjoy singing from an energetic perspective.
Freedom and its complement of stability within the body is explored and brought into consciousness through this fun and beautiful approach.”
*Excerpts taken from the HBS website
website: Heart-Based Singing
Orff Schulwerk Approach
"Orff Schulwerk is a way to teach and learn music. It is based on things children like to do: sing, chant rhymes, clap, dance, and keep a beat on anything near at hand. These instincts are directed into learning music by hearing and making music first, then reading and writing it later. This is the same way we all learned our language."
"Orff Schulwerk uses poems, rhymes, games, songs, and dances as examples and basic materials. These may be traditional or original. Spoken or sung, they may be accompanied by clapping and stamping or by drums, sticks, and bells."
"With Orff Schulwerk, improvisation and composition start students on a lifetime of knowledge and pleasure through personal musical experience. Learning is meaningful only if it brings satisfaction to the learner, and satisfaction arises from the ability to use acquired knowledge for the purpose of creating. For both teacher and student, Orff Schulwerk is a theme with endless variation."
"Composer Carl Orff and his associate Gunild Keetman evolved the basic texts for the Schulwerk as models for teachers worldwide. Now translated into eighteen languages, Orff Schulwerk is based on the traditional music and folklore of each country in which it is used."
"Orff Schulwerk is total, active involvement in music making that incorporates speech, singing, movement, and instrument playing in a creative environment. It develops the whole child with a balance of emotional and intellectual stimulation."
*Excerpts taken from the AOSA website
website: American Orff-Schulwerk Association
Singers: Lessons And Classes
Poets: Lessons And Classes
Additional Approaches
"In a lesson using the Kodály method, which is an experience-based approach rather than a cognitive developmental one, students are learning to read and write western music notation, singing a varied repertoire of quality children’s folksongs and chants, playing singing games, and practicing rhythm and pitch using the movable-do solfege system (Do Re Mi Fa Sol La Ti Do) and a special rhythmic language (Ta, ti-ti, Ti-ri-ti-ri). In addition to these musical elements, part-singing, part-hearing, improvisation, intonation, listening, memory, phrasing, and form are also explored in many ways. Emphasis is placed on the sequence of presentation of materials, concepts, and development of skills through meaningful curriculum. The three main stages of a lesson sequence include preparation, presentation, and practice.
Solfege is one of the main tools of Kodály for developing the inner ear. It is an invaluable aid in building musical skills for sight singing, dictation, ear training, harmony, and developing me memory."
*
Kodály Concept
"In a Eurhythmics class, students are moving in some way – in locomotion around the room, in gestures with hands, arms, heads, upper bodies, either in groups or alone. Their movements are responsive to the music that is sounding in the room– its tempo, dynamics, texture, phrase structure, and style. The body is understood to be the original musical instrument through which everyone first realizes music."
"The movements a student makes in a eurhythmics class do not have the essential purpose of training the body to convey a choreographic picture to an audience. Rather, their essential purpose is to convey information back to the mover himself. The movements set up a circuit of information and response moving continuously between brain and body, which, with training and experience, rise to ever higher levels of precision, coordination, and expressive power."
*Excerpts taken from the DSA website
website: Dalcroze Society of America