Course summary

The Graduate Diploma in Vocal Performance is primarily intended for graduates from three-year degree programmes. It provides a learning experience equivalent to the final year of an undergraduate performance degree at the RCM. The Graduate Diploma equips non-conservatoire graduate singers with the additional specialist vocal and ancillary training necessary for them to match the range of skills and experience of conservatoire graduates. This course is also ideal for conservatoire graduates who feel they would benefit from additional training before undertaking Masters level study. This one-year course is normally intended to be taken on a full-time basis in order to reinforce its equivalence to final year undergraduate study. During your time on the Graduate Diploma you will develop your linguistic and dramatic skills and build or reinforce a solid vocal technique. Singers who demonstrate potential for significant vocal achievement, but who lack appropriate formal grounding, will have the opportunity to develop their repertoire knowledge. By the end of the year you will have a vocal technique capable of sustaining the increased demands of more advanced study and assisting the voice to mature satisfactorily. You will have a broad familiarity with the nature of the vocal repertoire, coupled with a core of works known in some detail. In addition you will have facility in the principal European languages of the vocal repertoire and an informed awareness of the main national types. Your movement skills and knowledge of stagecraft will have advanced and you will begin to develop the ability to combine these with vocal accomplishment in operatic performance. Crucially, you will foster a realistic perception of your suitability for further study and/or future professional career prospects, based upon critical self-evaluation and an awareness of the demands and opportunities of the profession. If you achieve a result of 65% or more at the end of the course, you will automatically have the opportunity to progress to a Masters degree in vocal performance – leading to either the MPerf or MMus qualification. This allows for intensive technical work to be undertaken without interruption for audition preparation.