The Power of Voice Training for Leaders in Any Profession (ft. Serg Sanchez)

Welcome to Digital Voices, where healthcare and life science leaders explore the real work behind transformation. This podcast is about people, leadership, and the conversations that move healthcare forward. Now your host, Ed Marx.

Hey, it's Ed. Welcome to another edition of Digital Voices. This one's gonna be so much fun because we have someone from outside of healthcare, my friend Serge Sanchez. Serge, welcome to Digital Voices.

Hey, nice to see you. Great to see y'all.

This is great because you are a music writer, producer, singer, and you're a vocal coach.

Yep.

That's pretty cool. And that's what— and we're going to dive into that a little bit because that's one thing every leader needs, I think, is a vocal coach. And you, you do it in music industry, but I, I bet some of the things that we'll talk about are transferable to just anyone who's, who's kind of a leader. And so we first met really through my son. So my youngest son, Austin Shawn, he's a producer and writer. And the two of you met, I don't even know how long ago, like maybe 3, 4 years ago?

Yeah, probably around 4, 4 years ago, maybe even 5 now. I'm not sure. But yeah, I met him through, uh, Bailey essentially. Yeah.

Yeah. Through Bailey Zimmerman. That was a common point. And then we've got to interact in our, in our families a little bit. So it's really cool. But Serge, the most important question I will ask the entire podcast What songs are on your playlist? Like what kind of music do you listen to? I know it's kind of funny asking you this song, you this question because you're in the industry.

Yeah. I mean, no, it's actually, I mean, I can definitely narrow it down. I think I only laugh because of what I kind of go after every day. If I were to go turn on music, I'm, if it's a playlist type thing, I want something that I don't want to have to turn off or change.

Right. Yeah.

So it's gotta be an artist or music that that I can just listen to endlessly. So I can definitely listen to— I can't say growing up it was the same, but now I can listen to like, you know, John Mayer endlessly, Coltrane, the Eagles, George Strait, stuff like that. So when it comes to just kind of having something around the house, those are the kind of artists that I can just kind of leave running.

Yeah.

Going Tyler Childers, even I could just let that, that music go and go there. But if I'm hanging out working in the studio, I turn in If I'm working in the studio, as in like fixing something or working out or doing something like that, I kind of turn into a kid again and listen to some hard rock grunge music, you know, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Nirvana, all that stuff, Tool. But yeah, pretty much it's kind of, if, if I just tell what I'm asking Alexa to do is usually play some Coltrane or John Mayer, Eagles.

Yeah, that's very cool. What about life message or mantra? Are there, is there words or quote or sort of philosophy that you live by?

I don't know that it's necessarily consciously or that's something that I continuously say, but I guess when I think about it hard enough, it's definitely like a die-trying type of thing. I definitely am like a, you know, even in the music business, I would consider myself kind of like a cockroach. You know, I'm still around, still doing it all these years. So definitely just try, you know, almost in anything.

Yeah.

struggling, if my day has been going kind of rough, whatever, just try, give it a try, you know, just, just keep going. Don't stop. Try, you know.

Yeah, love that. So tell us a little bit about yourself before we get into vocal coaching, stuff like that. Like, who are you? Where did you grow up? What's your life story?

Okay. Yeah, I, um, I was born in Miami, Florida. My parents are from Cuba and I lived in Miami For about 10 years. My parents split up. My mom met, um, a guy from Alabama and we, we ended up moving to Gainesville, Florida. So, and we kind of moved on to a little, it'd be weird to call it a farm, but we did have a cow and a horse and all that stuff.

Okay.

And about, you know, 12 to 14 acres there in, in kind of the middle of nowhere, North Florida.

Yeah.

So I grew up there and essentially kind of lived pretty much a very country life there. I have an older brother. So that's 7 years older than me, but I spent pretty much from age 12, 11 and 12 and on as kind of an only child there. He'd, uh, stayed in Miami and, um, when we moved. So I had plenty of space and I had a lot of time on my hands and didn't have a lot of, didn't have, and I had friends and stuff. It's not like I didn't have friends, but I definitely was somewhat isolated after school.

Yeah.

In time and, and just kind of doing Doing my thing.

Yeah.

And that's kind of where I started. Yeah.

Yeah. What's a pivotal moment in life that fundamentally changed your trajectory? Like, did something happen in your youth or maybe as an adult that kind of changed like into what you're doing?

I would definitely say that if I were to look at my career and where I'm at now, probably it's gonna sound like a cop-out answer, but it's not. Um, probably when I met my wife in, in my late 20s, that was a Big change. My focus just really changed and I sort of evaluated my career, which we can get into later. But, and when I met her, it was pretty much the catalyst as to getting me to move to Knoxville, Tennessee, where I then started teaching voice there and met Morgan there. So if I look at that year of, you know, sorry, I guess it was a couple years before I moved there, but essentially meeting my wife.

Wow.

Shifting my location and moving to Knoxville, which was a huge change and a big difference in my life from touring, you know, and all the things that I was doing to go settle down a little town. And, but I met Morgan Wallen and it kind of really sort of took things into a different direction. That was a big one.

Yeah. So yeah, so you already broached the topic of music. Yeah. Tell us how you, how did you get into music? Like you talked about living sort of on the farm.

I have to say, when you have an older brother, um, and an older sibling, especially in that era, in the early '90s, late '80s, early '90s, I was exposed to whether my mom wanted me to be exposed to or not. Yeah, I was exposed to, uh, a lot of pretty edgy music, you know, whether it was what was kind of happening in my, you know, in the pop scene, um, hip hop scene, I should say. But I always come back to a specific song. It's a song called Big Empty by Stone Temple Pilots. And they— that song was on a soundtrack for a movie called The Crow. And when I was a kid, my brother had taken me to one of those dollar theaters or whatever and saw The Crow. And I guess if I remember correctly, there was some soundtracks for sale there. He bought the soundtrack and we were listening to it on the way home. And when that song came on, I might have been around 11 or something like that, 10 or 11.

Yeah.

When I heard that, I remember being very enamored by it and I heard my brother singing along with it because he kind of knew it, and I immediately was like, I want to try to sing to this. Can I sing? This is cool. This is really— it was almost the first time most of us, when we have music, you feel that there's something that's yours.

Yeah.

Like, this music is mine. This is not my mom's.

Yeah.

You know, this is— this kind of thing is mine. So I remember really getting into that, and I feel like just at an early age kind of getting into some pretty deep, you know, even to an extent dark music at an early age. That was big because I feel like it set the tone for, for the rest of it. I can kind of go back every time I hear that song. I think about that moment.

Yeah. And then did you have this like dream? Like, is that when you started like picking up an instrument or did you have—

No, actually, no, I didn't. I didn't. Probably was a couple years later in Gainesville when I was living there, specifically the town of Trenton, Florida that I grew up in. I like to give Trenton a shout out, always home of Easton Corbin, but it's also the home of me too, guys. Come on, you know?

Yeah.

Um, but, uh, I specifically remember, um, wanting to play drums. So I was obsessed with bands. So I got really obsessed with it. I would, I just got really into that and, and, and the culture of that. And I wanted to be in a band. It was such a big departure from where I grew up, you know, some of those cool bands that you would see on MTV and all that stuff. And I felt like, you know, I, I just wanted to play some drums. I just remember getting some drums from my mom and my parents got me, and they immediately were like, yeah, we love you, but I don't think that's gonna happen. And I ended up, picking up my grandpa's guitar, and that was kind of the deal that I can play guitar and maybe they'd get me some lessons. That's kind of where it started. It was— and I have to tell you, as bad as it sounds, even though I'm a vocal coach and I always tell my clients this, it's funny that in a way my first few lessons kind of— I think that was a big moment for me because I felt like I didn't want to learn what they were teaching. I just wanted to go learn some Nirvana songs or write some songs.

Totally.

I had an inclination already. My immediate thought was, I do I don't want to learn the things you're showing me, which is not good, but it definitely opened my eyes that I actually did have an interest in this and I wanted to write music. I wanted to do my own thing. I almost didn't want to go that route, which was pretty interesting. In other words, I think if I just stuck with guitar lessons, I don't mean voice lessons, but I'd stuck— if I stuck with guitar lessons, I don't know that I would have actually, you know, really stuck with it. I just got to— I just said, you know something, Mom, I'll make you a deal if you can let me quit these lessons. Which, by the way, my mom does not like me quitting stuff, but she— I was like, I promise you I will play this guitar. I love it. I just want to sit at home and learn how to play some power chords and some songs. And I became very obsessive about it. So it's kind of interesting that that was— it was almost a little bit of a punk rock moment where I'm like, okay, actually, I don't want to do this, but actually I really want to— I want to make sure my mom allows me to still keep playing. I was only like 12, you know? Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

And yeah, that's, that was big.

That's pretty cool. So, so fast forward to today and we're going to get into vocal coaching in a second, but fast forward today, generally as a singer-songwriter, producer, and vocal coach, what's a typical year like? I imagine it's very varied, but what's a typical year look like for you? Are you on the road sometimes helping out? Are you, you know, in the studio? How's it go?

You know, I could ask the universe that every day, how it's going to go or how it went. But, uh, if I, if I look back the last few years, the last few years have been Sort of, it's almost a little bit more how my week looks, I guess, would be. It's kind of like a couple, a couple days of writing in sessions with different artists and various songwriters in town. And then there's always some form of production that's kind of sitting there for the most part, some sort of record that I'm working on recording or something that's pending there. But mixed in, I'm teaching lessons, you know, throughout the week on Zoom or in person. And then what it's kind of been just about in the summertime every year, I find my way out on the road with some artists that need some help and some guidance and some teams that, you know, that need some help and guidance and how to get, you know, just singers really at an optimal place or help them with injury recovery, things like that. So I do a little bit of all that throughout the year.

Yeah.

It's pretty hectic, but it's— I don't know, I complain some days, but then I'm like, I don't know, I think it's Kind of, kind of how I want it, you know?

Yeah. Yeah. Super cool.

It's all, it's all surrounds music, you know?

Yeah, no, that's super cool. Tell us one or two highlights in your career so far that, that, you know, are top of mind.

Definitely. It's hard to look at my journey and not, especially with how, how huge Morgan's become, it's hard to look at my journey and not, um, kind of look at that, put a magnifying glass on that specific time where I met him and helped him develop everything, you know, just kind of worked with him songwriting, vocal coaching, kind of essentially— I mean, I moved my life to Nashville. In fact, Morgan's band was the band I was in. So I recruited the band, the band that I was in, I recruited them to be Morgan's live band. And still to today, still today, they are his That's cool. The members of the band that I was in throughout, throughout all my 20s, a band called Atom Smash. But yeah, I would say the highlights would be definitely being a part of his journey and trajectory. And I've had a couple of milestones with songwriting, you know, having songs, you know, stream in the billions and stuff. It's a pretty big deal, you know, in the sense of like for somebody like how I grew up and certainly would have never thought it would be in the country genre.

Right.

So some of that stuff, but definitely like, you know, really just the highlights would be just kind of getting phone calls from certain artists and their teams that are, that are kind of in a bad— in a tough spot and, and they need some help and kind of being there for them. And the last couple years especially have been kind of like a highlight, one little highlight after another of just, of just that kind of thing, just working with those artists, being somebody that they would call and Yeah. For help there.

Yeah, that's very cool. Yeah. And just, and the audience is gonna wanna know, and as we go into vocal coaching here. Yeah. So Morgan, there's, uh, Bailey Zimmerman that you've worked with. Uh, Nickelback. Who, who else?

Uh, uh, Parker McCollum. Uh, uh, there's a young guy that's out there now doing great called Cameron Whitcomb that I'm working with. Uh, Dylan Marlowe. Yeah. Josh Ross. Uh, Nate Smith. I've worked with him quite a bit this year. So there's also stuff outside of country. There's an artist named Bryston Maroney. That's an alternative act that's doing really well that I started working with him when he was a teenager. I kind of have to go back even though he's— it's been a long time. I was there kind of in those early days. And but yeah, I've just worked with quite a few of those acts and it's kind of neat because like Bailey— Oh, Bailey would be a really interesting highlight because he's another act that I would, I would have had songs that I've written with Bailey that have, that have been released and all that, but also vocal coaching him. So that's, that's kind of, you know, it's— so as I was saying, Morgan and Bailey would be artists that have that kind of sort of like, oh, that's kind of interesting. You were the vocal coach and you had some songs with them too. It's, you know, so that's cool.

Yeah. So on vocal coaching now, why, why would artists reach out for a coach? And then what does that mean? Like, what, what do you do? Give us an example.

Okay. Yeah, that's actually a really good question. So I would compartmentalize that and say that if a person is starting off and they're just somebody that, you know, they're really just getting going, I would say that the phone call and the initial lessons are really surrounding singing on key and like giving them regiments, proper vocal technique and breath support, but a lot of it is fundamentally seeing if they can hold a tune, right?

Yeah.

Although I have, and I have worked with, you know, a lot of, I mean, I've been in Nashville for about 10 years and I've probably worked with close to 700, 800 clients or somebody. I've kind of lost track. There's, my wife has a, if you call it a Rolodex of stuff, but we have that. But definitely a lot of novice, a lot of people I've worked with, a lot of people that are, and I think it's helped. One hand has washed the other. I think working with people that are Getting going and just doing it for fun. But I get more calls now. Hey, my voice is just hoarse. It's blown out. It's having— I'm having issues with sort of surviving as a singer through the, through the touring process. Sometimes I get calls for pre-recording process, like let's work on stuff before we get in the studio. Sometimes it's, hey, I need you in the studio with me.

Yeah.

To kind of be— that's actually how we met, now that I think of it. We probably met like in that sort of thing, like, hey, I'd like to have the vocal coach in the studio while I'm making the record with Bailey. So essentially, but yeah, a lot of it really is, if I were to really narrow it down nowadays, the big phone call is, I don't have a solid daily routine that I'm doing. I don't— where do I start and why am I losing my voice so much?

Right. 'Cause I imagine, Serge, that it's, you know, someone just started singing, they had a band and they get popular and they make a hit and they've never had training, right? They never had formal training. And just like we do with exercise, like you gotta lift weights and that's what—

That was me.

Yeah.

That was me. That was actually, you know, that's, by the way, I should probably mention this is very important to the journey. Okay.

Yeah.

Because it is also, I experienced that. That's how I got into this at all was I, the band I was in, Atom Smash, was Got signed to Sony. And I'm not even kidding, literally as I signed the document in that, in that, that week, I lost my voice and I didn't get it back. I was trying to tour through. I had not taken lessons. I really avoided lessons. I was like, you know, too punk rock to go do that. They're not— I'm a lost cause. I'm screaming. But I, I blew my voice out and it didn't come back. And it was the scariest point of that time in my life because I had worked so hard to get there. And I had no voice to record the album that we were going to make. So I got lucky that the producer I was making the record with convinced me to go see this vocal coach in New York. And that's where we were making the album. And that vocal coach just really just sort of changed the game for me, gave me all the daily routines that I could ask for, really taught me lifestyle things. I was not living right. Just got me— just sort of set me on the right path and went on to sing. thousands of shows beyond that and finish that record and become a sponge for— I was almost like fascinated with how it worked. I'm like, whoa, this is crazy. How am I getting through this? You know?

Yeah.

So, so by the end of it, so what I was getting at is I was the client. I was the person that was in a jam and had something. So now I'm kind of, I kind of get to go through that process again, although it's a little stressful reliving that a little bit, but I've done it enough times that I kind of, the story Yeah, I've been very blessed and the story ends well usually.

Yeah, no, that, that's cool. And I saw it, you know, in a different way, but I saw the power of it. Excuse me, speaking of voice, I saw it in a different way when, you know, I grew up 7 kids, brothers and sisters, and we all had average voices. We always sing at Christmas time, Christmas carols and all sorts of things. One of my sisters goes off to college one semester. She comes back for time for Christmas and we sing. And her voice was amazing. And it was cuz she got coaching, cuz that she got her, she was getting her degree in music and she got coaching. And I saw right there, dang, she, it's not like she had, uh, a more blessed voice than the rest of us. We all had that raw voice, but a good coach brings it out.

Yes, absolutely.

And so Serge, that's where I wanna pivot to now. So a lot of my audience, as I mentioned, are executives in healthcare. Many of them, all of them have to perform, if you will, with their voice on a daily basis. Sometimes it's formal, like speaking to thousands of people, or sometimes it's just speaking to a smaller number, but there's always this performance, there's always speaking. And so when I— when we met and I'm thinking about coaching and music industry, I think the same in my profession. So what are one or two techniques that you might suggest, not for a musician, you know, an art— musical artist, but like professionals that have to speak for a living?

Yeah. Listen, I think the reality is that public speakers or leaders or people that are taking meetings or whatever it is, essentially you are bar singing. That is what you're doing. It's not a musical thing and there isn't something musical happening necessarily, but you are having to get a lot of words out, right? Getting the information out. And that's quite often how we lose our voice. The reality is Just make sure you're breathing also while you're talking. So being conscious of inhaling and taking a breath. And sometimes we have to get quick. Sometimes we have to be very fast at it. So if you hear me, if I'm saying like, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, you're hearing that I'm taking a breath. I'm supporting my voice, making sure I have some air while I'm talking.

Yes.

Be conscious of it.

It's easy.

It's actually a lot easier to forget to breathe when we're speaking than it is when we're singing, because there's something rehearsed happening when we're singing, if you will.

Yeah.

And then the next thing is everyone can use a warmup. It doesn't matter if you're a singer or that. There's plenty of great little warmups on YouTube. You just— vocal warmups, doing any warmup. There's some that are probably more effective out there in terms of for public speaking, but finding a warmup that works for you in the mornings before you go into your meetings, 5 minutes, doesn't have to be a long thing and get your voice stretched up and warmed up a little bit for the day. Um, you'll also notice that a big one, so you don't lose your voice, is make sure that you find a spot in your voice, in your speaking voice, that you, you hear clarity or you feel smooth. So in other words, if I'm talking down here, if I'm, if I'm trying to lose this voice here, you know, like that, Yeah. I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna lie. I'm not gonna, I'm more susceptible to hoarseness and wearing down my voice. But if I find a spot where the voice is here, here, here in my voice.

Yeah.

So I'm working a little bit. So I'm actually projecting. I'm working a little bit to find smoothness in my speaking voice. And I laugh cuz sometimes I hear it in like an AI voice, you know, like I'll hear, I go, oh, that's interesting. The AI voice has a pretty solid, like it's clear. It's not too fried. It doesn't have that tone in it.

Right.

So yes.

Yeah, those are great. I love that. And you mentioned tech, you mentioned AI. What about tech? Do you leverage any tech at all in what you do?

Oh yeah. And I'm not ashamed to admit it on the creative front of my journey, as far as a songwriter and producer, there's no doubt about it. I mean, the way things are, I'm able to model Bailey's voice or someone's voice and actually have a little model of their voice. And when I write a song, I can put that vo— I could sing it, replace my voice with his, pitch it, right? And, or, you know, to, to different artists, various artists, you could do things like that with AI. You can— probably one of the huge ones in the creative side would be if I'm, you know, if I don't wanna rack my brain sitting all night writing a demo for a song that I wrote that day that I'm not even sure about if it's any good. It's nice to just like, I write the song, put it down on an acoustic, throw it into one of these AI apps, and it'll show you a demo and you're listening like, oh wow, that sounds done. Cool. Next day, next idea without having to sit there. The producer side of me doesn't use it much, like the producing that world. If anything, AI is like what not to do for my style of producing. Like for what I go for as a producer, AI is a little bit more of a, okay, don't do that. If AI is— don't do that, go in a different direction so that you really stand out. So, but in vocal coaching, I do use recording as a tool. So if clients are in studio or they're at home, even I'll have them send me recordings, learn how to use a recording software to like record their, what they're practicing. I'll send them little videos that has my, like, you're basically looking at the notes like on, we call it MIDI in this world, like little piano notes. You see them on recording software and you see these little notes and it helps you sort of look at them and guide you through. So I use technology quite a bit, honestly, in terms of, you know, in the, even the AI front of it all.

Yeah.

The hardest thing about AI is that I always tell people the hardest thing is when you throw that demo on there or you throw that work tape, as we call it, like an acoustic and a vocal, and you throw it and you hear it back. And it does something different that you love.

Yeah.

It's hard to unhear that.

Right.

You're like, oh boy, what do I do? Do I not do that just because this thing kind of bends the melody this way? It's like, that sounds so good. So that's, that's the tough part. That's where it gets a little fishy just because you're like, oh no, like I didn't, I didn't come up with that little movement. This thing did that. And you're like, oh gosh, what do I do? How do I unhear that, that what it did? You know?

Yeah, no, that, that's super cool. Yeah. So Serge, we'll put all of your notes, uh, and how to get ahold of you, your website and things like that. Well, in our notes. And that way anyone who's listening or watching has an interest in vocal coaching, cuz I think you should do this for professional speakers or not, not even professional speakers, regular people like myself, executives that speak a lot. And it's just—

And I have, and, and I certainly have, by the way, just, you know, I, it's not something I have worked with clients like that. I also will see sometimes football coaches and I'm like, man, I, you know, or a quarterback, you know, going like, hey man, this guy, this guy's going to lose his voice if he keeps using his voice that way. And, you know, so yeah, of course.

Serge, this has been so fascinating to have someone outside of healthcare like yourself and such a creative force and energy. And we talked a lot about yourself, how you grew up, how you got into music, just how important your parents were in that journey, and sort of 4 or 5 hacks you shared with us on how to improve our own sort of self-coaching, if you will, but improve our own voice and be careful with. So thank you for that. Super fascinating. Is there anything we missed or anything you want to double down on? I'll give you the last word.

You know, I was a really, really terrible singer when I started. So I didn't mention that. I didn't have a natural ability or inclination. I actually was extremely pitchy, didn't have great rhythm, not much range. It's kind of crazy. I have a higher register and range now than I did when I was a teenager.

Wow.

So it's very important to note that I basically knew that singing was my weakness. I could write songs, I could be a crazy frontman, but singing was my weakness. But I look back and I think I was very determined To somehow turn that into a strength, you know, and essentially, so that's a big one is, is, is I'm actually a vocal coach who is a singer, a singer that someone would want to learn from. It definitely blows my mind that, that, that my journey was not started off. It didn't start off with someone saying, hey, you're pretty good. You should pursue this. That isn't how it started.

Right.

Like I was not getting told you should go on a show or do that. That wasn't my journey. If you ask my parents, everybody, they were kind of like, we're just letting him do it. He loves it. We're just letting him do it. But I'm sure what they were thinking is, oh my gosh, this is not good. So it's, that's, that's important to see that this, this, this, the 20-year journey or longer, 24-year journey that I've been on is kind of interesting. It's, it's, there's a ton of weaknesses and I have a way of just really trying to turn those into my strengths.

Yeah, no, I love that. And, uh, and like you talked about in the very beginning, like don't give up, keep trying. and pursue your dreams and dreams happen. You've done amazing things, Serge, and, and I think you're gonna do even more amazing things in the future. So thank you so much for being my guest.

Oh, thank you, man. Thank you. Uh, I'm, I'm a big fan of you and your family. Thank you for listening to Digital Voices. We hope today's conversation sparked ideas, reflection, and connection. Subscribe on YouTube, Apple, and Spotify Podcasts so you don't miss an episode.