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Tuning In: Voice teacher Ina Kraus has been teaching private lessons from her Willow Glen home for 26 years.
Photograph by Skye Dunlap
All the Right Notes
Instructor Ina Kraus' students are singing for a good cause--their teacher's health
By Jessica Lyons
Ina Kraus has a simple explanation for why she teaches voice lessons. "It's a helping profession, and I love that," she says. Ina, 59, has taught private lessons out of her Willow Glen home for 26 years.
Now it's her students' turn to help their teacher.
Three of Kraus' students--Carmichael Blankenship, Renée Hewitt and Audrey Lee--will perform scenes from Stephen Sondheim's Passion and selections from West Side Story, Company and other musicals on Oct. 2 at Le Petit Trianon Theater. But instead of just giving a recital, the three will be singing with a particular cause in mind--raising money for dystonia medical research, a neurological disorder that plagues Kraus and about 300,000 other people in the United States.
"Doing a benefit for anything would be a great experience, and I think we all have causes that are close to our hearts, but with dystonia--and the fact that we're all singing and our voice teacher is the one who has the disease--it has a more personal effect on all of us," says Audrey Lee, 29, who has studied with Kraus for three years.
"Because it's so closely connected with Ina, there's an awareness for us that may not have been there if Ina was not our teacher. To benefit her cause and be a part of her life and her efforts is really great for us."
Co-hosted by Kraus and Amy Haynes, who also suffers from dystonia, the evening benefit will include a concert and a silent auction. All proceeds from ticket sales and the auction will go to the Dystonia Medical Research Foundation.
"I'm so amazed and appreciative that I have these students who would invest so much of their own time and money to do this," Kraus says. "It reminds me why I'm in the business."
Kraus was diagnosed with dystonia in 1990, after years of serious muscle pain in her jaw and neck. The disease causes these muscles to pull to the right in very painful contractions. While dystonia is not fatal, depending on what form it takes, it can be debilitating. To help alleviate the chronic pain, Kraus flies to New York every three months for Botox injections in her neck. Dystonia is uncommon enough that finding a specialist locally can present a problem.
"It's very painful," Kraus says. "Without the Botox, I can't chew, I can't swallow. The nerves are constantly exciting my shoulder muscles, and pulling them, too."
Every day between teaching, Kraus rides an exercise bike for three hours to keep her shoulder muscles moving and prevent them from getting stiff.
"You really have to fight," she says.
It's the disorder, however, that also led Kraus into teaching. Born and raised in Pittsburgh, the classically trained voice teacher holds two degrees in secondary education and music from the New England Conservatory, Carnegie Mellon and San Jose State universities. Prior to being diagnosed with dystonia, she performed as a soloist with the Pittsburgh Opera Company and the Lyric Oakland Theater. Kraus played the soubrette--"the silly parts," as she calls them. "There's a lot of scampering around which I can't do anymore," she says. "You have to be really physically strong to be a performer. I didn't know why I was so tired all the time."
So she turned to teaching full time.
Today, Kraus teaches four classes with San Jose's American Musical Theater and has about 25 private voice students. Some of her students start as adults, and some start as young as 12 years old. To most of them, Kraus is more than a teacher.
"We're teacher and student, but I also consider her a friend as well," says 29-year-old Carmichael Blankenship, a local actor with American Musical Theater. "She genuinely has concern for all of her students. She is one of the best teachers around; not only will your voice sound good, but your voice will last you."
Kraus' students go on to perform on Broadway, with theater companies and in bands. Some go on to earn music degrees at such prestigious schools as the New England Conservatory of Music.
"I love her, we all love her," says Hewitt, 34, who has been studying with Kraus for eight years. "She has this disease, and we have to see what we can do to support her because she's done so much for us. She's so selfless as a teacher; we've got to return the favor."
The Love and Passion benefit takes place Oct. 2 at the historic Le Petit Trianon Theater at Mother Olson's Inn, 72 N. Fifth St., San Jose. Tickets for the concert and silent auction are $28 per seat and must be purchased by Sept. 15. The silent auction starts at 6 p.m., followed by the concert at 7 p.m. For information, call 265-3413 or visit www.techiehouse.com/loveandpassion.
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Willow Glen, California Since 1992
