Determined Society with Shawn French | Adversity & Mindset - Singing as Medicine: How Liz Caplan Healed Through Music

Episode Date: December 15, 2025

In this deeply moving episode of The Determined Society, host Shawn French sits down with Liz Caplan, world-renowned vocal coach, founder of Liz Caplan Voice Studios, and trusted voice teacher to some of the biggest names in film, television, and Broadway, including Hugh Jackman, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Andrew Garfield, Ben Platt, Stephen Colbert, and more.From growing up with asthma to discovering that singing and breathwork could literally change how her body functioned, Liz explains how music became her first medicine, long before success, recognition, or a thriving business.She shares how deep, intentional breathing can calm the nervous system, reduce anxiety, and create a natural “high” with no crash, no hangover, and no harm.Liz also pulls back the curtain on her journey from teaching a few students to becoming one of the most trusted vocal coaches in the industry, explaining how small steps, word of mouth, and genuine care built a world-class career rooted in service, not ego. Key Takeaways-Your voice and breath are powerful healing tools, not just performance skills.-Deep, intentional breathing can regulate the nervous system and reduce anxiety naturally.-True success is built slowly through service, trust, and word-of-mouth consistency.-Burnout often comes from absorbing others’ energy; learning to release it is essential.-Creativity, music, and movement can be medicine when used with intention.-Determination means continuing your mission with empathy, care, and integrity. Connect with me :https://link.me/theshawnfrench?fbclid=PAZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAaY2s9TipS1cPaEZZ9h692pnV-rlsO-lzvK6LSFGtkKZ53WvtCAYTKY7lmQ_aem_OY08g381oa759QqTr7iPGALiz Caplanhttps://www.instagram.com/lizcaplan/ Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

At a very early age, Liz Kaplan found her own medicine. Excuse me while I get my tissues because that got me too. Yeah, come on, right? You just gave me the damn goosebumps. Stop it. I had asthma. Singing helped change the way I breathed. I could almost get myself out of it from my own techniques.

That is proof that the healing properties of music are happening. Have an asthma attack, sit at the piano and start singing. more asthma attack. And there's so many people out there struggling right now. They don't know what their medicine is. They think it's chasing boys, chasing women, drinking alcohol, doing drugs. Prior to every single vocal lesson, I do an incredibly detailed breathing series. They would come up from this big breathing series and go like this. Wow. Why use drugs? Because the high you get from deep breathing is real. Damn, and no hangover.

None. What's up, everybody? We're back. I have Liz Kaplan today, the vocal coach for the stars. She founded Liz Kaplan voice studios up in New York, and she has worked with some amazing people that you see on the screen a whole lot, right?

Hugh Jackman, some people from Pitch Perfect, and some other big names. But her story didn't start. there. And that's really where I want to dive in today. See, she took small steps to get where she's at. She provided a service. She provided exceptional service. And then one person told one person and another and another. And then now here we are, this amazing vocal coach of the stars. Like I said, Liz Kaplan, welcome to the show. Thank you so much. I'm so happy to be here. I'm so happy that you're here too because one thing that people don't know about me. And I know

This isn't all what you do. I know you've worked with some of them, but my wife and I are obsessed with Pitch Perfect. So, you know, I know anybody hears Ben Platt and they're like, whoa. Yeah. And he was actually like, to me, the big star, right?

Because he was the underdog throughout the whole film. And then at the end, he came on. And it was like magic, wasn't it? Totally. And that's basically Ben in a nutshell. That is awesome. You know, I really love having conversations with accomplished individuals like you because there's always a story involved, right? I want you to walk the audience through how you actually started because if they're coming into it and look you up, look at your website, they see all this amazing stuff, all this press, you know, amazing, amazing testimonials from like Stephen Kobay.

bear that, I mean, that, that testimonial, people see that though, like, I don't know how I can relate to this person because they're so big and they're so, they're so great, but that's not where it started for you. Can you walk the audience through how this, this massive momentum and this massive business started for you? It's going to start so teeny weenie. I remember being six years old and being asked to sing, God bless America at the lip of a stage in some school auditorium. And I sang, and it was probably just a piano playing behind me. And I felt, I don't think I understood patriotism at the time at six years old, but I certainly felt that my voice singing in general, but certainly singing, in general, but certainly singing,

that song because it's very broad. And I was like, hmm, and the audience applauded. And I was like, oh, that feels good too. But mostly I felt my own instrument as a healing mechanism for myself. And how sound at six years old made people respond. Interesting. Interesting. So I want to stop here and I want to dive into this because you said two things to me that are very important. One, that your instrument, your voice was healing for you. That's big. But then you, so I want you to touch on that. But then I want you to touch on the reaction from the audience because those are two different things. Those are two different wins and they're both very impactful. agree. Interestingly, the response from the audience was not for me, at least to my recollection, six years old. It wasn't so much based in ego as it was. It felt good to me, but it mostly felt good to me because I elicited a response from a large crowd.

And it was because I also got to open my mouth and express myself freely, which was new for me at that time. And I certainly do not recall whatsoever what led up to me singing that song or being asked to sing it. I have no idea. I can't believe you actually went to. I have to really go into a past life regression to do that. It started me off understanding the truly healing. formula of the human voice for oneself, and that's one of the questions you asked, and also for others. And I think I could sort of sum up that healing perspective of like, if I kind of kept

going through my life, if anything like not fantastic was happening to me at any point, I'll cite examples. I didn't get a good grade on a test or somebody, a boyfriend broke up with me or something like that. I literally would go to the piano and start singing. And the perspective I actually have in my mind right now, based on what we're talking about, is Joni Mitchell's blue came out when I was about just turning 14. So I would sit at the piano and play through the music on the piano singing her entire. album. And she wrote that as a healing self for her, herself. And I felt that she was speaking for so many

others and that you can be hurt and you could go through these dark periods. And yet you still have creative use of vocabulary in music. And you also can use your voice to cry in the sense of how it makes sound. And you can use your voice to feel joy in how you make it. sound. So I have a distinct memory of that beginning my need to use my voice mostly for myself. Because if I think about my life now and how I'm completely dedicated to educating, you know, A-list people, but it didn't start that way, but entertaining and listening and hearing people's voices all throughout my teaching career, I never, ever wanted it to be about me. I felt like I wanted to be the clear canvas and let everybody come in and just like, you know, throw up their

emotions at me. And I was all clear and ready to accept because I didn't have any business that needed to be intertwined with their things that they were going through. So I realized like I said early on, that singing should be mostly a healing art form. And the teaching of singing should be exactly that too. And I had come from teachers myself all throughout junior high school and high school and college who were not particularly lovely human beings. And I say that because I never. felt very comfortable in myself with them. So the feeling I had was, I mean, I don't think anybody

used the word dysfunctional back in that time, but it was. It was completely a dysfunctional situation. And I kept saying to myself, I asked myself these questions as a young person, why is singing, which is supposed to bring joy to myself and to others, feeling so tense and tight and restrictive? And I knew early on that whatever I was going to end up doing in my life, and I didn't know at that time, I always wanted to make sure people felt comfortable in whatever room I was in with them. and certainly comfortable within their bodies and themselves when they were listening to me help them. So, and the word threatening should never come into play when you're learning anything, I think. Right, right.

That's interesting. That kind of like got the momentum beginning in terms of how I knew what I wasn't going to do and how I knew. and how I knew what I did want to do, and I just had to obviously figure out where that was going to take place. You know, I find it interesting, and thank you for all that, all that context, because there are so many great things that you said. You know, early on, you know, when you talked about eliciting a response from a whole bunch of people,

and then at the end you touched on people feeling comfortable in your presence and whatever room you're in and feeling just feeling just whole while they're there. I feel like there's a big thing in this world that not enough people do

because some people say don't. I've had people tell me this, don't chase feelings. You know what? If I didn't chase feelings, Liz, I would not be where I'm at right now. I chase feelings on everything. I'm chasing a feeling right now

while I'm speaking to you because the moment deserves that. And when you can get a response from a client that you work with, a response from a crowd, that is proof that the healing properties of music are happening. And while the audience is listening, there's a bigger lesson here. You know, music for us in my house, my wife, there's always music on. There's always music and the kids know music, they listen to it. You know, every time a good song comes on, I get goosebumps, my wife does. And we really dive into the, into music because it makes us happy. And it kind of helps us forget about where we're at. But the thing that I really

enjoyed, I want the audience to start latching on if you haven't already latched on because I'm hit you all with something. At a very early age, Liz Kaplan found her own. medicine. And there's a lot of people out there. Excuse me while I get my tissues because that got me too. Yeah. Come on, right. Now, you just gave me the damn goosebumps. Stop it. I'm in completely teared up mode. Yeah. Well, thank you for that. I mean, but that's what it is. Like, she found her medicine and there's so many people out there struggling right now that doesn't, they don't know what their medicine is. They think it's chasing boys, chasing women, drinking alcohol, doing drugs, you know, becoming completely obsessed with the gym.

I think it's a healthy obsession to a point, right? But more people need to understand how they can work themselves through hard moments in their lives. I want you to go into that a little bit more, please, because I think there's a lesson here that you can teach the audience as it relates to that. Absolutely. Well, interestingly, and I'm going to share major, you know, personal truths in that I grew up and it was discovered when I was, I think, three or three and a half that I had asthma.

And how it was discovered was that I was running my tricycle and it was squeaking. And my father kept oiling it, oiling it. And my mother was like, why is it still squeaking? And it turned out I was squeaking. My lord. So that began sort of like, oh, I'm going to be having a challenging respiratory system. And at a young age, that's very, very difficult.

And the medications that they gave even little tiny children were very harsh and very, I want to say, if you imagine taking a steroid as an adult because you can't speak and you have to speak, so you need to get yourself inflammation down. but I was given really hardcore medication when I was very young. But, you know, the long view of that story is to say, singing helped change the way I breathed. And what ended up happening was, even though I had teachers along the way,

I would basically take the good things that they would contribute and say, I did not appreciate the way that was delivered to me. But if I were a kinder person and a person that wants to be healed, I get a glimpse or a glimmer of what they were trying to say, and I've tried to make it more gentle for myself. So, I mean, I keep going back and forth to being a little person and being who I am today many, many years later. and it truly was quite miraculous that I ended up getting scholarships to college

for basically what I overtame with asthma. But by that time, nobody knew I had asthma. And I still did have it and I had bouts of it. People are like, you have asthma? It's like, we're going to give you this scholarship to college. Wait, we're going to get this scholarship. People turning around and going, but you're just saying in the high school play, how are you having asthma?

So the idea was singing as a medicine, as you so beautifully put, was truly that. And it wasn't just the singing. It was basically learning how to increase my lung capacity so that even when I was having smaller issues with breathing, I could almost get myself out of it from my own techniques of trying to open myself up or have an asthma attack, sit at the piano and start singing, no more asthma attack. That's interesting. So if I can continue, just one extra thought is that what I'm known for beyond, obviously,

teaching, singing is prior to every single vocal coaching or vocal lesson, I do an incredibly detailed breathing series, and they're made of three sequences. That involves, it's almost like, it's a combination of if yoga, met Pilates, met Alexander Technique, met any kind of martial arts where you're becoming very, very aware of your movement, and you're inhaling on one movement and exhaling on the other. So I've kind of condensed it into, you know, that doesn't take up the whole lesson because we'd never get to sing. But what I was going to say, the reason I want to say this based on what you just said earlier is that I've had people literally complete, and I do the exercises with them every single time. And I'm watching them simultaneously. It's winter, New York. Pardon my, part of my mucus.

they would come up from this big breathing series and go like this, wow, why use drugs? Because the high you get from deep breathing is real and it is clean and it is something that you could give to yourself on a daily basis and multiple times a day. damn and no hangover none exactly i'm gonna need those techniques you can wake up the next day and be like breathe the day hey i'm gonna need those techniques because my wife always says hey you need to breathe a little bit i'm like i don't know how you know i think we're in a highly cortisol environment nowadays and i think our all of our adrenals are being so demanded upon and so crashed so often from just what comes at us on a daily basis, no matter

who you are, what you believe in, all of that. I think just in general, so I think breathing and also purposeful breathing is something as a kind of cure, if you will, or at least calming moment that you can say, I can shut everything else out right now, which you could do by watching television and being engrossed in a television series, which is great. I do that. I love that. I can do that. Say again? I said, I can do that easily. Right. I love that. In a way, you know, and I have this conversation with my husband all the time. I said, television, especially when it's good TV, is a meditation for me because I'm not thinking about anything else except for what's coming at me.

And quite frankly, because I'm giving out so much energy to so many people every day, every week, every month, year, years, it's nice to not be thinking about that for an hour or a binge. So whatever it is you need to, you know, quiet your mind and calm your body, I'm all for it. But in this particular case scenario, I'm using significant deep breathing and physical movement techniques to also prepare people for their voices to feel ready to sing and feel open. And I always joke to everybody that by doing these breathing exercises, I say it's 50% of your grade to complete them because you already feel halfway into feeling warmed up. And then we do the vocal technical exercises. And then we do the song at the end of the session where we use everything we just did to see what we created.

And absolutely 100% in the time by having done all of this. gradual work, people are much freer. They're emotionally freer. They're physically freer. They're all their systems. And the techniques I use are very, I call it internal, external, external, external, because I'm dealing with organs and nervous systems and, you know, glands and things that, all the things that I call it sort of basically when the compensatory muscles get in the way. then you're like trying to find your way out. So you almost feel like you have to tighten up more to like get rid of them. So finding a way to in general, and this would be life in general, like what's getting in your way

and what's happening with your sound and where were you when this started happening? I love the diagnosis of that because I love trying to figure out what the answer and what the best way to get through to that person is on any given day. That's interesting. That's awesome. It's very academia, you know, very academia of you. It is, it is. But simultaneously, my sneakiness is that I'm also dealing with healing chakras and all the energy centers in the body and how notes, there's a note for each one of them, like that goes up the scale.

And if somebody is locked up on a certain note, I actually. either have them put a pair of glasses on that has that color or I find them. I asked them to think about a certain color because I know that note is locked up because they're locked up there. So it's academic, it's homeopathic, it's holistic, it's spiritual. It's like everything, and it's not the same for each person. I have to keep changing ways in which I address somebody based on understanding who they are and what their needs are on that given day.

It's really interesting because you're tying all this together for me now, right? Because I mentioned it before, Stephen Colbert's testimony for you. And even like I, you know, even on his show, he's, you know, mentioned he misses that spiritual community. But at the end of his, at the end of his testimony, I don't want to quote him because I know I'm going to butcher it because I didn't memorize it. He goes, I miss the spiritual. message that your work provides.

The spiritual message. It's really cool because, you know, there's so many different ways to do our jobs, right? And I want to bring something up and then we'll get back to this because I just think it's so important not to glance over it. You mentioned when you go home, and this is for everybody listening and watching, when you go home from a long day's work, whether you're a teacher, a vocal coach, podcast hosts, an actor and actress, a big engine mechanic.

I don't care what it is. There's a switch that you have to turn off. And there's another switch that you have to turn on. And that's always the hardest for me, right? Because in what I do and what you do and what everybody else does, and they may not be aware of why they're so tired at the end of the day, is because they're absorbing so much energy from others. Absolutely.

And while I love it. that aspect of my job, it wears me the hell out. You know, on days where I just have one, like today, I have you, I'm good. But there's days like, where I'll have three, and I've got three different energies and three different conversation paths and in all these different ways for me to steer a conversation, scaffold it, build here, go back there, now go to the front of the line. That's a lot. So I want you to walk through the audience of some ways, you know, that you can instruct them like, hey, when you go home, you got to decompress a little bit. You know, they may not be able to meditate for an hour, but maybe if they can take two minutes

in the car before they walk through the door, it can make for a happier place for everybody when they finally enter the house. Listen, I will answer that. Of course, it was a beautiful question. And I think every one of us experiences this in some ways. What I have learned is, so the first thing, I find as helpful is to have a little space to myself for a few minutes after the day is over. And one of the interesting ways of getting rid of the, we'll call it karma of your day,

it could be good karma, it could be maybe darker karma, it could be, it was a heavy subject matter that was talked about, and then you were kind of feeling heavy from it, is literally to sort of like spin around a little bit in a circle. like almost like male and female, women, men, anybody. Pretend you're wearing like a poodle skirt from the 1950s and literally just like spin around, around, around, around, around, around, around, change direction, spin around, round, round, round, round. And that helps just get that sort of, I want to say that noise from the day that got into you out of you.

And that is like if you don't have a whole lot of, lot of time that's very easy to do. And the other thing that I like to do is I lay on the floor and I bring my knees to my chest and I kind of hold my arms around my knees and I just breathe into my lower back because what I'm also doing, the adrenal glands sit atop the kidneys. So when you're laying on the floor and you're bringing your knees to your chest and kind of buckling your arms around your knees, you're actually rebooting your adrenal. So you take deep breaths into your back, and then I'll go one step further, and I'll literally

pretend I'm in the womb, and I roll to one side with my knees connected. I roll to one side, and I breathe on that side. I take a breath in. I come up, and I roll to the other side, and I breathe in, and I come up, and then I roll to one side and pull myself up and stand up straight, and I feel like, day away. That's very cool. That is very cool. That's literally some of the very many things that I will do in here in my studio where I am actually coming to you from.

But I think what you're saying is so, so important because we could all crash energetically, and it's not even from our own energy. It's from the energy that came at us during our work. It could be you walked along the street. I mean, I live in New York City primarily, and you could get people's karma that walked by you. And you're not even trying to get their karma. And you're not trying to get their energy. You take it in.

And if you're an empath and you're sensitive because your work requires it, and that's really great that you are. We can't have everybody, you know, sort of like. like thick-skinned when we need the people who are doing the emoting and helping people emote. So you can feel people's energy on you. So you have to actually try to remove it. And honestly, the other really very matter-of-fact way of getting people off of you, that's what the way I put it, is getting people off of you is to get in the shower and really

scrub, like use a washcloth and scrub yourself and just cleanse the outer layer. of your skin, of all the nerves that are on top of the skin and just like, release them. And that obviously we all know that taking a hot shower at the end of the day just feels so great, but it feels great for more than one reason. Yes, I'm clean. And yes, you know, it is getting off anything that you may have taken in. You know, it's so interesting because I'm going to tell you a story.

Okay. And I'm going to tell the audience a story. But I'm not going to say any names, okay? I had a guest one time on the show, and I'm trying to pick my words carefully because I don't want to give away if it was a male or a female. And it was such a heavy lift. I mean, just me receiving, me receiving, me receiving, me receiving, me receiving. I got home and my wife goes, I've never seen you so tired. I, shit you not, Liz, and everybody listening.

I broke down in tears and said, I cannot speak the rest of the night. I don't know what I'm going to do. I don't know what happened today. But I am just worn the F out. Like I could, Liz, I fell asleep at 8 o'clock that night. Wow. I'm a very late night owl, so that would be like going to sleep in the morning. I usually go to bed like around 11, you know, 1030 or 11.

Like I decompress. I watch shows with my wife. We laugh, we talk, but that night I couldn't do it. So, like, these, my whole point is I want the audience to really understand that when you come home, and they're getting so much value out of this episode, I hope, because, you know, I certainly hope so too. I hope so too, because, you know, you never know which way a show is going to go, but there's so, there's so much substance to you and what you do that literally can help

these, the audience that's listening that aren't singers. And we're going to get to all that fun stuff in a second. Yes, please. Yes, we're going to get there. Hang on with us, guys. But everything you're talking about, even if they just try it for one time

and see how they feel and just kind of disconnect from the outside world, what they had put on them that day and then come home and function because at the end of the day, I go home to a beautiful wife, and three beautiful children.

Oh, wonderful. They deserve having me lit up and happy to see them. That night, though, I was like, I'm sorry, guys. You ain't getting nothing for me. I couldn't shake you. You could pick up on the other people who you may have spoken to mood. And what you're doing is basically, that's not you. That's somebody else's mood.

And you're just wearing it. So that is also so crucial to acknowledge that if you're grumpy and you're feeling sort of like, I want to say, you know, even argumentative because you're being defensive because you're almost like you don't want this in you on you. And yet there it is. I mean, I'm glad for you that you figured out I should probably get out of here and just go to sleep and sleep this off. Just cry. It's definitely healthy. crying is also really good. Yeah, listen, I mean, I think about people in the mental health profession

who are, you know, from the pandemic before the pandemic, during and after the pandemic, and certainly, obviously still since the pandemic, who are walking around with such heaviness from listening to what their patients are going through. And certainly one of my students, clients, is somebody that came to me through, also not mentioning names, at a time where she was going through a very heavy time. She was going to school to get her MSW. And when you're learning about all the mental health potential crises that could happen, how do you. you not take that in? So she ended up taking singing lessons. And that was her way of kind of having moments to clear her heaviness. And when you think about that's only one profession, but people

who are, you know, very physical in their lives, people who, honestly, I think about all the trainers in my gym and I'm at my gym multiple times a week doing a very, very intense workout. But they're seeing people personally who are personal trainers and there are lots of people looming around also carrying a lot of their stuff and they're at the gym to get rid of it. So all this energy is always, always circling around. So we have to find ways, you know, I would say speaking for myself and my career as well as singing to help, you know, get that off of you. So you find out Who am I actually right now? And not what I'm,

and who I'm carrying on. So, okay, let's get to the fun stuff. Like, we've, you know, we've gave the audience a lot of good stuff. And I hope you stuck around because this is going to be really cool. So, you know, I get phone calls and text messages from friends that have watched me over the years build this show, this brand. Okay. Which, by the way, is extraordinary.

Thank you. Thank you. Seriously. It's extraordinary, not because it's just you, because you are by virtue of your energy, extraordinary. But what you're espousing is really trying to find ways to heal people and heal the world in the larger, in the larger picture of things. That's the goal. You know, like you said, it can't be about you, right? It's got to be about somebody else.

So I think that we're all here to serve. I know that for a fact. I think we're all here to make our impact. Good or bad. You know, you guys get to choose what kind of impact you make on someone's life. You had some bad teachers. I had some bad teachers. I had some bad coaches too.

But, you know, I get these calls. They always ask me, like, what's it like? Like, what's what like? Talking to all these people, like Jay Leno, I'm like, it's really cool. Like, what do you just, that's it? It's like, I'm like, guys, look, it's just one of those things where, you know, I chose this as a career and I'm blessed that I'm here. So now that I'm here, I operate in a space that, you know, I'm going to acknowledge these wins, but I'm also needing to be super effective and efficient. So I can't go there in my mind.

But like now I'm sitting here, right, talking to you and blown away at the stars that you. you've worked with. You know, I mean, for the audience, just go to her website. Like literally, Liz Kaplan Studios. Check it out. Yeah, Liz Kaplan Vocal Studios.com or Liz Kaplan.com.

And it's Kaplan with a seat. Thank you. Yeah. And we'll see some of your favorite stars on her website. What's that like? So now I'm asking you the question. I'm happy to respond to this. The most important first statement

I couldn't make is that in a million years, I would not have expected my life to have ended up this way in terms of the clientele that I have attracted, that have been sent to me in combination. The cleaner and calmer and more centered and more aware. I became, which I've always been this person, but, you know, acknowledging these things as I got older, you attract the kind of people you want to attract, or you hope to attract.

So teaching, and I'm sure you can share this with me, and as soon as you said Jay Leno, I thought, when you're in a conversation with a major celebrity, you realize you're just having a conversation with a person who agreed to have a conversation with you, who felt that he was ready to, he or she was ready to open up. And you end up realizing after you kind of calm down and exhale, you realize, oh, I'm just going to be having a conversation with somebody I have watched on television my entire life. And it doesn't seem as gigantically impossible when.

and you're in this intimate environment. And truly, for me, I work with full Broadway companies, and I'm on set with films, and I'm on set with television series, I have music attached to it. So I'm working, you know, in different locations. But my primary, obviously, first thought is my private studio where it all starts. And usually the people with whom I work bring me onto their project.

So it all starts small, and then it kind of expands. as it kind of just begs to. So what I do is, I know, is exceptionally cool to anybody who is not exposed to this kind of career. But like, I will say, for instance, I have been working with Hugh Jackman for going on 12 years. He and I were put together from. from the composers of the greatest showman. And they wanted him to go from being a certain kind of singer into more of a pop singer.

And they said, you need to go to our friend. We've known him for this many years. These are her clients. I think you'll get along unbelievably well. And he basically said, yeah, send me. Fine. And it turned out that that same exact week that they told him that they would like him to try to work with me, I had tickets with friends amongst them Amanda Seifred. So that's dropping, like like dropping all over the place.

She's great. But she and I went to see his play on Broadway. And we went backstage after. And Amanda said, do you know Liz Kaplan? And he went, wait, aren't I supposed to see you next week? voice lesson. And I said, indeed you are. So one of my first photographs that I have is me in his dressing room of his play with

literally, I must say, and pardon my friends to your listeners. But I had such a shitty ingrin on my face because I thought, oh, this is just ridiculously fun. And who would imagine that you need to go see Liz Kaplan? And Liz Kaplan, unbeknown to those people, went to see his play. I go backstage because I'm with Amanda, whom I had just worked with on Les Miserables, the film. And then I'm meeting him. And it was personal.

And it was after his play. So he was exhausted, but calm. And he put his arm around me and gave me a hug in advance of working with me. So by the time he came in the following week for his first ever voice lesson with me, we were already so comfortable with each other because we had met not like, I'm going to be your teacher, you're going to be my student, you're unbelievably famous, I'm going to have nerves working with you. But he is the kind of person, and I'm going to say this about most everybody else with whom I work

of this Aeless nature. They are so aware that people are going to be nervous with them initially, that they try to calm me down or whomever they're talking to. It's almost like get the nerves out of the way and like who are we when we're actually having to do the work that we've been assigned to do? And that was assuaged so quickly. And then when I did the lesson with him and I did the breathing series that I told you about and that's when he came up, he was like, do you do this every lesson with everyone?

I went, yes, he went, whoa. And I said, okay, and now we're going to sing. And I'm going to show you like different ideas as to how you can approach this material, which I had already known about. And I worked with him multiple times a week for many, many years before they even started rehearsing and then filming the greatest showman. Wow. So we have very, very personal, natural,

no big deal texting, emailing. And like every now and then, I will look at my phone and go, Hugh Jackman. That's wild, right? But also, I will say, like, I'm not, I'm not to that level yet, but I'm texting people and talking to people on the phone that I never thought in a million years I'd even have contact with, right? And it's all, it's all this thing where, you know, it's a process.

You build up and then, hey, maybe one day, you know, Hugh Jackman shows up on my phone. Like, I don't put anything out of the realm of possibilities because I should never, should never, big visionary. But the thing that I'm really hearing in is a, and I love that perspective you shared because I need the audience to know something. Just because they're on TV, just because they're super famous, does not. not rid them of a personality, does not rid them of their actual human experience on this planet. And too many people see these celebrities like, what do you have to say? Like, you're so-and-so. You don't have any struggles. Like, you have no idea about the amount of struggles that those individuals go through. Like, you want to talk about adversity? They're judged constantly.

You're worried about being judged in your job in corporate America. These people are being fine tooth comb, too skinny, too fat, not muscular. enough. Not good looking enough. He's balding. He's aged out. She's aging out. She's done. Like, but this is so powerful. But like, the way you're bringing this together is you're painting this picture for the audience and even for myself that like you're painting the same picture I'm experiencing in my own life when I'm talking to these people's like, yo, they're a human being. and we're going to have a great time. We're going to have a great conversation.

I sat down with William H. Macy and had a conversation with him. He's like, dude, this has been amazing. He's like, this is different. You do it different. Wow. I'm like, hey, man, let me know when you want to come back on it. Whenever you want to promote stuff, I'm here. Like, let's do it.

But to do what you do. I mean, just backing up just a second, William H. Macy is major. and not just from his TV and film work, but he was one of the founders of the Atlantic Theater Company, and that is a huge teaching environment. They have a school connected to it. The theater only puts out the most amazing pieces and all original work,

and he is on the letterhead of that. So I know these things. I don't work with him, so I don't know him personally, but I know how deep getting to talk to him. actually is. Yeah. It was pretty, it was pretty rewarding, right?

It was like, those are those moments you look back and, you know, most recently, Marcus Luttrell, a lone survivor. That was a big story,

but his brother was also one too. That's 20 years of seal service between the two of them. I'm like, whoa, this is an amazing experience. The whole point is, is like, we get to do something really cool.

Right? Really freaking cool. In your experience and working, with everybody and all the things that you've done, what's been the most rewarding thing? And you don't have to include names

if you don't have to. You can just give the situation. But what's the most rewarding for you? I just would mention this. Oh, interesting. I will drop names because it does kind of frame the story. But I worked on,

as vocal supervisor and vocal producer, on the Lynn Manuel Miranda tick-tick-boom musical film. And he called me himself. I've been working with him all along from In The Heights and all the shows that he did, you know, experimentally for himself and ultimately Hamilton. So when he has vocal things that he has to prepare for,

I am so lucky and somewhat also continuously shocked. that I'm being called upon to support Lynn Bowdenwell, Miranda. And why I'm talking about this is that he came in several weeks in a row fairly recently to work on some material for a new show that they were just going to be workshopping and seeing if it is a show. And I said to him, he asked me, he goes, have you talked to Andrew Garfield? And I said, yeah, I'm in touch with him all the time because this is how that story went. I was on a weekend. I get a text. Hi, it's Lynn. I need to talk to you about a new project. Call me back. I was like, let me give it five minutes before I call him back. And I literally was like, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. Okay, time to call him back. So I called him back and he said, I wanted to let you know that I have a new project for us to work on. And I said, oh, I said, cue the intrigue.

He said, I got the rights to do Tick, Tick, Boom, which was an off-Broadway play, kind of a cult play musical that a lot of musical theater people do know about. And it was written by Jonathan Larson, who wrote Rent, and he passed away before he realized what was going to happen with that show, the most tragic story. That's crazy. So Jonathan Larson wrote this musical. It was prior to Rent. But they did it after rent. So he said, I got the rights to tick, tick, boom. I said, oh, that's so exciting.

And he said, and I'm going to direct it. It's going to be my first feature. And I said, that is amazing. I said, who do you have in mind to play the Jonathan character? And he said, we're hoping to get Andrew Garfield. And I said, oh, does he sing? And all he said to me was, that's where you come in. and so began me meeting Andrew and him having never sung a note in his entire life showing him how

I mean this is a great story for anybody who would want to try to make sound in any way even if it's to like yell or scream or bellow or let out a cry or a moan or anything but our first lesson was so filled with emotions I I won't go into total detail, but it was like, let's just say it was like everything came out. And I had also a three-year period where I worked to prepare him while he was doing film after film. So he was on location in Europe and all around our country and all around the world. And we'd always FaceTime and Zoom at different hours of the day or night. And then we got to the filming of it. And I will say, based on your question, that when I saw Lynn recently,

I said to him, I just need you to know that you reaching out to me and trusting me with Andrew, who had not ever had any singing experience and I got to sort of help birth his voice was definitely a career highlight in that it used everything I had and knew. And it was a psychological journey. It was an emotional journey. It was a spiritual journey. It's like, please help us, you know. So that is a career highlight. There have been so many.

And I don't mean to be minimizing, you know, all the things I've done, but also, you know, working with Hugh and getting him prepared for the greatest showman film and how that film ended up being responded to was extraordinary. And I have worked with him on other films since. I actually was helping him not lose his voice. when he was doing Wolverine because his voice was going to need to be in one piece because we were going to be going back into the greatest showman. So I was like, okay, what exactly is happening with your voice?

How hard are you growling? And so he actually growled, and this is obviously on Zoom. And I said, okay, that's definitely going to kill you. Let's find a better way to do that. So it was just like sharing ideas and finding ways to sort of know that he could do what he had to do, not try to hold back and not be in the moment, but figure out a way to like as a precursor to making that growling sound that we remember Wolverine doing, it was preparing his body for it and his breath for it. So that's been a reward sort of cyclically over time. that's really cool man i i like to ask questions like that because i get to watch you light up and i get to watch you express how much you love what you do oh there's not a lot of people

out there right now that can really say that and it's sad and i understand a lot of people are doing things they don't want to do and thinking one day one day and look i i was there I was doing sales and I was doing this part time. I'm like one day, man, I just want to be able to do that. Every day, 365, man. I don't want to do anything else. I want to be my own boss and, you know, I wasn't ready when I pulled the trigger and my wife surely wasn't ready either, right?

That was a scary. 2024 was scary, Liz. Scary. And, but I will say that finding something that you love, love, that is your passion, that you feel it is your gift from the gods. You know, God gave you this gift. It's like, I feel like he gave me this gift of conversation. And so for me not to use this ultimate act of disrespect.

So I'm going to use this gift. I'm going to go hard on it. And one of the things that I remember, and this is not bashing him, but, you know, my dad always said to me, what are you going to do if you don't make it to the major leagues and play baseball. You can't work with your hands. You can't work on cars. And I'm like, people like talking to me.

And he said to me, and I was probably 16 or 17, he's like, you can't make any money with your voice. Like you can't make money by having conversations. And it's so crazy because early on, like I had this, this thought, this feel like, no, I can talk to people. Like, I can have conversation. I know I can make a living out of this. I don't know what it's going to look like.

but that's none of my business. I just got to let my life roll out and execute certain checkpoints. And so for the listeners, my whole point is you may be in a spot right now where you're not doing what you love. You're not lit up every day. But just think of that one thing that just sets you on fire, that you just love so much that you think you can never make money doing and just go do that thing and do it for free for a little while.

And then all of a sudden you'll find that you're going to be in a better position and you probably created something very, very special. I mean, that's what you did. You started very small. Yeah. And I basically, I was going to ask you the question. Did we have the same father that we didn't know that? But we might, we might, you know.

I had the same thing where I, if I had ever paid attention to anything, either one of my parents rest their souls ever said to me, I don't know what I'd be doing. I don't know how I'd end up. If I was following that sort of given framework, I would have been the unhappiest person. And for me, several things here. One, I was always teaching.

When I was 14 years old, I had a full roster of students because people with whom I went to school wanted my help. Or I musical directed a theater summer program. And people said, oh, you know, during the year, can I work with you? So I've never not known having sort of a clientele of sorts.

And it obviously was very little, very small. And then when I started, you know, and I came back to New York where I'm from and I started teaching three people who also I had gone to college with. And then three people told other people. Three people became seven. Seven became 11. Eleven kept expanding. And then I started working with people who were in.

shows or films or in TV series and one person to tell another person that increases your sort of visibility. And that's why when I started saying, like, I can't believe my life turned out the way it did with, I would have been very happy teaching fully just aspirational aspiring people who are hoping to do this as a career. And I still do work with people who are just starting out because that's still a very major passion. for me, especially if somebody was, I want to say, emotionally abused in an academic musical theater program and they are carrying it on them, I don't even think, oh, I'm going to send them to somebody else. I think, no, let's let this at me and let me explain to them how I

understand how they're feeling. And they go, you totally get me and let's do the work. So I love the mishmash of like, you know, Hugh Jackman and Stephen Colbert and and Platt, who I see often still, and Andrew working on the film. And then the people who are coming out of college programs who were really, really beaten down and need to find their tea energy again to basically shine because they lost the light in their eyes and they lost the color in their face. So that's the kind of thing that also brings me so much joy. And then the other part of the same thing is I said to myself way long ago. I said, okay, I'm enjoying this now. It feels like how much fun am I having while I'm making a living? Wow, did I ever expect that to be the case?

But I said, promised myself the day it becomes drudgery and the day I am not feeling motivated and the day that I'm actually like phoning it in or not fully present, then I'm not going to be that person. I'm going to be the person that goes, peace out, homie. Well, dang, one thing that I want to end on, I want basically the audience to really key on how you began your career. You know, three turned into seven, seven turned into 11, 11 and turned into more and more and more.

And I want you guys to understand something, because this is a thing that I think people struggle with. And I know I did and I still do at times. I take my blinders off and I like to compare myself and where I'm at to other big shows. Like the shows that everybody knows who they are. And I'm like, well, I'm like, wow, we have really good conversations too. Like, why am I not here? Why am I not there yet?

And I always think of this. I go, okay, wait a second. How much further are you ahead than you were 12 months? months ago and it's astronomically high. It's no, you know, I looked at our numbers. We're 99% better this year than we were last year on all analytics. Oh my gosh. So it's wild, right?

But guys, there's this stupid cliche Rome wasn't built in the day. I'm going on five years of this. You're going on 38 years. You're going to have to do something for a while, guys, for you guys to see that visible progress. Everybody else may see it before you, but you just have to understand something. Your job is to wake up every single day determined to chase your dreams, no matter how you feel emotionally at that moment. Because the payoff will come, you just have to work your butt off to get there.

So the one last question I have for you. Sure. This is the Determined Society. In Liz Kaplan's book of definitions, what does determination mean? I think a willingness to certainly keep. going and continuing the same work with the same mission statement that I began with, which was also, you know, like doctors say, do no harm for me. It's use love and caring and empathy to make people realize that they can be comfortable

with you and then ultimately themselves. I love that. Pardon me, it's so New York dry and rainy here. No, you're good. It's 80 degrees here. I'm sorry to brag, but. Yeah, I'm getting on a plane. Yeah, come on.

Come hang out. Come hang out. It'll be fun. Love. If it's okay with you, I would like to mention just a few things that, you know, we have a little bit in common, but I wanted to say that I'm also on Instagram

and welcome people to ask me questions and, you know, respond to curiosities. And my handle is at Liz Kaplan. The website is Liz Kaplan.com or Liz Kaplan Vocal Studios.com. And that is Liz Kaplan on Facebook as well. But also, apropos of this conversation we've just had, I am in the midst of shopping a book based on all of this that we just talked about.

Wow. How it's about singing, not just to be a professional singer, but as a tool like you even mentioned in your words, which I will take with me from this interview, which is as medicine, singing as medicine. So there will be a book out eventually. It's happening. It's in the works. Oh, what's going to happen? And I can't wait to read it. Thank you.

Same here. Well, thank you so much, Liz. You're incredible. This has been an amazing conversation, but I know this is the beginning of a really good friendship. Agree. You know, and that's what I'm, you know, the show is great, but I love making new friends.

And I'm going to be up in New York. I'm pretty sure sometime soon. So I will let me know. You better make sure I know that you're in the vicinity for sure. Absolutely. I would love to keep having a chat with you. And I believe that this podcast that you are doing besides the fact when our mutual person told me the name of it, I was like, oh, what a beautiful, brilliant name for a podcast. Because it tells you almost everything and then even bigger than that.

It's little and it's medium and it's big and it's gigantic simultaneously. So congratulations from me to you. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate you and I appreciate that. So, well, I will talk to you soon. And for the audience, you heard her, go follow her on Instagram. Check out her page, her website.

That'll be in the show notes for you guys just to click on and go directly there. So one thing that I want you guys to understand is, you know, we're all human beings. we all have our struggles and we all need our tools and certain medicines to help us through things. And what I want you guys to do is share this episode with someone that you know love and trust that can get something out of what we talked about because we talked about her amazing career. We talked about the amazing people that she works with. But what we really talked about is self-wellness. And there's a bigger message here, guys.

And I want you to really dive in. So again, share the show with someone you know love and trust. Until next time, guys, stay determined.