Meet Shauna
I didn’t set out to build a studio - I just needed to find my way back to my voice.
I'm Shauna - a soprano, vocal educator, endurance athlete, and the founder of First Instrument Studio. I'm based in Los Angeles, and I've spent most of my life in devotion to two questions: what does the voice need in order to be free, and why does traditional training so rarely answer that?
My musical foundation is grounded in Black American music (gospel in the Baptist church for 20 years, jazz and blues in the community since 1997) and was expanded with Western classical training at Temple University's Boyer College of Music & Dance. I've performed solo sacred works with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and worked in Anglican parishes as a staff singer for both the Philadelphia and Los Angeles Episcopal dioceses. In 2016, I was hired to tour with Golden Voices of Gospel - a German production that brought Black American vocalists to European audiences to perform Negro spirituals and gospel classics. I’ve sang with every type of contemporary band there is - rock, jazz, blues, funk, pop, house music, and more.
I've taught students in every grade as well as at the college level for years. I know what these institutions offer singers. I also know what they withhold.
When the pandemic ended all of my performance opportunities overnight, I turned within and became a cyclist - not as a hobby, but as a survival tool. Cycling and endurance sports have rebuilt me from the inside out. In March 2025, my home was burglarized and my bike was stolen. Coincidentally in the days that followed, something unexpected happened: I was awarded a scholarship by the David Lynch Foundation to begin practicing Transcendental Meditation. Two 20-minute daily meditation sessions and consistent exercise helped me to become clear on how I can serve the next generation of singers and vocalists.
Meditation didn't just help me grieve the loss. It helped me see clearly (maybe for the first time) a few key truths: 1) the voice cannot be free inside a body that isn't regulated, 2) contemporary music cannot be taught without context, and 3) wellness is the foundation of a strong, healthy voice. That clarity became the Integrative Vocal Wellness™, my proprietary curriculum and the foundation of how I teach.
What began as personal survival became a methodology that encompassed all of my education and performance experiences. That methodology became how I help to transform singers and speakers into healthy, creative vocalists.
First Instrument is the studio I was searching for when I was a voice student. I know what it feels like to train without being seen or cared for. I built it so no one else has to feel that way.
I created First Instrument for the singer who has been technically trained but emotionally abandoned by their training, for the educator who pours everything into their students and has forgotten to tend their own instrument, for the musician who loves the music but carries complicated feelings about how it was handed down, and everyone in between and beyond.
My approach was built around a simple belief: you cannot separate the voice from the person carrying it, so I don't. Every dimension of your humanity (physical, emotional, cultural, spiritual) has a place in my studio. I didn't just build a methodology - I built a mirror that reflects the full range of who singers and vocalists are, not just what they can produce. My students are people who have been called to serve the world through their voices - they deserve to be met as whole human beings first.
I currently serve as voice faculty at Musicians Institute College of Contemporary Music in Hollywood, sit on the board of Wellbeing in Entertainment & Creative Arts, and run First Instrument as one of three mission-based brands through Creative Alchemy Alliance.
Wherever you are in your vocal journey, I'm glad you found your way here. I look forward to meeting you soon.
And if you have a dog, tell them Auntie Shauna says hi. 🐾