A 7 night residential retreat with accommodation in North Wales
Bodlondeb Retreats are deeply immersive, experiential and tailored programmes designed to deeply connect you to yourself, and each other by combining techniques, exercises and coaching with outdoor activities like white water stand up paddle boarding, canoeing, canyoning, abseiling, foraging, sump diving, rock jumping, scrambling, archery, making dinner on the camp fire and so much more. 

Arrive Open, Leave Changed

We are delighted that this inspiring and knowledgeable human is coming back to Wales to work with us. Together we have designed a course which will stay with you for a lifetime. There is no other course like it in the world.
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Her courses often fill up so don't hang about on booking. 

We have two date options, make sure you choose the right one!

3-10th August
4-5pm arrival time and 10am departure time
For... Actors, Voice Over artists & Voice Coaches (18+)

Booking
Please get in touch and introduce yourself before booking
NB Barbara is running 3x weekend retreats of her own here too. Go to the Calendar Page for more info.

About the course...

This retreat will enable you to explore connecting deeply with your inner and outer voice. Removing the blocks that stop you from fully expressing your authentic self with confidence and ease whether speaking your own words or the words of a script and whether you are communicating/performing in person or on screen. 
 
There will be a mixture of deeply organic work and practical, tangible technical work which you can easily carry into your everyday life. The first four days will explore all aspects of inner and outer voice work and connection to text. The last two days will focus in on individual work on text.
 
Here at Bodlondeb Studio & Retreat we are passionate about rich neurological, full bodied experiences that stay with you for a lifetime so this training will also be combined with outdoor activities to drop your learning down deep into your body and other-than-conscious. And aside from anything else, it’ll be fun!
"While I’m sure that we have all come away with technical skills and a deeper knowledge of vocal technique, when Barbara asked us on the last day what our learnings were, we were all saying the same things: trust, acceptance, allowing, grounding. All of which seem like a pretty solid base upon which to build our craft." ~ Nicki from Nov 2021 Retreat

Aside from your packing list you'll need to bring:

-    a piece you love - could be a poem, song lyrics, passage from a novel or a speech from a play or even a passage from an autobiography, magazine, newspaper, non fiction book. You don't have to learn it unless you want to - just be familiar with it.
-    a couple of short (1 minute) pieces of text - one that is very emotional where you feel your voice might tense up and another you might find difficult to connect to.
I first became aware of Barbara Houseman’s work some years ago when I was performing with the RSC. She was part of the great tradition of voice teaching which the company encouraged, pioneered by the brilliant Cis Berry.
More recently I have worked with Barbara as a director and an actor. In both cases she was an enormous inspiration.

~ Kenneth Branagh

Barbara is a passionate teacher and, as an actor new to the stage, there was no better person to be working with…She is an inspiring teacher, and I left every session stimulated with the new discoveries we had made…
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I continue to work with her, as I find her a hugely motivating force in my work.

~ Daniel Radcliffe
"Having returned to the stage for the first time in 14 years I recently enlisted the help of Barbara and found her to be hugely helpful , supportive and inspirational .. I rate her as one of the best voice coaches I have come across .. Incisive .. Instinctive ..Specific ..and a great enabler... I feel very lucky to know her and be able to work with her." 

~ Clive Owen
"Barbara's work starts with voice, passes through the physical and results in a character.Her teaching helps total performance."

~ Jude Law

Barbara Houseman

Barbara Houseman has worked in theatre for over forty years. After dividing her time between Directing and Voice Work, she spent six years in the world renowned Voice Department at the Royal Shakespeare Company, working alongside Cicely Berry and then became Associate Director at the Young Vic working on Grimm’s Tales & Comedy of Errors.

For the last 22 years she has worked freelance as a Voice, Text and Acting coach and Associate Director and Director. Among other private clients she coaches Daniel Radcliffe, Jude Law,  Clive Owen and Jessie Buckley on various projects.

In 2009 she joined Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre as Voice and Text Coach and in 2014 became Season Associate Director - Voice & Text.

She has worked on numerous shows in the West End including End Game, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead, Duchess of Malfi, Design for Living & Playboy of the Western World at the Old Vic; The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night time and The Ferryman at the Gielgud; Macbeth, Richard iii  and Dr Faustus for the Jamie Lloyd company; the All Female Shakespeare Trilogy, St Joan, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Coriolanus, Trelawney of the Wells at the Donmar.​
She is the author of Finding Your Voice and Tackling Text [and Subtext] both published by Nick Hern Books and of two digital Masterclasses Developing Your Voice and Bringing the Text to Life. Barbara has also trained as a Healing Shiatsu Practitioner, Master NLP Practitioner and Clean Language & Symbolic Modelling Coach and these have all influenced her work as has her 33 years practising Mindfulness. She now teaches Mindfulness and Compassion alongside her voice, acting and directing work.

Prices

£763 - Full price shared room
£819 - Full price private room off site
£704 - Course only

£713 - Early Bird Discount shared room
£769 - Early Bird Discount private room off site
£654 - Early Bird Discount Course only

​NB early bird discount ends 22nd June, midnight
Book now with only a 50% deposit and pay the rest later. ​

The Prices Include

- You can choose course only as an option (this includes using the kitchen with the group)
- Or there is one private room available on the farm down the road
  • Food package for arrival evening and first morning and kitchen basics ie tea, coffee, spices, oils etc (the rest you’ll order with local delivery)
  • A beautifully fused coaching experience from the studio into the wild and back again.  
  • Other activities: Night walk, wild swimming, country walk with mindful movement & white water rafting.
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NB we reserve the right to change or adapt the activities if necessary

Are you ready to jump?

Arrive open and you will leave changed.

Get in touch if you have any questions.​

Booking
Please get in touch before booking to introduce yourself
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