Call to set up a Zoom introduction 646-981-9330
about me - Elizabeth Hurwitt
why I teach AT
- I was born into a family tradition of care: my father was a psychiatrist and my mother was a public health pediatrician. I grew up with a sense that listening to people, understanding and helping them was the most important and most interesting thing in the world to do.
- I hold the deepest respect for medecine's effectiveness in diagnosis and cure. At the same time, I have long been aware of and curious about medecine's disappointing track record in addressing behavior-based conditions that negatively affect health outcomes, like obesity, addiction, depression, anxiety and chronic pain. AT is an outstanding strategy for changing behaviors that aren't helping us do well.
- I have a background in teaching creative writing and in music journalism. Although the use of my hands is paramount in AT teaching, it is helpful to the student that I am able to describe things about the body and sensory awareness that are, like descriptions of music, difficult to put into words.
- AT has been a part of my life for over 30 years. Teaching helps me continue my own learning experience. Every lesson is a new conversation between two nervous systems - my own and my pupil's. I gain a new understanding of the work each time I share what I know.
- AT is uplifting, literally and figuratively. My AmSAT teaching certification is a license and obligation to practice expert care, which begins with taking care of myself.
my AT training
- My teaching practice, betterATbeing, is certified by the American Society for Alexander Technique (AmSAT). I trained for 3 years (1600 hours) with TOM VASILIADES, Director of Alexander Technique for Performance and Development.
- I am currently pursuing post-graduate studies with Tom. 2019-20 was my fourth year assisting Tom in his course at The Juilliard School Evening Division, working hands-on with students. My practice of AT is informed by Tom's post-graduate training with John Nicholls and Walter Carrington.
- Carrington is revered for preserving and communicating the principles established by F.M. Alexander, AT's founder, taught into the present at the Constructive Teaching Centre in London.
- This profoundly effective way of teaching emphasizes the engagement of the postural muscles via the whole body's web of elastic, opposing pulls. It promotes a widening as well as a lengthening of the back, freeing the rib cage for deep and natural breathing. The teacher's inquiring, guiding touch speaks to the entire individual with each placement of the hands
OTHER BACKGROUND
I come from the San Francisco Bay Area, and earned a BA in English Literature from UC Santa Cruz, where I cultivated a love for poetry, reflected in my passion for the symmetry and simultaneity of Alexander Technique. From Santa Cruz I moved to NYC's Upper West Side, joined a church choir, and sang Bach alongside a lively group of trained singers and actors. As singing became more important to me, I pursued private vocal training, gave small recitals, and took my first AT lessons with Pamela Anderson, while working in publishing, legal management and music journalism.
As an arts executive for the past 25 years I have helped shape and sustain several of the small but brilliant companies that shine among the monoliths of New York's great concert-giving scene, including New York Festival of Song. Today, in addition to teaching AT, I serve as Development Director of Copland House, a unique creative center for American music based in Aaron Copland's historic home in Cortlandt Manor. I live in lower Manhattan with my husband Elliott Hurwitt, a music historian.