Perhaps the most well-known of vocal coaches was the Australian Lionel Logue, immortalised in the film The King’s Speech, played by Geoffrey Rush. King George, of course, had an intractable stammer, but the exercises he undertook with Logue helped the king deliver important speeches in the time of war.
It’s a commonplace that people often gravitate to disciplines which had helped them overcome a challenge. Young people who have received salient medical care may harbour an ambition to be such a care-giver themselves. So it’s not a surprise to find a vocal coach who may have stammered in their youth. Stammering, or stuttering, is more prevalent in populations across the world than one might think.
According to Wikipedia, stuttering occurs at a rate of about 5% in young children, and of course can be exacerbated by difficult circumstances. Children often grow out of their stammer, but even so, in the general population the frequency of stammering is about 1%.
I’ve always thought that the challenge when trying to communicate with someone who stammers/stutters (the words mean the same, but are more common respectively in England or North America) is a lack of patience. This impatience can, I’d have thought, provide a negative reinforcing feedback loop that further blocks the ability of the stammerer to speak.
The disjunct between ability to sing and to talk, in the case of stammering, is well known.
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