Dr Ralph Strehle is the Director of the Mascarade Opera and Head of Education for the Mascarade Opera Foundation. Ralph is a leading expert on peak-performance psychology and was formerly the Associate Head of Vocal Performance at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. Ralph works frequently as a guest performance coach and lecturer at institutions across Europe, such as: the National Opera Studio London, the Norwegian Academy of Music, the Hamburg International Opera Studio, Oslo National Academy of the Arts, the New Generation Festival, the Kiri Te Kawana Foundation. Ralph’s work has been the subject of articles in Opera Now, Classical Music Magazine and many other publications. Ralph’s experience and expertise in quality assurance and educational management, in particular implementing and monitoring strategies and structures for the artistic and professional development of singers, equips him with a wide and unique skill set. His areas of expertise include effective practice techniques, performance profiling, audition and competition preparation, the design of individual psychological skills training programmes for musicians and peak performance workshops. Ralph holds a doctorate in music, his thesis exploring performance psychology and motivation, as well as doctorate in English with an emphasis on ethics and philosophy. He was resident performance coach at the CLIP International Singing Competition and the Veronica Dunne International Singing Competition. This summer he will be performance coach at the BBC Cardiff Singer of the World Competition.