Who was F. M. Alexander?

Frederick Mathias Alexander (1869- 1955) was born in Tasmania, Australia in l869. He began his career as an actor. His promising future was jeopardized because he kept losing his voice when he went on stage. Doctors could find nothing wrong with him and prescribed rest and waiting for his voice to return. Upon examining his situation Alexander realized that although he could speak during his every day encounters it was when he went on stage that his problem occurred. He reasoned that it most be something he was doing to himself that was causing his loss of voice. Determined to overcome this problem he organized a system of three way mirrors in which he could observe himself. Determined to overcome this problem, Alexander used mirrors to observe himself and noticed that he became tense and stiff when he recited. Through long, patient observation, he came to develop and articulate principles that not only enabled him to solve his voice problems, but also had a profound influence on his general health and well-being.
There is no such thing as a right position,
but there is such a thing as a right direction
F. M. Alexander
He found that certain muscular tensions could cause a compression of the head-neck-spine axis, resulting in respiratory problems and even loss of voice. Decreasing these tensions would relieve the pressure and allow the spine to return to its full natural extension.
Thus, through better mind-body communication, Alexander was able to recover much of his natural ease of movement, leading to an economy of effort as well as improved performance. He opened a center in Sydney and began to teach others what he called "Psycho-Physical Re-Education", also affectionately referring to it as "Organized Common Sense". He became known as "The Breathing Man". His great success in helping others make dramatic and lasting improvement in their coordination and health helped to spread the popularity of his work beyond actors and singers to people in all walks of life. He was invited to London, England in 1904 where he remained until the end of his life. (He made a number of visits to the United States, teaching in New York and Boston). He wrote four books: Man's Supreme Inheritance, The Use of the Self, Constructive Conscious Control of the Individual and The Universal Constant In Living. Their titles certainly suggest the great scope of his thinking. He began training teachers in 1932, and continued teaching until the week before his death at the age of 86 in l955. Many well known people of the day came to Alexander for private lessons they included the great English actors Sir Henry Irving, Viola Tree and Oscar Asche, writers Aldous Huxley and George Bernard Shaw, Lady Winston Churchill, the then Archbishop of Canterbury William Temple, the Viceroy of India, the Earl of Lytton and the American educator and philosopher John Dewey.

Click here:
Photo archive of F.M.Alexander
(The Society of Teachers of the Alexander Technique's official website)