Tom Vasiliades studied math and science at Queens College, City University of New York in the 1970’s. During his second year, he took an acting course, caught the “acting bug” and decided to pursue an acting career. From the late 1970s to the early 1990s he worked mostly in theater as an actor, director and producer, and as an actor in film and television. He studied acting with Stella Adler, Robert Lewis, Sanford Meisner, William Esper and Peter Thompson; Voice and Speech with Clyde Vinson and Robert Neff Williams; Movement with Loyd Williamson and Anna Sokolow; Mime with Richard Morse Mime Theater .
In 1985, following a friend's suggestion as a way to help his acting work, he took his first Alexander Technique lessons. From these lessons, he noticed significant changes. He felt freer, more open, and expansive. Studying the Technique created benefits in his acting work: improved breathing, better vocal production, more freedom in movement and greater emotional availability and expression. He also found that it profoundly changed how he did life activities off-stage as well. These experiences, along with studies in other disciplines and practices in personal growth and development, led him to train as a teacher at the American Center for the Alexander Technique in New York City; he certified to teach in 1994.
Since the 1980s he has experienced the Alexander work with over 100 teachers from different teaching lineages, traditions and styles. His post graduate training includes studying in London with Marjorie Barlow, Walter Carrington, Dilys Carrington, John Nicholls and Peggy Williams. They are his main influences in his teaching and training.
Tom has taught in university settings, medical offices and health clubs. He teaches at The Juilliard School. He was on the faculty and the Chair of the Movement Department at The New School for Drama (formerly the Actors Studio Drama School at New School University) and was on the faculty at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts-undergraduate drama. Tom has presented workshops and lecture demonstrations to the general public. He has taught workshops to the Alexander Technique teaching community at the AmSAT conferences and International Alexander Technique Congresses. He continues to teach lessons, classes and workshops throughout the United States and internationally. Tom has taught the Alexander Technique and coached professional actors on Broadway and Off-Broadway.
In 2004, he opened the Alexander Technique Center for Performance and Development whose mission is to make the Alexander work available to the public. Tom works with performers, people with chronic pain, asthma, emphysema and other respiratory ailments, business people and athletes.
In January 2014 he opened his own Alexander Technique teacher training program, the Training Center for the Alexander Technique-NYC (TCAT-NYC). For 15 years prior to starting his own training, he had assisted on the training courses American Center for the Alexander Technique (ACAT), Habit and Choice and, most notably, for ten years as an assistant on John Nicholls’s training programs in New York City.
Tom studied with Carl Stough for seven years. Stough is the developer of Breathing Coordination, an approach that improves breathing function.
In 1999, Tom completed a two-year psychotherapy training program in Social Therapy — an approach that helps people re-initiate human development through performance and group building— at the East Side Institute for Group and Short Term Psychotherapy.
Having studied with the Michael Chekhov Association (MICHA), Tom teaches the Michael Chekhov Technique.
He is a member of the American Society for the Alexander Technique (AmSAT). He has served as the Chair of the Board of Directors and President of the American Center for the Alexander Technique. He also served on the AmSAT Board.
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