My Facebook and Twitter news feeds have all been on fire with the same video of the 13-year-old opera singer, Laura Bretan, wowing the judges and audience with her rendition of "Nessun Dorma"during the season 11 premiere of "America’s Got Talent." She finished her performance with a standing ovation by an audience with tear-filled eyes.

There is no denying that this girl has a big voice and knows how to perform with genuine emotion. Judge Simon Cowell, after harshly commenting on the acts before Bretan, was thoroughly impressed. “That just happened. I have never heard anything like that in all the years I’ve been doing this show,” Cowell said after giving a standing ovation. Judge Mel B. even gave Bretan the first Golden Buzzer of the season to immediately pass her along to the next stage.

After listening to this young opera singer, I had some reservations. Other young opera singers, like Jackie Evancho, have also made me sit a little uncomfortably; whether it was out of jealousy or actual concern for their careers, I’m not sure. As a classical singer, I understand how easy it is to overextend one’s abilities at a young age. This will lead to further damage as a person matures if healthy singing isn’t a priority while learning how to control the voice.

I am actually overjoyed that the art of opera is being shared more often, especially through pop culture and popular TV shows. There has been a great division between opera lovers and people who don’t love opera as much because of the so-called snobby actions of regular listeners. I’d like to say that I am in no way saying I dislike or don’t support Laura Bretan. I love her passion, and her genuine ability to perform. I love that she is making opera accessible to a larger audience. But, as classical singing is becoming more accessible to a modern and less-elitist audience, the praise of loud sounds and high sounds without the knowledge of the training that gets a performer there has been a misguided motivation to sing out of a person’s actual healthy ability.

Sure, Bretan shows off that she is able to make sounds over a nice range for her age, especially with her being able to get a decently stable B5 out at the end of the piece (for reference, at this age most sopranos can sing to about an E5 comfortably, so she’s singing much higher -- eight half-steps -- than most, or than she really healthily should). I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt that she can usually hit that note with a little more punch and stability, but nerves got in the way when she saw the thousands of people she had to perform for. She can roll the heck out of her Rs, and she can really spit out those words with meaning. She puts on a show. She entertains.

Though she is entertaining this audience, is she doing it correctly? I’m all for challenging abilities and going above and beyond what people expect of performers of a certain age. This piece that she performed, "Nessun Dorma" from Puccini’s "Turandot," is obviously a higher level piece to perform. This wasn’t written for a soprano (and if it was, this piece doesn’t show off the soprano voice in much of a musical way) but actually for a tenor. The range isn’t really what’s concerning here, though.

At Bretan’s age, the voice is changing in ways that are different than when children originally learned the staple songs from school like “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star,” etc. A child, before the voice starts to change, is supposed to have a breathy tone, which means that there isn’t so much pressure put on to the larynx or muscles in the throat that control singing. Of course, every singer’s voice will differ, especially with how supported, light and “breathy” it may be, but having a breathy tone in the voice is healthy at this age. This is how you probably hear the kids in your church choir or in your brother’s Christmas program sing.

The larynx changes and lengthens as child ages, which is around age 13 to 15 for girls, in Bretan’s case. This is a vital time to make sure a solid foundation for singing is learned so that the singer, when ready, can move onto more operatic pieces that require a “big” voice, such as her own. Voice teachers like to use folk songs and standard repertoire with a smaller range at this age to teach students to gradually let their voices change while the voice naturally drops and opens. A singer needs to lightly use his or her vocal chords, without too much pressure on the chords and the larynx, because it is still growing.

Bretan, though she making some really beautiful and mature sounds, is putting a great deal of pressure on her vocal chords in this important time in their growth and development. Loud is not necessarily a good sound, and high isn’t necessarily a good sound. I worry for her future as a singer, because if she continues to sing these dramatic opera pieces, she could run into severe problems with her voice, like vocal polyps and other vocal chord injuries that take surgeries and months or years of vocal therapy to fix.

And comparing her to Jackie Evancho? I can’t be sure whether either of these singers is really trained in a healthy way. I do like how, as Evancho has matured, she sings in a way that doesn’t seem to be harming her vocal chords too much. She does still have a slight breathy tone to her voice, she breathes in some odd places, and she still makes sound as she breathes. This is natural as a young singer. She obviously has been making sure that she takes care of her voice, even if it’s not the biggest voice out there. She's doing what she can and, someday, she may have a huge voice that can sing over the orchestra.

Bretan has a great grasp on singing without a shy voice, keeping a legato and connected sound through her phrases, and performing emotionally in front of an audience. As an audience, we should start to learn the difference between beautiful and entertaining -- loud and big sounds are impressive, but we also need to keep in mind what it takes to make those sounds. I hope that through Laura Bretan’s competition coming up that she will be given advice on keeping her big voice healthy, because, through healthy singing, she will be able to have a successful -- and lasting -- career ahead of her.