Forever Singing » Vocal Diagnostics

Sing Light and Right, Not Strong and Wrong

thomas — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 05:13:38 +0000

It is very easy to get into the habit of singing loudly in order to hit higher notes.

The problem with this approach is that if you don’t have a solid foundation for singing, you will be hurting your voice instead of helping it.

Enter the concept of “sing light and right instead of strong and wrong”. The basic idea behind this principle is that if you can sing the notes correctly with a very light sound, you can sing them louder and still maintain that correct and proper foundation.

I will admit that this is tough at first, especially when you are first starting out singing. There are a few exercises, though, that can help you sing light with more ease.

Lip rolls are one of the best ways to build strength in your voice. Building strength with lip rolls will make singing light much easier.

You can also do mums which help keep your larynx low and build quiet power in your voice. You can also check out these vocal exercises to build your voice as well.

As you build strength in your voice, singing light will come easier and easier. It just takes practice!

How To Thin Out Your Voice

thomas — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 01:25:32 +0000

Today we are going to discuss ways on how to thin our your voice. You need to thin our your voice as you approach your bridge and enter into your mix voice (or head voice). If your vocal cords do not thin out during this transition, you will bring up way too much vocal weight and cause your tone to sound strained, squeezed, tensed, and whatever other adjective you can think of that relays the idea of not sounding good.

Because thinning out your voice is such a vital component in developing your mix voice, it is crucial that you learn how to thin out your voice as soon as possible. Shelby Rollins, a new Brett Manning Associate at Singing Success, has made an excellent video that describes one way to thin out your voice. However, this is not the only way to thin our your voice. There are other ways to thin out the voice (which we will discuss below the video).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6C4_Z1VBt8

As the video pointed out, vocal fry is an excellent first step towards thinning out your voice, but it could use some help along the way too.

I have found that another way to thin out your voice is to simply practice scales in a lighter sound volume. This is much tougher than it actually sounds. The reason why practicing at a lighter sound volume helps your voice thin out is because it forces you to learn how to bring your vocal cords together in the lightest manner possible in order to produce that light sound. Try this out by using the “mum” exercise. Start out at your normal volume and gradually get lighter and lighter as your practice through your scales. Once you find a volume that proves to be somewhat difficult to connect, stay on that volume until you have taught your vocal cords how to connect at that soft volume. You will notice that as you learn how to connect at lower volumes, your voice will thin out better at a normal volume. It has worked wonders for me – surely it will work for you too.

Another way to thin out your voice is to intentionally practice your exercises with your sound resonating more in your head. For example, let’s take the lip roll. The lip roll can take on many different weights. If you intentionally shift your resonance towards your head when doing lip rolls, your vocal cords will automatically thin out more than if you were to practice lip rolls normally. You can practice lip rolls in this manner in order to develop the sense of how thinning out feels in your own voice.

Learning how to thin out your voice can be tough, but it is well worth the effort and time. What steps have you taken in order to learn how to thin out your own voice?

Photo Credits: garryknight (flickr)

The Mix Voice

thomas — Mon, 10 May 2010 03:28:10 +0000

The mix voice is elusive to say the least. I have been bombarded with questions lately about explaining the mix voice in more detail, so I figured I would just write a post and hopefully answer all those questions at the same time.

The mix voice is essentially a blend between chest voice and head voice. The mix voice has the energy of chest voice while maintaining the light weight of head voice. It is developed at the point where the singer crosses his first bridge (or passaggio). The larynx begins to shift towards more of a C shape when you begin to sing in the mix, incorporating the pharyngeal sound as well (the pharyngeal sound is “nnggg”…or you can just think of the Bee Gee’s). The pharyngeal resonator acts as a connector between chest voice and head voice and holds the mix together to some extent. It is very important that all three resonators (chest, pharyngeal and head) are well developed when singing in the mix voice. If one of the resonators lacks training and/or precision, the mix voice falters.

Sounds like the mix voice is complicated, doesn’t it? Technically, yes – it is quite unique. But mechanically, it is no worse than learning how to play guitar for the first time. (Ok, I realize for some that may have been a nightmare..for others a breeze…but just stick with me for now.) I chose the analogy of playing the guitar for the first time because it is quite relevant for learning how to sing in the mix voice. At first, it is quite tough and can be very frustrating, but the more you practice playing it, the better you get at it. The sames goes for the mix voice.

Speaking in general terms (each person is different), the area when the mix begins to form (or should begin to form) are as follows:

male: Eflat4 to F#4
female: F#4 to A4

Like I said, these are general specifications. Some people begin to mix before the specified notes, others afterward. In general, my mix voice starts around E4 (first bridge) with my next bridge coming right around G4/Aflat4. I have a friend, though, who doesn’t starting mixing until G4 (it must be nice to not have any vocal weight all!). In some instances, I may start mixing as early as middle C depending on the nature of the song. Like I said before, it varies from singer to singer.

The mix voice takes time to develop. I would be telling you a lie if I said I had it nailed down. In reality, I am still working through my own issues with the mix voice. However, I know that it is getting stronger and clearer with every day that I practice in it.

Do you have have any more questions about the mix voice that you would like answered? Ask them here – I’d love to help!

Photo Credits: flo and me (flickr)

Vocal Tips For Beginning Singers

thomas — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 01:18:29 +0000

I sometimes have this issue where I forget just how much I have learned about singing in general. That’s why I want to roll back and give three vocal tips that will help the beginners get started. I remember what it was like back then, and I remember some of the questions I had. It can be quite overwhelming to say the least, so here are three vocal tips that will help you get started on the road to learning how to sing better.

Vocal Tips

Vocal Tips – #1: Study and learn about the different ways to approach singing.
This is my number one vocal tip that I can encourage you to use as a beginning singer. Please do yourself a favor and take the time to study about the different schools of vocal thought. I promise you that it will save you much grief and headache in the long run. Here are some schools of thought to get you started:

1) The Speech Level Singing Method
2) The Complete Vocal Technique (CVT Method)
3) The Italian Method
4) The Classical or Opera Method

The method you chose depends somewhat upon the style you want to sing. I personally use and endorse the Speech Level Singing method used by Brett Manning. It offers a healthy way to build your vocal technique, and it is very simple to learn, understand and implement.

Vocal Tips – #2: Decide between private instruction or a singing program.
Most beginning singers have the common misconception that they must have voice lessons from a private instructor in order to learn how to sing better. This is a faulty assumption that can be quite costly. There are singing programs out on the internet that give you fantastic results from the comfort of your own home. Of all the singing programs out there, I recommend Brett Manning’s Singing Success. It produces incredible results (check out my Singing Success review) in a fairly short period of time. If systematic study does not suit you well, seek private instruction.

On this note, I want to go ahead and assert that you should find a vocal technique and instructor that turns you into a better singer without pain or tension to your vocal cords. If you ever find your vocal cords hurting after a session, take some time to rest and re-evaluate your technique or instructor. You always want to keep vocal health a high priority on your list. When you learn how to sing correctly, you won’t have any pain when singing – it will be free and powerful. If you ever feel pain or soreness, take a break and assess the causes – you may need to use a different vocal technique or instructor.

Vocal Tips – #3: Commit yourself to practicing!
With most other things in life, you need to practice in order to get better. It is no different with singing. You must commit yourself to making an honest attempt at practicing! Of all the vocal tips I could give you, this one is definitely the hardest to keep. Practice and effort pays off in singing, so be sure that you are willing to put in the effort to practicing!

I hope you find these vocal tips helpful! Do you have any vocal tips that you would like to share? Comment and let myself (and everyone else) know!

Photo Credits: SimonDeanMedia (flickr)

Singing On Empty

thomas — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 04:24:23 +0000

As I write this post, the weight of the title bears down upon me. Life has been quite busy lately, and it has been tough to keep up with all its demands. I have a great passion for singing, and it is my desire to do it to the best of my ability. But sometimes life gets a little bit tough and it wears me down. Have you ever been there before?

I’ve entitled this post “Singing On Empty” because it hits home in so many different ways. Physically I have been drained. Emotionally I have been drained. Mentally I have been drained. And yet somehow I must find ways to sing. I’m discovering new things about how singing works during this process of being stretched thin.

One of the biggest discoveries I have made during this rough spell is that my voice is the most pliable it has been in months. By pliable I mean flexible, agile, able, and capable. I am somewhat shocked by this because it would seem that all the stress of everyday life would kill my voice and tone. However, it seems that I have been drained enough to completely release my voice of tension and strain and the results have been absolutely incredible. My voice has gained a buttery smooth texture. My mix is quite smooth and connected. My control is solid. It’s like I’ve found a new voice inside of me.

So what does this have to do with you? I wanted to share this with you because I understand that singing is not the only thing that you do. You also have jobs, families, other important commitments, etc. and you simply cannot cram everything into one 24 hour day. However, I can’t help but notice all the new areas of my voice that have been opened up during this time of stress. So here is my encouragement to you: don’t worry so much about if your voice sounds good when life is giving you all that it has. Just simply sing..that’s right, just sing – and take the time to reflect on what you felt when you were singing during those times. I think you will be surprised with the new things that you discover about your voice.

I’d like to hear about some of your own experiences with “singing on empty”. Feel free to share them here.

As always, sing on my friends!

Photo Credits: hectorir (flickr)

Singing With Stress

How To Breathe Properly

thomas — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 03:10:37 +0000

Learning how to breathe properly is a very important factor in learning how to sing better.

Some people put great emphasis on breath support. Other people put little emphasis on breath support. I just want to put breath support in its proper place.

If learning how to breathe properly was all we needed in order to learn how to sing better, singing would be so much easier. But oh, things aren’t always that simple..and such is the case with singing.

For starters, I want to assert that you need to learn breath support. Period. There is no way of getting around this. You need air to create sound (phonate). Therefore, it would seem logical that you would need to learn how to regulate your air support when creating your sound, right? Right!

I want to go ahead and assert that I am coming at the subject of how to breathe properly from the stance of vocal cord closure. Without proper vocal cord closure, breath support will not help you one bit….ok, well maybe it will help you burst and shout through your high notes, but your vocal cords will not last very long and your tone won’t be clear. Breath support is most appropriately exercised when coming from a position of vocal cord closure.

Let’s further unpack this idea of learning how to breathe properly by examining what is actually going on regarding vocal cord closure and breath support. The vocal cords are positioned horizontally across your larynx. To get this image in your head, hold your hand out and make the peace sign. Now I want you to open and close the peace sign. This is a representation of how your vocal cords function. When the peace sign is open, that is like the resting state of the vocal cords (vocal abduction). When the peace sign is closed, that is like the singing state of the vocal cords (vocal adduction). Now, here is where we get into the healthy tension between vocal cord closure and breath support. You see, if you have proper vocal cord closure but lack breath support, your singing voice will find itself getting stuck in the back of your throat, giving you a kind of Kermit the Frog type of sound. On the flip side, if you have proper breath support but lack vocal cord closure, your singing voice will find itself sounding, well, breathy while being pushed and devoid of tone, causing excess strain on your vocal cords (and your audience’s ears).

Here’s the important factor in all of this: breath support adds that needed pressure to vocal cord closure in order to create a healthy tension within your voice.

Now that you have this, I want to give you some advice regarding breath support.

How To Breathe Properly Tip #1: Practice your breathing exercises regularly!
Your lungs need to be worked out just as much as your vocal cords do. Practice breathing from your diaphragm in order to augment the amount of breath you can take in with a single breath. Breathing from your diaphragm requires your stomach to poke out, not your chest! Take time to practice holding out your breath and work on increasing the length on time you can sing on a single breath.

How To Breathe Properly Tip #2: Practice breathing through your high notes!
As singers, we have a tendency to forget that we still need to breathe properly through our high notes. While we do not need as much breath on our high notes as we do for our lower notes, we still need to breathe through the high notes. If we forget to breathe through the high notes, our tone ends up sounding strained (this sound is different from the sound tension produces) and gets stuck in the back of our mouth. In this sense, we want to bring our sound forward (hey, doesn’t this sound familiar to classical teaching styles? – now you know what they mean!) by remembering to breathe properly through our high notes.

Obviously this list is not an exhaustive list, but it does highlight some of the main struggles that singers have regarding breath support. In my own personal experience and study, I find that most beginner singers struggle with this because they don’t know how to breathe properly and more advanced singers struggle with this because they forget that they still need to breathe properly.

Enacting proper breath support along with vocal cord closure will give you exceptional control over your voice. I think you will find the results pretty amazing when you get the two to flow hand in hand!

What are your own experiences with breath support? I’d love to hear from you!

As always, sing on my friends!

Photo Credits: 1

The Vocal Weight Factor

thomas — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 03:59:59 +0000

Oh how I wish I would’ve know about vocal weight when I first started singing…

I wrote an article about vocal weight a while back, but I wanted to come back to this subject again because it has such a dramatic effect on the voice.

The vocal weight factor can radically alter your voice if you are not carefully monitoring your voice – this is where taking voice lessons can really come in handy. Unfortunately for me, I had to learn (and am still having to learn) the hard way about the negative effects of excess vocal weight in the voice. Unless you are a light tenor who has never had issues with excess vocal weight before (lucky dog), you probably struggle in some measure with excess vocal weight.

But why do we struggle so much with bringing up too much vocal weight? I think it may be because we have a fundamental misconception about how we look at singing. For most us (myself included), we tend to think of singing from the bottom up. That is, we tend to mentally approach hitting notes from the perspective of looking up at them. Therefore, we think that we must necessarily “climb” so that we can reach these notes. In essence, we do climb to reach notes – but we do not have to view it this way.

A very freeing concept in singing is to imagine approaching the note from the top down. To illustrate, take your arm and hold it out straight. Now bend your arm at your elbow into a 45 degree angle. Now imagine that the note you have to hit is at your hand and you are standing on top of your elbow – the top down approach. Silly illustration I know, but it gets the point across. If you attack the note from this approach, it is much easier to sing without the negative effects of excess vocal weight.

Sometimes we progress in singing and never really learn to keep our larynx neutral. We practice the dopey lip rolls and mums and buhs, but we never move on to the state of keeping our larynx neutral. This can be very damaging because singing with a constant low larynx will bring up way too much vocal weight when you are singing in your mix. I’m not saying that practicing with a low larynx is bad – it is very beneficial in the beginning stages of learning how to sing better. However, I am saying that we must always be moving towards neutralizing our larynx in order to completely free up the voice.

If you struggle with excess vocal weight, you are not alone. Many singers struggle with excess vocal weight and have no clue how to get rid of it. In my own personal experience, the mindset of “light and right” has helped tremendously with lifting vocal weight. Also, literally practicing exercises at speech level and not trying to do anything extra has been extremely helpful.

Fortunately for those of us who struggle with vocal weight, the guys at Singing Success have just posted an incredible lesson dealing with the issue vocal weight. Check out this video clip below to glean some valuable vocal knowledge.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OuYBPHGQg4

This lesson is wonderful and insightful. If you find this video helpful, you may want to look into getting a subscription to Singing Success Online. They have an extensive library of online vocal lessons that work mainly on vocal diagnostics (like removing excess vocal weight). It is definitely worth every penny. I attest to its power and worth!

Hope you enjoyed the post! Sing on my friends!

Photo Credits: 1

I would also like to take this opportunity to mention that I do use affiliate links on this site. I only promote what I personally have used and what I personally believe is beneficial. If you would like to know more, please view the disclosure policy. Thanks!

Voice Lessons

thomas — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 04:53:05 +0000

Let’s talk about voice lessons.

Voice lessons (also known as singing lessons or vocal lessons) are provided to teach you the proper techniques in order that you may sing better. This is generally the aim of all voice lessons offered (if it isn’t, what truly is?).

If you have never taken voice lessons before, I want to share you with some insight on how to go about finding a vocal coach. As you may already know, there are many different vocal techniques within the discipline of singing. However, not all vocal techniques are healthy and not all vocal techniques will provide you with the results you desire. So before you spend thousands of dollars on lessons that may never work, I want to save you some cash (and heartache) by offering some guidelines to approaching voice lessons.

Voice Lessons Guideline #1: Make sure voice lessons are the right place to start!

“What are you talking about??!?”, you may say. “I thought you had to get voice lessons in order to get better!” Thankfully, guess again. You do not necessarily have to take voice lessons when you embark on your journey in learning how to sing better. In fact, you can do quite well without them in the beginning. Why do I say this? I say this because I have tested some singing programs and they do produce results!

Brett Manning’s Singing Success is by far the best quality vocal program currently on the web (with Singorama coming in second). It offers an unprecedented 6 month money back guarantee and boasts an increase of an octave in your vocal range. My own experience with Singing Success has been wonderful. This vocal program saved me thousands of dollars in voice lessons. After talking with a previous vocal coach, he openly admitted that it would’ve taken me over three years to grow as much as I did in 6 months. This is a testimony to the power of this program, so I would suggest you check it out before you look into voice lessons. It may be the right first step for you!

**Now I want to be sure you understand that a vocal program should not take the place of voice lessons from a vocal coach. A vocal program will give you a good foundation for the proper vocal technique, but you should find a vocal coach to help you with the details and diagnostics of your voice. Vocal programs will give you an excellent voice, but vocal programs coupled with voice lessons will give you a polished and refined voice.

Voice Lessons Guideline #2: When going to a new vocal coach, only pay for one voice lesson upfront!

Do not, and I mean do not, pay for a voice lesson package upfront when you have never met with the vocal coach before. I highly recommend that you pay for a single one hour voice lesson first to determine if the vocal coach is right for you. A good vocal coach will begin to unlock your voice in the first voice lesson. If you find the voice lesson is profitable, then seek to purchase a package deal. If the voice lesson does not go well, consider finding another vocal coach.

Voice Lessons Guideline #3: If the lessons make your vocal cords hurt, stop immediately!

If you vocal coach is constantly telling you to push harder or give it more breath support and your vocal cords end up hurting, stop taking voice lessons from that vocal coach. You should never leave a voice lesson with your vocal cords hurting. Vocal health is extremely important, so you may want to begin looking for another vocal coach if you experience pain after your lessons.

Voice Lessons Guideline #4: Start off slow, then work your way into a more aggressive schedule.

When you first begin taking voice lessons, remember that your vocal cords will not be used to all the new attention they are receiving. They will get tired and need to be rested often in the beginning. After you begin to build your vocal cord strength, seek to add lessons more frequently into the mix.

I hope these guidelines save you some time, money and heartache! I would love to hear your thoughts!

Photo Credits: 1

Finding Your Head Voice

thomas — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 21:01:59 +0000

Head voice is a mysterious part of the voice for many singers. Many singers refer to it as their “falsetto” voice, but the two are very different. Falsetto is an airy, weightless sound made by a very loose connection of the vocal cords. Head voice, on the other hand, is a weighted sound based on proper vocal cord closure. The main difference between head voice and falsetto is tone. Falsetto has little to no tone. Head voice can be full of tone.

When seeking to find your head voice, you need to approach it in this manner:

1) Understand that you already have a head voice – you just haven’t found the correct way to access it. Too many singers believe that they just don’t have a head voice at all. That is completely untrue! You have a head voice, you just have to “find” it!

2) Understand that it can take some time before you find your head voice. I was lucky and discovered mine in a few days. For some people, it can take weeks to months.

Now that you have a proper understanding, let’s start unpacking how to find your head voice.

I think the easiest way to find your head voice is by doing lip rolls. Lip rolls automatically aid you in getting the correct amount of vocal cord closure, allowing you to access your head voice in a relatively easy manner. I have placed a video of the lip roll exercise in an article about vocal weight – check it out to see the example.

Now many people go on to say the sound they make with lip rolls is too light to be head voice. However, the people that say this either have only: 1) just discovered their head voice, or 2) discovered their head voice and have not trained it. Keep in mind that your head voice will be weak when you first discover it because you have never trained it before! It will sound similar to falsetto at first, but trust me – with a few weeks practice you will begin to tell the difference between the two.

Another way to access your head voice with more vocal weight is to practice exercises using vocal compression. Vocal compression will bring up more energy into your head voice so that you can feel how it differs from falsetto.

Finding your head voice is relatively simple once you get down the proper techniques. Start with lip rolls and practice them – and seek to master them. They are a critical step in helping you find your head voice. They can also help you develop your head voice.

What are your experiences with finding your own head voice (or not finding it)? I would love to hear from you!

Relaxing The Voice

thomas — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 07:17:40 +0000

Relaxing your voice can be as easy as sitting in a La-Z-Boy and sipping on hot tea. Relaxing your voice can also be as tough as teaching an uncoordinated person how to dance. It all depends on your voice.

Unfortunately for me, I suffer from what I call a stubborn voice. Simply put, my voice never does quite what I want it to do (can I get a witness?). If you also suffer from possessing a stubborn voice, here are a few things that I do in order to help relax my voice:

1) I massage my jaw and loosen it up thoroughly. Jaw tension can destroy vocal tone if it is not dealt with properly. In order to relieve some of that excess jaw tension, I massage both of my jaw bones for about 5 minutes. I also jostle my jaw bones from side to side and move it up and down. The idea here is to get your jaw mobile and agile. When your jaw is free to move around without tension, it makes it easier to sing with more freedom.

2) Hot tea also helps relax the voice and soothes the vocal cords. Sipping on a nice cup of hot tea can ease any excess muscle tension from the throat and soothe/loosen up your vocal cords so they aren’t so rigid and ornery.

3) Finally, I massage my neck in general for a few minutes to make sure I remove all possible muscle tension from the throat area. Gently pressing your fingers against your neck and rubbing them in a circular motion around your throat does wonders for relaxing your voice and preparing your voice to sing.

These ideas sound so simple, but I find that they are very easy to forget. Remember, when we are singing, we want to relieve as much unhealthy tension as possible! These are just a few more ways to help you achieve this goal!

As always, sing on my friends!

Photo Credits: 1