Hi there STM - wow that is a really well articulated analysis of where your problems may lie. I agree with a lot of advice already given, and have a thought to add.

You say you can hear that you are not in pitch but struggle to make an adjustment to get into pitch. This suggests that the stumbling block is that you maybe do not yet have full control of all your vocal apparatus; so it is probably a mechanical/muscular control problem rather than a problem of perception. The suggestions for trying to incorporate all your senses into your singing should help here. Also like any muscular skill the more you try the more you will learn the fine motor control needed for pitch correction.

What happens in your throat is that your vocal chords sit like a pair of curtains over the top of the air supply coming up from your lungs. The edges of the vocal chords can be completely separate and flap at low frequency, producing a low note. In order to raise the note, the edges kind of partly zip up together, to shorten the length of the edges free to flap in the air. The shorter those loose edges are, the HIGHER the note you produce. Learning how this actually feels and how to control that, and connecting that back to the pitch you are aiming for (i.e. the signal coming in from your ears and the other part of your brain which is comparing your pitch with the one others are singing and playing) may be the thing you need to work on. Yep when you break it down, singing in tune is quite a complex task, and you maybe just missed out on picking this up more naturalistically in life due to being in a non-musical environment during childhood.


As you are already having formal singing lessons I assume you are used to the idea of doing vocal exercises, both in class under your teacher's watchful gaze, and also possibly on your own between classes. So try this:

Use an instrument or pitch pipes (whatever is to hand) and sing a note (just any note you are comfortable with).It doesn't matter WHAT you sing (La, or Do, Ah, whatever). Place both hands gently with palms onto your throat area. Focus on the feeling of the sound you are making. Try to use your imagination to "see" inside your throat at what all the bits are doing to make that sound, including your vocal chords in a partially zipped up state, flapping in the air stream. Your voice teacher may even have a diagram of the vocal apparatus to help you "see" this.
Once you feel you can create some kind of image of what it going on in your "voice box", SLIDE the pitch up just one tone and hold that new note. Look for the changes you had to make in order to change the pitch, and then do the same with another whole tone up. Do it slowly, still with your hands in place. Notice what may be happening inside your throat to produce that change in pitch. Try sliding just up and down slowly over those three notes, paying attention to those internal adjustments you are making with each step up and down.

You can then develop this exercise by asking your teacher or a helpful musical chum to play a random note that you have to match with your voice: this can be part of learning to sing intervals as well. Again, do this slowly, with hands on throat, noticing the muscular changes that happen as you move to each note. Eventually, you will be able to do the singing of random notes automatically because you will have gained control of the apparatus, the same way that a tennis player can just move to hit a ball coming over the net without breaking it down into all the little movements and hand-eye coordination needed.

By getting this sense of the movements you need to make in your throat to change pitch, this should help you to make the adjustments when you hear that you are off pitch.

And of course do go out and sing for pleasure, with others, and make up for those early years without music! The more you do it the easier it is to tackle both the motor skills and any self consciousness that could be holding you back.

And if you tell us where you are in the world, I am sure some of us will be able to suggest some local sources of support too.