Subject: RE: Speach Level Singing
From:
Don Firth
Date: 17 Nov 04 - 04:46 PM
There are umpteen different methods for trying to get the best out of the human voice. Some are successful. Many are, to put it in the most gentle terms, counterproductive. They can all be boiled down to two different approaches: one approach emphasizes a relaxed, open throat, correct diaphragmatic breathing, uses a lot of imagery in "placing" or feeling where a tone resonates, and avoids any attempts to exert direct muscular control over the vocal mechanism. The other approach attempts to take over direct, conscious muscular control of the vocal mechanism by minutely adjusting muscular tension here or there in and around the throat, and/or trying to hold the larynx in a particular position or moving from one position to another while singing.
The basis for the former method and the problem with the latter method is that, other than some conscious control over breathing, the vocal mechanism is controlled by involuntary muscles—muscles over which it is impossible to exert direct, conscious control.
We learn to speak in the first place by imitating the sounds we want to make. Within the limits of individual physiology, involuntary muscles make the necessary minute adjustments in an attempt to duplicate those sounds. Thus, we learn to speak. Imagine how well you would do if you had to learn to speak by holding your larynx in a particular position, concentrating on how much tension to apply to your vocal folds, and manipulating the shape of your mouth and the position of your tongue to produce the correct series of consonants and vowels. That's just not the way it happens. And that's not the way to learn to sing.
Almost anybody can sing, after a fashion. Some people have a naturally pleasant sounding voice, and others sound like a rusty hinge. Part of this depends on individual physiology, and part depends on habits we've picked up during a lifetime of talking (however long that life happens to have been). We can't do a whole lot about the physiology, but the rest we can. The habits we've picked up that inhibit or obstruct the potential of our voices can be changed. More often than not, they have to do with tension in the vocal mechanism and how we place our speaking voice (where the tones we produce resonate).
The method for producing the optimum sounds from the human voice have been around for a long time. The following passage describes how the best voice teachers teach:Bel canto emerged in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, but its roots lie all the way through the Middle Ages. It began in the singing instruction that Italian masters provided their students. Because singing must be mastered internally, teaching singing is tricky. Italian masters relied on a system of teaching and listening to their pupils. When the pupil created a tone or sound that was of admirable quality, the master would urge that pupil to repeat the sound until it was ingrained in their memory [Emphasis mine]. This practice became so inherent to Italian singers that Italian singing became shrouded in mystery. Many thought that Italy was protecting its singing mastery from foreign countries, when in reality it was simply espousing a valuable teaching style. This "admirable quality," if it is to be produced at all, invariably comes from a relaxed, open throat, a relaxed jaw, an open mouth, properly controlled (but not over-controlled) diaphragmatic breathing, and allowing the tones to resonate where they resonate the best. Low notes tend to resonate in the chest and throat, and high notes should resonate in the nasal passages ("head voice"). The correct feeling for head voice can be fairly easily found by humming a medium or fairly high note ("mmmmmmm"). But even when singing low notes, you should be able to feel some nasal resonance. But "nasal resonance" does not mean a nasal or "nosy" sound to your voice. Good nasal resonance has an almost ringing sound to it. This is the quality that gives life to your voice, and, although it may not sound all that loud close-up, can bounce your voice off the back wall of a fairly sizable auditorium.
This is the method that produces some of the finest singers in the world. And the most admirable voices. But never fear. If you want to sing folk songs, it will not make you sound like Luciano Pavarotti or Renée Fleming. Not everybody has an operatic voice. Actually, darned few people have operatic voices. This is one of the reasons why voices like this are often referred to as "God-given." They're not that common. But even if you did have an operatic voice, you don't have to sing that way. I've heard opera singers like Kiri Ti Kanawa and Samuel Ramey back off and sing Broadway or pop songs, and although they sounded great, they didn't sound "operatic" at all.
Every few years someone comes along with a "new method" of teaching singing that is supposed to render all previous methods obsolete. And often the purveyor of this "new method" is predisposed to trash the long-standing, tried and true methods. This is not Divine Revelation; this is salesmanship.
During the Fifties, when I was studying music at the University of Washington, I knew a voice student, a young woman, who insisted on sticking to her voice teacher (not one of the University's four voice teachers) who operated out of a studio downtown. He had taught her the complete physiology of the larynx, including all of the surrounding muscles, and his method consisted of teaching her how to control these muscles to produce the kind of tones she wanted. Over a period of a year, I heard this young woman's voice go from promising to chronically strained and frequently hoarse. This guy was a regular Svengali. He had her convinced that he was the only way to go. Other voice students who were familiar with him, but considerably less enthralled by him, referred to him as "The Strangler."
I started voice lessons even before I got interested in folk music. My first voice teacher was a soprano who had retired from the Metropolitan Opera. She wasn't one of the biggies, but she did sing small roles and she had also sung in the chorus. She was American, but she had trained in Italy, and had married an Italian cellist who played in the Metropolitan Opera orchestra. I've taken voice lessons from other teachers, all good, but she was the one who gave me an excellent foundation in vocal technique. I've sung folk songs and ballads for fifty years, and my voice (I'm a bass-baritone) is strong and secure—and at the age of seventy-three, it remains so. It's deepened a bit within recent years, but I've retained my top notes. I still practice the vocal exercises Edna Bianchi gave me, every day. The voice feels good, and a few people have told me recently that it sounds as good as it ever did. Actually better (very nice to hear!). For this, I have to thank Mrs. Bianchi, who started me off right.
And when I sing, I don't sound "operatic." Unless I want to.
Don Firth
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