Some vocal stuff
Mar. 13th, 2005 08:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flexagonThis is the first followup to my long post about how I'd like to improve my speaking voice (visibility was quickly battened down to four people out of embarrassment, as I recall, so I won't bother providing the link). I'm still signed up for a one-day course on the topic through the BCAE, but I also just read a book with a dumb title: Change Your Voice, Change Your Life by one Dr. Morton Cooper. Stuff I learned:
* Projection, and "good" healthy use of the natural or "right" voice, tends to come from speaking through "the mask".
* That means you should feel buzzing/vibration all around your nose and mouth. There should be a balance between these two.
* Americans have a love affair with very low voices that come from the lower third of the throat, but speaking constantly at the lowest sustainable pitch (and especially trying to force a loud volume from this part of the throat) often leads to a voice that is hoarse, hard to hear because it doesn't have overtones, tires easily and can eventually become afflicted with chronic laryngitis or injuries to the vocal cords. Oh, and I do this all the goddamn time, by the way, generally in an attempt to reply to my male coworkers at the pitch they were last using. Hello, my name is self destructive.
* Because of that last point, it can be psychologically hard to get used to what you may perceive as a voice that is too high and/or too loud, even if it is healthier (and not really too loud, just strong for maybe the first time ever).
* If you sincerely say "mmmm-hmmm" as if in agreement with something, you will often be at about the right pitch for you. Go ahead... Bush is a suckass president, right? Mmmmmmmm-hmm? Feel a buzz in your face? Hmmm, that's interesting mmm-hmmm... the next trick after that is to practice saying other words at that pitch... mmm-hmmm one... mmm-hmmm two... mmm-hmmm yes! ready. that's right. good morning. mmm-hmmm hello!
* The other main technique is breath support. You should speak as you breathe out, not after you have already breathed out, and breathe from the belly rather than the rib area or (worse) the upper chest. This very, very last thing is the only thing I already do right. Yay me. Go me, mmm-hmmm go me. Probably this is the thing that takes most practice, in terms of transitioning from exercises to real life talking.
* I realize one reason for my talking the way I do now is this one time my mother told me it sounded bad when people talked through their noses. She was talking about an especially twangy midwestern voice when saying that, but I took it to apply to all nasal resonance, and I remember playing around that day with trying not to resonate up there at all. Geez, mom, thanks. Wasn't that the year I totally stopped being able to sing high, too!?
* Also, I have hardly had any female role models when it comes to speaking. I can only think of one female voice I ever really admired, and that is the voice of Frances Moore Lappe (author of Diet for a Small Planet). I heard her speak once at MIT, and I noticed how high-pitched her voice was but also how pure and direct all her words sounded. In retrospect I know she was resonating a bit higher than I would choose to or than the book calls for in the name of vocal health, but she projected so beautifully that I distinctly noticed it--even though I was mostly thinking of other things entirely.
* I also learned much more than you want to know about spastic dysphasia, nodes and polyps on the vocal cords, and severe voice loss, because after the "how to speak nicely" chapters the book goes on to what happens if you continue to grind out sound from the bottom of your throat. Scare tactics, perhaps... effective, definitely.
Well, this is only a beginning. I was impressed by this book. What it says is simple, but compelling, and my voice definitely rings when I do the exercises. However, it wasn't that strong on anatomical detail, so I'm left with some questions (can you still get some buzz in your chest, while you buzz your head? is that okay? just how do the vocal cords/folds work anyway, and how is it that they get lesions and polyps if you talk too low for too long?). There's another book I want to read called The Right to Speak, which claims to blow away the whole notion of a "right" voice. And there's still that BCAE course... I'll be very interested to hear how the information presented there lines up with this.
* Projection, and "good" healthy use of the natural or "right" voice, tends to come from speaking through "the mask".
* That means you should feel buzzing/vibration all around your nose and mouth. There should be a balance between these two.
* Americans have a love affair with very low voices that come from the lower third of the throat, but speaking constantly at the lowest sustainable pitch (and especially trying to force a loud volume from this part of the throat) often leads to a voice that is hoarse, hard to hear because it doesn't have overtones, tires easily and can eventually become afflicted with chronic laryngitis or injuries to the vocal cords. Oh, and I do this all the goddamn time, by the way, generally in an attempt to reply to my male coworkers at the pitch they were last using. Hello, my name is self destructive.
* Because of that last point, it can be psychologically hard to get used to what you may perceive as a voice that is too high and/or too loud, even if it is healthier (and not really too loud, just strong for maybe the first time ever).
* If you sincerely say "mmmm-hmmm" as if in agreement with something, you will often be at about the right pitch for you. Go ahead... Bush is a suckass president, right? Mmmmmmmm-hmm? Feel a buzz in your face? Hmmm, that's interesting mmm-hmmm... the next trick after that is to practice saying other words at that pitch... mmm-hmmm one... mmm-hmmm two... mmm-hmmm yes! ready. that's right. good morning. mmm-hmmm hello!
* The other main technique is breath support. You should speak as you breathe out, not after you have already breathed out, and breathe from the belly rather than the rib area or (worse) the upper chest. This very, very last thing is the only thing I already do right. Yay me. Go me, mmm-hmmm go me. Probably this is the thing that takes most practice, in terms of transitioning from exercises to real life talking.
* I realize one reason for my talking the way I do now is this one time my mother told me it sounded bad when people talked through their noses. She was talking about an especially twangy midwestern voice when saying that, but I took it to apply to all nasal resonance, and I remember playing around that day with trying not to resonate up there at all. Geez, mom, thanks. Wasn't that the year I totally stopped being able to sing high, too!?
* Also, I have hardly had any female role models when it comes to speaking. I can only think of one female voice I ever really admired, and that is the voice of Frances Moore Lappe (author of Diet for a Small Planet). I heard her speak once at MIT, and I noticed how high-pitched her voice was but also how pure and direct all her words sounded. In retrospect I know she was resonating a bit higher than I would choose to or than the book calls for in the name of vocal health, but she projected so beautifully that I distinctly noticed it--even though I was mostly thinking of other things entirely.
* I also learned much more than you want to know about spastic dysphasia, nodes and polyps on the vocal cords, and severe voice loss, because after the "how to speak nicely" chapters the book goes on to what happens if you continue to grind out sound from the bottom of your throat. Scare tactics, perhaps... effective, definitely.
Well, this is only a beginning. I was impressed by this book. What it says is simple, but compelling, and my voice definitely rings when I do the exercises. However, it wasn't that strong on anatomical detail, so I'm left with some questions (can you still get some buzz in your chest, while you buzz your head? is that okay? just how do the vocal cords/folds work anyway, and how is it that they get lesions and polyps if you talk too low for too long?). There's another book I want to read called The Right to Speak, which claims to blow away the whole notion of a "right" voice. And there's still that BCAE course... I'll be very interested to hear how the information presented there lines up with this.
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no subject
Date: 2005-03-14 06:17 am (UTC)Really though, everything you are going to learn is useful in anything with voice projection. Diaphragm support is the most important part. When you breathe, your shoulders should not go up, only your lower rib cage and directly underneath should expand. Most people breathe shallowly, making it impossible for them to speak for long periods of time without taking constant breaths. If you raise your shoulders when you breathe, you are only using the upper part of your lungs. If you use your diaphragm..then you are using all of your lungs.
The polyps and lesions are basically because you've hurt your vocal cords by straining them to speak in the wrong manner. The polyps themselves are just the vocal cords healing. (Like scar tissue is you will) Both will hurt the sound of your voice and the purity of your pitch. That's why long time smokers' voices turn gravelly and rough as they get older, smoking causes massive quantities of polyps as you hurt your throat more and more.
And the buzzing in your face does not mean that you are using your nose to speak.:P In fact, if you notice the actual sound is in your mouth. It's your soft palate (or right behind it...can't remember) that vibrates when you speak properly, making the nasal cavities work like a speaker. If you speak through your nose, your voice comes out breathy, like Marilyn Monroe's. It might be sexy,;) but not good form.
God, I hope you don't feel lectured at. This is one of my favorite topics in the world.:)
no subject
Date: 2005-03-14 07:43 am (UTC)Ha! I'm never using my mouth again! o.O
no subject
Date: 2005-03-14 08:12 am (UTC)Thanks for the info, and I hope you'll weigh in on future posts too. Especially if you know any good exercises for projection. :)
no subject
Date: 2005-03-14 09:06 am (UTC)See...*blushes*, erm, what one of my voice instructors told me once is to picture yourself as a mushroom. And then your cap extends outwards towards the audience. And you hold your hand up to the bridge of your nose and then slowly move it out in a gentle arc...that would be about where the edge of the cap is.
Now, pick a target that's really far away. A tree or something. Speak so that it can hear you, only you aren't aloud to shout. You pretend that the edge of that mushroom cap (i.e. the part of the arc furthest away from you) is where the sound travels from. Doing the hand movements really help.
Also, always positioning a hand on your diaphragm as you speak helps, because it makes you very aware of what you are doing.
Yeah, I feel silly now.:)
no subject
Date: 2005-03-14 06:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-03-14 07:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-03-15 04:27 am (UTC)