The power of the vowel...

A concept that has come up several times recently in both speech and singing students is the power of the vowel.  The vowel is what a singer lengthens for singing.  The vowel carries the breath and the resonance.  If you want to be louder or clearer, it has to be the vowel in the word that gets louder or clearer.  "p,t,k,v,b,g,d" simply doesn't have any real sustaining ability.  "m,n,l,ng,s,z" are sustainable but have limited resonance.  How do you make a vowel clearer?  You 'think" it clearly.  How about louder?  You got it - "think" it louder.

Two students come to mind from this week.  One is a young bass/baritone.  He has only been  in lessons for a few months.  His voice still has that reedy post-puberty quality.  A few weeks after he started lessons, he was cast in a comedic tenor role in his high school musical.  So lessons have been a crash course in head voice singing.  He came in last week and he had been working on making some of the spoken lines louder at home.  His inclination was to increase the energy in the consonants.  The effect of this was to make his words almost impossible to understand.

The second student is an adult who records books on tape.  In her reading, when she wanted to emphasize a word, she emphasized the consonants, which had the effect of diminishing the word.

English is a particularly difficult language in some respects; not the least is the fact that a lot of the vowels on the page do not sound like they look.  The vowel sound in the word "the?"  Looks like an "e", but sounds like an "uh".  So when you want to lengthen the vowel, you go by what it sounds like, not what it looks like.  How do you lengthen a vowel?  You breathe into it.  Why would you want to?  To gain resonance, either for speech or singing.  Go ahead, try it - it's actually kind of cool...

Application of FM Alexander's moment of choice - "or not?"

I am in the process of rereading FM Alexander's The Use of Self and I was in Chapter 3 last week.  (A little nerdy, I know.)  The idea of  inserting a "moment of choice" between stimulus and response in order to circumvent a detrimental habit of muscular contraction became really clear to me.  If I hear a chord and think "sing" then my body responds with a series of muscular movements, learned over time, in preparation of singing.  They may be good movements, or not so good movements but the response has become instinctive and habitual.  If I choose to improve my coordination into singing, I first must inhibit the older coordination from automatically starting up.  This is done by creating a "moment of choice" between the stimulus of "sing" and the instinctive response of my body to that stimulus, in order to have an option to use a new coordination or in the case of my student below, to simply experience singing without the habitual muscular contractions.

I decided to call this moment of choice the "or not?" moment. (Mentally thought with the question mark in place, by the way.)  In the "or not ?" moment, you give yourself permission to not respond to the stimulus if you don't want to.  The internal monologue runs something like this: "sing" (chord or note from piano), inhalation, "or not?" moment (I could just stand here and not sing, or move my arm - how curious, my body is relaxing), release air into sound (Ah! easier sound production...).  I played around with this for a few days with different activities, especially walking; then I took it into the studio.

I have a student, very intelligent, who loves to compose folk music and play guitar.  He has only been in lessons for a couple of months, but had been with another teacher for almost three years before he came to me.  He breathes fairly well, but when he starts to sing, an incredible amount of tension in his neck and jaw comes into play.  We had made some progress in introducing an easier coordination for the onset of his singing, but it was slow going - the pattern I was observing was very strong.  I decided to try the "or not?" moment with him.  He looked a little sceptical, but understood what I was suggesting.  It's a little like choosing not to sing after you've decided to sing, and then singing anyway.  Well, he tried it - with phenomenal results.  Not all the tension disappeared, but at least 80% did, giving him a new experience of singing.  He didn't have the awareness to understand exactly what changed in his body, but he knew that creating that little space and insert a moment of choice between the stimulus of "sing" and his response of singing changed "how" he sang.  I'm very curious to see him again this week...

"Elbow grease" - an AT perspective?

I was reading an Agatha Christie short story the other day, in which one character mentions that it was hard to find servants who used "elbow grease" nowadays.  It got me thinking of the term and it's effect on my movement.  "Elbow grease" is a term that originated in the 1600's, believe it or not, and refers to working harder and with more effort.  If I was told to use more elbow grease in cleaning the bathroom, for instance, my instinct would be to press more firmly onto the surface I was cleaning and engage more torso musculature in order to do so.  But is that what the term is really asking for?  If you grease a mechanical joint in a piece of machinery, then the movement at the joint happens more quickly and with less friction.  Would I be a more effective bathroom cleaner if my arm movements increased in frequency (speed) rather than pressure, with a quicker easy movement at the elbow and wrist joints?  I tried it of course, because cleaning the bathroom is boring anyway, and found that my cleaning was effective and my body was much less fatigued afterwards.

"Elbow grease" might just as easily be about the mental attitude of the bathroom cleaner, an exhortation to be thorough and not lazy in one's cleaning.  If I think about being thorough and meticulous in my cleaning, how does my movement change?  If I am grumpy about cleaning and want to be done with it, how does my movement change?  Hmmm...the kitchen needs cleaning next...

Songs and Singers: a social commentary?

I have a musical theater student, in her late 20's, who is learning "Woman" from The Pirate Queen.  She loves the song, which is about a young woman in Elizabethan times wanting the same opportunities as a man to follow her dreams and realize her potential.

I had a couple of other female singers, in their late teens, also look at the song.  None of them had any connection to the text at all.  Have we managed, in the space of a decade, to raise a generation of young women who do not know gender inequality?  That would be amazing, indeed!

A song these younger female singers relate to are "Astonishing", from Little Women, in which Jo faces the choice to leave a traditional life to pursue her dream of being an author.  Or "Defying Gravity" from Wicked, in which Elphaba commits to finding her own way in the world and to being herself.  So, the self-expression theme is still evident, just not the gender comparison.

AT and the singing teacher

I had a reminder this week of the need to monitor my own coordination when I am teaching voice lessons.  I found myself consistantly physically tired after a day of teaching singers and not in a way that made sense to me. I play piano during lessons, but not intensely or throughout and I do move about during lessons in order to model.  Am I tensing in order to listen to my students?  Am I concentrating?  Tightening to think?

My real clue came when I realized I was starting to mouth the words of my singers' songs while they sang.  Since I am a singer also, I was calling on my singing coordination in order to teach, rather than calling on my listening coordination!  No wonder I was tired at the end of the day; it was as if I was singing for 6 hours or more.

Calling on my listening coordination to teach was an entirely different experience in the studio.  Most particularly, my breathing stayed relaxed and everyday, rather than expanded for singing.  I became more of a n observer and less of a participant in the students' process.

Teacher with dysphonia, named Mary, part 2

Mary is making such lovely progress in her speaking.  Her breathing coordination is clearer, her head/spine balance is much better.  Mary was preparing to give a workshop last week to educators.  It was also a review for her, so there was a lot of pressure on her.  She had to talk from a script and use a powerpoint presentation that included directed activities for the workshop participants.  The last time she was reviewed, she was told that she had to be more formal in her approach and pitch her voice lower for greater authority.  Mary is naturally a petite and bubbly woman and very relational, so these instructions were difficult for her.

When Mary started to give her presentation to me in her session last week, I noticed she was pressing down on her larynx a lot, which increased her dysphonia to the point where her entire sound stopped.  I asked her if she could speak a little higher in her range, which is when she told me about her last review.  I suggested that she use more formal, direct language since she would be talking to adults instead of children, instead to trying to drop the pitch of her speaking voice.  Mary's voice has a lot of head resonance and it flows and carries naturally just a few half-steps above where she was trying to talk.  The more direct form of communication increased her poise and confidence.

Mary came back this week feeling like she had achieved a personal best in her presentation.  There was no mention in her review of needing to pitch her voice lower for authority.  Success! :)

Personality profiles continued: Priorities...

One of the most helpful elements in the application of personality profile information to teaching is the understanding of different goals and communication styles.
A student who's primary is a D (dominant) wants results and direct communication.  "Give it to me straight" they might say, or "just tell me what I'm doing wrong and I fix it".  They will ask direct questions of you and expect improvement fairly quickly.  They will ask "what?" a lot.
A student who's primary is an I (influential) will be relational and want enthusiastic feedback.  They will make small-talk at the start of the lesson in order to feel connected to you and this is very important to them.  While singing, they do the best under encouragement and they are your best advocates in your community :).  If you ask them to participate in a music recital, chances are they will ask "who?" else is involved.
A student who's primary is an S (supportive) looks for security and stability.  A voice that performs well one day and poorly the next will often be what brings them to your studio.  Like Influentials, they are relational in nature and will want to feel connected to you.  They will want to be supportive of you as you teach and will encourage you to share personally with them.  They will ask "how" in the process of a lesson.
A student who's primary is a C (conscientious) is concerned about quality and details.  They will be listening to the quality of their voice and looking for the best tone possible.  They are not very concerned about small-talk or being relational, but can get into lively discussions about "why?" something is the way it is.  They delve into the details and need to be encouraged to see the big picture.  They will practice diligently.
Remember: everyone has a primary and a secondary style and they can switch in the middle of a lesson if they get emotional or are under more stress than usual.  This is only one factor of many available for understanding how your student learns.  Learning styles (aural, visual, kinesthetic, etc), education and cultural background all play a part.

Studio teaching and the application of Personality Profiles - intro

Happy New Years! everyone :). I'm going to begin this year with a big topic: the application of personality profiling to the teaching studio.  There are several personality profile systems in use in the business and clinical sector.  The one I have had experience with is the DISC personality profile system, used mostly in business as a tool for sales/marketing and for personnel management.  DISC divides personality characteristics into 4 areas: D for direct, I for influential, S for supportive and C for conscientious.  The DISC profile has about 100 questions to it, designed to map out a person's personality pattern.  Each one of us has all four elements to our chart, one element is usually primary, then a secondary.  DISC is also environment-specific, so a person taking the profile would answer according to one setting; ie, work, or home or school.  I'd like to give an overview in this blog, then go in-depth in subsequent blogs.

I don't give the personality questionaire to my students, if that's what you are wondering, but I have taken it myself.  I map out as a C primary, with either D secondary or an S secondary, depending on my environment.  As a Conscientious primary, I value quality, details and usually ask the question Why? first.  When I am teaching students, my secondary is Supportive, which values stability, safe environment and asks the question How? a lot.  When am I Direct?  In a confrontational situation :).

How is relevant to teaching in the studio?  Each personality type has different values, different things that are important to them.  If I only taught from my own perspective, then I would always tackle the Why and the How with each student.  But what if a student is a Direct? - they won't care about Why? as much as they will want to know What?  Or an Influential?  They respond to enthusiasm and relationship.  I would do great with the C's and S's and eventually lose or alienate the D's and I's.

Of course, personality traits are just one aspect or layer of any person.  They will also have learned skills & character, background experiences and environment, etc. that make up a very complex picture.  Understanding their personality type allows me to choose a teaching vocabulary that will resonate with them, making me more effective as a teacher.