Vocalist.org archive


From:  Isabelle Bracamonte <ibracamonte@y...>
Isabelle Bracamonte <ibracamonte@y...>
Date:  Wed Apr 4, 2001  4:57 pm
Subject:  Re: [vocalist] not opening the mouth- suggestions from leading soprano



> The first thing was to suggest that I not open my
> mouth much. Currently, on my high B's I open about
> 3 fingers widths. This soprano also suggested I
> sing UH on this note to "ease the register
> transition." (I am unsuccessful at singing UH on a
> high B. My voice likes AH or AE.) She also said
> not to think about the throat, larynx, or soft
> palate. She suggests I get rid of the U shape
> which occurs with my tongue. She also suggested
> pushing out the lower abdomen but increasing the
> amount of air flow on the top notes. "The top notes
> are almost all air."

For the record, although Regina doesn't know my voice
and hasn't heard me sing, I COMPLETELY disagree with
the last sentence. Airy, breathy voices are all air
on the top -- true operatic high notes, whether full
voice or pianissimo (and even more so for pianissimo)
are practically NO air. That being said, a beginning
singer sometimes learns about relaxation from tension
by using a whoosh of air, and then learns to pull the
breath back later. Do you admire this singer's high
notes?

You mention that you're an AH and AE (like in cat,
right?) voice. Some are ee and ay voices, some are ah
and oh voices (in my experience). I'm an ee and ay (i
and e in IPA), and I find that an UH vowel (felt in a
forward up-place, rather than felt in the back of the
throat) helps my backwards AHs quite a lot. I will
often sing an AH vowel way too far back in my throat,
so that it loses ring and gets woofy. Shifting my
mental vowel into an AWE or an UH (high in resonance,
like an Italian would say uh, not an American shwa at
all) clears up my problems. For you, it might not do
anything at all.

I'm not sure about using a "yawn" position on the top,
which implies another kind of artificial stretch
position, but then I can't hear you.

I agree with her about getting rid of an artificial
shape of the tongue (you mentioned you hold yours in a
U shape), but letting it lie relaxed and flat against
the bottom teeth. You'll find that some singers like
to push the lower abdomen out and some like to use
expanded ribs instead (commonly referred to as the
"down and out" vs. "in and up" methods of breathing).
Jerome Hines has opined that men more commonly use a
lower-belly pushing-out method while women tend to use
a higher position in his book _Great Singers on Great
Singing_, but that's just his opinion based on his
interviews and experience.

Then there is the very common problem that not
everyone with a fabulous voice knows how to impart
that knowledge with any sort of comprehensibility.
She may think she's singing Xly, but her teacher will
swear he taught her Yly, and in a voice lab she'll be
doing something totally different.

Isabelle B.

=====
Isabelle Bracamonte
San Francisco, CA
ibracamonte@y...




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