Dear Linda:
You wrote: The way it had been taught to me, borne out by most of what I had read, was that the good co-ordinated voice was using both of these functions (vocalis muscle and vocal ligament/musocal membrane) in varying proportions for the greater part of its range, thought the extremities ("pure" head and "pure" chest voice involved the vibration of just the one portion or the other. I am aware that this is an over-simplification, but it always worked for me.
COMMENT: Basically this is correct. In chest voice all of the layers of the vocal folds are involved in some form of oscillation, in middle voice somewhat less of the vocal muscle is involved and in head voice primarily the local ligament/mucosal membrane is in oscillation.
What you mention as pure head voice is unclear to me, that is, I am unsure of your meaning. If you are speaking of falsetto then you are describing a different configuration of the vocal folds from that mentioned above. If you are speaking of a more fluty sounding head voice (similar to many British tenors) you are describing a true head voice that has been deprived of some of its color via resonance tuning or with a slight admixture of air to the tone.
-- Lloyd W. Hanson, DMA Professor of Voice, Pedagogy School of Performing Arts Northern Arizona University Flagstaff, AZ 86011
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