Vocalist.org archive


From:  Gina <classicalsinger@e...>
Gina <classicalsinger@e...>
Date:  Mon Feb 5, 2001  8:44 am
Subject:  Re: [vocalist] PED--The upper break


Hi,

I was thinking about this over the weekend. I was wondering how tightly
you are clenching the lower abdomen and buttocks and how hard you push
out the epigastrium. You may want to check that to be sure you are not
supporting in a hyperfunctional manner.
Try taking a belt and putting it around your lower ribs and fasten it
gently so that when you inhale, you can feel how all around to the back
your ribs go out. Then maintain that out feeling as long as you can
without pushing too hard.
Try singing the passages with the coloratura in isolation, just a bit at
a time, with the belt on, and on /i/ and /o/. Do the whole aria on /i/
and do it all on /o/. Notice when you start to collapse and renew your
breath before it becomes critical.
The other thing is... I sing in a mixed voice throughout my whole
range. I have heard this described as taking the feeling of the middle
voice into the top (without too much weight.) Do you do that or is your
top distinctly different and lighter? If you are singing in a way that
is distinctly lighter and you are "reconnecting" on the way down, that
could be why you get a glitch.
If I were to describe this in a more technical manner, I would say that
both the light mechanism and the heavy mechanism are present in each
note in my voice to some degree, depending on the pitch. I do not
exclusively sing in the light mechanism just because I am singing a
higher pitch, so I never have a point where one set of muscles let go
and the other takes over... it's pretty smooth all the way.. (now it is,
though it wasn't always.) It's mixed voice all the way up to high D or
Eb, though the light mechanism dominates more and more as I go up.
If the larynx is low, the appoggio is working not only on the way up but
the way down the scale, it will work and you will get better at it. It
does take time to coordinate and strengthen the muscles and reprogram
the brain. If you are a tenor, you are a tenor. Just because you can't
siren one day without a crack or even if you can't sing Mio Caro Bene
one day, that doesn't mean you're not a tenor and you're a baritone.
You either are a tenor or you're not. That aria is a very difficult one
and I remember it well... my teacher at the time worked on it with me to
get me to sing in mixed voice on those high A's and not disconnect. I
am a bigger voice now and don't sing very much Handel in performance but
now can do the runs and leaps required. It takes time. It also depends
on your age and vocal maturity. If your teacher says you are doing
things correctly and just need to strengthen the muscles, perhaps you
may want to take him at his word and be patient. Maybe taping your
lessons and listening back will help. I never sang in mixed voice until
I heard it on the tape and all of the sudden...bam... it was a
connected, full, professional voice instead of a child's voice. If I
hadn't heard it on the tape I may not have kept doing it because at
first it seemed so... well... loud or shouty. But not out there to the
listener.
I hope that this will be slightly helpful to you... I was thinking about
you while I was out of town on an audition this weekend!

Gina



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