Singing Lesson Insights || Expert Voice Coach Advice

February 4, 2024July 5, 2025

The Least Helpful Songs for Working on Your Voice

Last time I wrote about how some songs are more favourable than others to sing. I also mentioned the three I suggest the most for clients to help begin to figure their voice out.

I’ve also written previously about unsingable songs. But this time I thought it might be helpful to give some examples of songs that may well be singable, but are really not that helpful for developing and figuring out your voice.

One way to categorise such songs are as wide-range songs, narrow-range songs, and sudden range-jump songs.

Wide-range songs – All I Want For Christmas

Now, I have clients who sing this song, and sing it well… but I also meet a lot of singers who attempt this way too early in their development, and to say they butcher it is an understatement. Continue reading “The Least Helpful Songs for Working on Your Voice”

January 28, 2024July 5, 2025

Three Great Songs to Figure Out Your Voice

When people first start, we have to start building their voice from the ground up. This is true no matter how long someone has been singing, or how advanced the material they want to sing happens to be.

Once we have a reasonable technical foundation laid down, we can start to deploy that newly built facility on song.

One of the hardest things to grasp is that not all songs are equally favourable for the voice. Three songs could have the same notes and same range, but the nature of the melody is such that one may feel exceptionally easy to sing, another a bit more difficult, and another may seem impossible. I’m sure you may have even experienced this ponderance first hand…

“This song goes EXACTLY as high as this other song which I’m doing so well on, yet I feel like I’m killing myself trying to sing it… what on earth is going on?”

How easy/hard a note in song is depends on many things: what was the note before, what was the note after, how fast or slow is the piece, how intense are you singing, how staccato or legato is the piece, etc.

It means that some melodies are extremely favourable for the voice, and others less so. It then follows that there are some songs that are amazingly favourable for the voice, and provide a fun playground to start to build your voice and figure out how it works.

With that in mind, I’m going to share the THREE songs I suggest most often, for male singers and for female singers: Continue reading “Three Great Songs to Figure Out Your Voice”

January 14, 2024July 5, 2025

Pepsi vs Coke Taste Test, and Singing

Several years ago, I read the book “Blink” by Malcolm Gladwell. This book is on the idea that for the areas we are each experienced in, often the first reaction is pretty correct. But for areas we are less experienced in, our first reaction is often not correct, and is missing a lot of nuance.

In one of the chapters they discuss the history of the Pepsi vs Coke taste test.

The Pepsi Challenge

Now, for those of you too young to remember, once upon a time Coca Cola was about the only game in town. Then Pepsi came on the scene.

What Pepsi was known for was the “Pepsi Taste Test”. This was (surprise surprise) a taste test, where participants blindly tasted Coke and Pepsi, and had to say which one they preferred. The overwhelming result of this was that people seemed to prefer the taste of Pepsi in these blind tests.

As the results of the taste tests became more and more widely known, it was expected that Pepsi would overtake Coca Cola as the most bought soft drink.

Yet that day never actually arrived. Despite all the taste tests saying otherwise, the market buys far more Coca Cola than Pepsi. This means that despite all the taste tests saying more people prefer Pepsi, reality says more people actually prefer Coca Cola. Continue reading “Pepsi vs Coke Taste Test, and Singing”

January 7, 2024July 5, 2025

The Most Read Articles of 2023

I send one email a week, at 6pm on a Sunday, to those on my subscriber list. I only send one so as not to bombard people with more emails than we already get. If you’re not already subscribed, you can sign up via the vocal prospectus signup at the bottom of this page.

Come Friday/Saturday of each week, I look back on what has come up in client sessions and what has been on my mind, and send something out that is highly relevant to that specific week. Most of the time it’s a fresh article, and sometimes it’s one I’ve revised to bring up to date.

At the end of each year, I look back and see which articles grabbed people’s attention more than any others. Maybe there was something in the zeitgeist that year that meant everyone was thinking along the same lines, but sometimes it’s just because they are eternally relevant questions.

These are the five most read articles from my website for 2023. It’s fairly obvious why some of these are on people’s minds! Have a scan of the headlines for yourself, and dive into whatever grabs you!

1) Why some voices sound better than others?

2) Four singers that changed my life

3) Unsingable songs: Why there are some songs you’ll NEVER sound good on

4) If I could go back in time and tell my younger self THREE things…

5) What most voice teachers get wrong about singing

Want to learn more?

If any of these have piqued your interest and you’d like to discover more about your voice for yourself, you can book in your first session via my booking form right here.

December 17, 2023July 5, 2025

How Voice Training Changes Your Brain

One of the things I regularly discuss with clients is how a huge proportion of voice training, is actually ear training.

Sure, we are looking to train our body and voice to operate in more refined and better ways, and in this regard it is undoubtedly a physical/physiological endeavour.

However, we cannot hope to program our body in more refined ways, unless we know what we are aiming for, unless we have a target to shoot for. The more refined and clearly defined that target is, the better we can hit that target.

But there’s a problem with this target.

This target is not visual like an archery target, nor is it numerical like a mathematical or financial goal. The target is aural, and we can’t see it, touch it or measure it in any helpful way.

The only feedback about our accuracy that we get is from our own ears and bodies. Our brains then have to interpret all that data, and decide how accurate we were with hitting the intended target.

Two challenges present themselves

Even before we consider the physiological aptitude that we have, our ability to do great singing is therefore dependent on two main things:

1) What we hold in our heads as the aural target we are aiming for; and… Continue reading “How Voice Training Changes Your Brain”

August 6, 2023July 21, 2025

Why I don’t like falsetto

The topic of ‘falsetto’ comes up a lot in lessons. Questions like “what is it? when should I do it? SHOULD I do it? Where is it useful?”, etc.

I’ve had clients ask me whether I even like it when singers sing in falsetto, as I’ve often given the impression that I don’t. As such, I thought it worth covering here to clarify.

What exactly is falsetto?

Firstly, let’s be precise about what falsetto is, what it isn’t, and then we’ll get into the details on falsetto usage.

When singers sing in true falsetto, their vocal folds are no longer operating normally – or ‘modally’ – like they would when speaking.

When singing or speaking normally, the vocal folds are adducting (coming together) firmly against each other in order to make sense. They are actually contacting one another.

In contrast, when singing in falsetto it’s just the very edges of the mucosal layers of the vocal folds which are loosely flapping against the airflow. It’s more like the vocal folds are roughly hewing the air into a particular pitch.

This sound is extremely light and breathy as a result. And due to there not being any real musculature involved, you generally can’t drive any meaningful volume out of that particular function. True falsetto is therefore limited, both tonally and dynamically.

What falsetto is NOT

Here’s the thing, when MOST people think they are hearing falsetto, what they are actually hearing is very light head voice or even a very light heady mix (the blend between chest and head voice).

Now even though light head voice can sound very similar to falsetto, it is still what we call modal singing, i.e. the vocal folds are contacting with each other like in normal speaking/singing.

When light head voice/mixed voice is done at its very lightest, it can sound aesthetically very similar to falsetto. As a result, people often use the term falsetto – which is a primarily functional definition – to describe a particular quality in a singer’s sound.

It might feel like I’m splitting hairs, but I want to be precise.

The key difference is at the vocal fold level

If the singer is in true falsetto, then they are mechanically disconnected from being able to use their normal voice…

In contrast, a light mix or even just light head voice will deliver a very similar aesthetic, without any gear switching…

A good mix enables a singer to dive into the chestiest low notes as well as to the lightest high notes…

I’m not against that sound/aesthetic

To summarise, I’m not against a voice singing with that lighter quality (ala falsetto) when done appropriately…

I never rule it out, but in the first instance, I train people to deliver the sounds in a smooth and functionally connected way first…

There are several reasons:

Philosophical

At its philosophical core the technique I teach is trying to build a complete and uniform voice…

Dynamic variation to explore lighter sounds is part and parcel of technical development…

Artistic

True artistry is predicated on choice…

Nine times out of ten, mixed voice sounds objectively better

Here’s what tends to happen in sessions…

Sure, there’s still 1 time out of every 10 that they prefer the lighter/falsetto sound…

For a singer with a good mix and control of their voice, switching into that sound is relatively easy…

Related reading: What Most Singing Teachers Get Wrong

Feel like you’re stuck singing in falsetto for high notes?

Perhaps you’re someone that has been finding themselves switching constantly for higher notes, or opting for a lighter than desired sound at parts of your range. If that’s something you’d like to improve, I’d love to help you with that.

Book a session now

July 23, 2023July 5, 2025

My voice seems to have got worse as I’ve got older

If you’re reading this, you likely love singing. If you’re over 25-30, then you’ve likely noticed that your voice has changed as you’ve got older. If you’re under 25/30, then keep reading as this is relevant for you too.

What many singers start to find as they get older, is that their voice seems to suffer or even get worse as they get older. They find that things seem to hurt or feel unpleasant when they sing, and that these issues start to happen more often and more quickly whenever they start to sing.

Notes may feel way too heavy, way too light, raspy, lacking depth, or strained/strident when trying to sing material they used to take for granted.

Many singers may even feel like they can’t hit notes they used to be able to hit. Even then, if they can, then the tone is often weaker, wavering, or even a bit pitchy/out-of-tune.

What I’ve noticed…
This leads to many singers:
a) running themselves ragged trying to keep up with repertoire that (seems to be) slowly slipping away from them;
b) completely changing the material they’re singing; OR
c) giving up entirely.

It doesn’t have to be this way

There’s something really important I must stress: voices are actually meant to reach their peak in the late 40s/early 50s. And it is not meant to be a rapid downhill slope thereafter. Properly trained singers have incredibly voices in their 50s and beyond, but somehow the modern era makes us think it’s only younger voices that have it all going for them.

Voices reaching their peak in later life is especially true in classical and opera… but why? Continue reading “My voice seems to have got worse as I’ve got older”

May 7, 2023July 5, 2025

The Future of AI in Music (Rick Beato)

I came across this video from content creator Rick Beato this week on AI in music. In it, he plays some clips of AI generated songs, where the AI had been tasked to copy and recreate the style of a famous artist.

Most of these are from modern singers/rappers like Drake, but some of these include an AI generated version of Kurt Cobain singing Chris Cornell’s ‘Black Hole Sun’. Beato closes the video by sharing his thoughts on the commercial direction AI generated music is going to take the music industry. Have a listen and see what you think:

What do you think?

I’m still distilling my own thoughts on AI in music, but one thing does spring to mind with the modern music examples. Namely, that the fact the AI could copy the modern music so closely but be less convincing with the other examples. To me, this touches on the the formulaic, often indistinct and (frankly) dehumanised nature of a lot of modern music.

Consider this: in music of years gone by – even as recent as the 2000s – rhythm and tempo would vary. Chords would be voiced differently or with different intensity as the song progressed. Sometimes notes would be played sung ever so slightly out of perfect tuning, but would sound consonant with the piece as a whole. These things occur because musicians are only human.

In contrast, modern music is increasingly ‘locked to the grid’, i.e. the tempo is mathematically locked in and perfect. It never wavers. The drum beats land in exactly the same place every time. The tone and timbre never fluctuates. Every note is autotuned/heavily tuned to be perfectly pitched. Nothing pitched will lie off the piano keyboard. Vocals all echo what the last number one hit did, rather than tread new ground. Artists are turning increasingly to computers and software to either generate these notes, or iron out the portions that were generated by real musicians.

Caveat: To be clear, I am not trying to say modern music is worse than older music – you can make that aesthetic judgment for yourself, and if you like a lot of that music, feel free to enjoy it.

What I AM saying, is that modern music and the way it is produced, has ironed out so much of the human elements that make music actual art (making it distinct from just being a commodity/product) and we are already turning to computers to make our current crop of number one tracks, that it stands to reason an AI would be able to synthetically generate a convincing facsimile of such dehumanised art. Virtually none of the components that make art a human endeavour seem to remain in modern commercial music… so why would you need a human to do it? Other to maybe give the AI some modest direction?

Truthfully, I don’t know where it’s all going

All of the above are just my musings on the human elements (that in my opinion cannot be put ‘in the box’) vs the dehumanised elements that now populate increasing amounts of commercially produced music. Maybe, the more convincingly an AI can generate a piece of music that harkens to a particular artist, the less human/artful that original artist’s style actually is in the first place.

Food for thought, and I’d welcome yours.