One of the biggest (fallacious) objections I have encountered against formal voice training, is that it is formulaic and limits artistry. This objection is one I tend not to hear too much these days, but I used to.
Usually it was overly set-in-their-ways artists/aspiring artists, and they’d want my help, but they would be unwilling to change anything about what they were doing.
They would want more range and power, but they’d be unwilling to adjust their present approach. They’d want me to solve the vocal fatigue and damage they were encountering, but they would be unwilling to change even one iota in what they were doing.
I’m sure you can see why this is a foolish path to take. In the words of Henry Ford, “If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.”
Humour me though. For a moment, let’s argue their corner. The way vocal technique works is that it accepts there is a particular way the voice is meant to work. The vocal folds and vocal tract have an optimal way of working, and this is the same for all voices, glossing over minute variations between different voices.
Surely then, this would mean that as we train our voices, then trained voices should end up all sounding the same as each other? If we train voices to all work “that one way“, then all voices would sound start to sound identical? If this were the case, then it would stand to reason that one would want to avoid formal vocal training to avoid this overly homogenised result?
By no means!
As always, the devil is in the details. It’s the small variations that yield the biggest differences.
Namely, in increasingly well-trained voices, the tiniest of differences increasingly yield dramatically different sounding voices. Personality also plays a huge role in how someone likes to deploy their voice on song.
This means that even if two singers are using their voices in 99% the same way – that their base technique is 99% identical to each other – just that 1% difference between individual vocal variance and personality will yield radically different sounding instruments. And the more refined the voices become, the more overt that 1% difference becomes.
This may seem counter-intuitive to many of you, so let me use an analogy.
An analogy of alloys
The best analogy I can give (today at least), is that of alloyed steel.
For those unfamiliar with what alloys are, they are mixtures of a base metal, with additives that affect the various properties of the base metal.
Steel is an alloy of iron. Iron is 100% iron, or Fe to use it’s periodic shorthand.
By adding tiny amounts of carbon, manganese, and other elements, we can end up with dramatically different types of steel with enormously different properties and uses. Here are just three examples of different steel alloy families:
– Mild (low carbon) steel: approximately 0.3% carbon content with up to 0.4% manganese content. Less strong but cheap and easy to shape; surface hardness can be increased through carburizing.
— This is still at least 99.3% iron.
– Medium carbon steel: approximately 0.30% to 0.45% carbon content with 0.60 to 1.65% manganese content. Balances ductility (ability to draw into wires) and strength and has good wear resistance; used for large parts, forging and car parts.
— This is still at least 97.9% iron, and can be as much as 99.1% iron.
– High carbon steel: approximately 0.45% to 0.75% carbon content with 0.30 to 0.90% manganese content. Very strong, used for springs and high-strength wires.
— This is still at least 98.35% iron, and can be as much as 99.25% iron.
These are steels that are 98-99% identical, with only a 0.1% variation here and there. Yet, they are fundamentally different kinds of steel, with entirely different mechanical properties. Look at the first and third examples. One is considered less strong but cheap and easy to shape, and the other is considered very strong and useful for springs and high-strength wires… yet their base metal content is almost identical, and the only substantive difference lies in tenths of a per cent of their additive metals.
The same is true for singers
Consider this “base metal” to be the same as base vocal technique. The better trained a singer becomes, yes, their base technique becomes more comparable to other trained singers, but this enables the tiny, miniscule percentage points that makes that singer unique to shine through.
Something I see all the time, is singers with almost identical voices in the early-to-mid stages of training start to diverge in later stage training. It’s these tiniest of variations you can barely hear at the start, which begin to become ever more important as voices develop. Better technique enhances and brings out their artistry and unique identity, it doesn’t stifle it or homogenise it.
I often see is several singers who start out with very similar sounding voices, yet as their technique improves, what they become good at radically diverges. One becomes a wonderful acoustic singer-songwriter, another becomes a rock singer, another moves into musical theatre, yet at one time (when their technique was limited) they all sounded pretty similar.
Technique begets options, and options begets artistry
This is the wonderful thing about vocal technique and voice training. The more refined your technique becomes, the more your artistry and personality is able to shine through. We don’t become more similar and homogenised through good technique, we cultivate greater and more diverse expression. I would even go so far as to argue it’s lack of good technique that leads to singers sounding the same.
If cultivating your own artistry and truly hearing your voice for the first time is something you’d like to experience for yourself, you can book in via my booking form right here.