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30 second tip: Let the larynx rest

This should only take you 2-3 minutes to read, and only about 10-30 seconds to apply each time you use it.

What’s the problem?

When you’re singing a song and you get to that difficult passage/line, you ever noticed how it’s sometimes harder than doing that difficult passage just by itself? Or perhaps you are trying to practice that difficult passage by itself repeatedly, and the first 2-3 times are decent, but then it feels like it’s getting worse no matter what we try? We’ve all experienced this and it’s frustrating as all heck – we’re on a roll then we lose the flow, and it feels like it keeps slipping away despite repeated attempts to regain it. What gives?

Why does this happen?

No matter how skilled you are as a singer, the longer you are singing without rest (rest as short as even 10-30 seconds), the more the larynx will continue to rise, whether obviously or gradually/imperceptibly. This happens as a result of continued vocal use without a break. This compromises ease of singing, no matter what your level of technique.

The simple solution…

Give yourself 10-30 seconds rest at that point. Try to JUST rest – don’t fill that rest with speaking, singing, coughing, or even drinking excessively (a few sips will suffice).

All things being equal you should find this returns you to a better state for attempting that challenging passage. By letting the larynx (and voice as a whole) rest for even just 10-30 seconds between sets of attempts to practice a line can make the world of difference. Rest will naturally allow and encourage your larynx to drop naturally. A quick yawn can help encourage a descent of the larynx as well. Don’t just keep hammering the line, let your voice rest and as soon as you feel yourself departing from the easier state, rest it up again. If you find 30 seconds isn’t enough, give it longer – experiment!

Give it a shot next time you’re tackling a tricky passage!

Learn More: Related Articles

If you’d like to learn more about what good vocal function involves, check out these related articles:
Pursue vocal function BEFORE sound, every time
What makes a song “feel” high?
Tongue Tension: How to spot it and fix it
5 Reasons Sleep Helps Boost Your Singing
A Key to Great Singing: Hyper-function vs Relaxation

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Five Famous Singers with Vocal Problems

From Nodules and Granulomas, to Haemorrhages, and Surgery Complications

This week I thought it would be interesting to look at the kind of issues that can befall singers who neglect their vocal health, nodules and otherwise. Now some of the following are due to particularly hazardous vocal technique (or lack thereof). However, even with half-decent or great technique, if you over-use your voice and give yourself inadequate rest you can encounter similar issues.

John Mayer – Granuloma

A few years ago John Mayer had to cancel an extensive tour to undergo surgery for a granuloma.

John Mayer is a self-taught singer, and if you watch interviews with him at Berklee College of Music he talks about the search to find a great ‘base’ tone for his voice. Sadly, this tone (as cool as it is) is not a healthy form of phonation full stop, let alone for extended periods. Granuloma is a swelling/inflammation of the cartilage at the back of the vocal cords, whereas nodules occur on the cords themselves (see below). However the growth of this inflamed tissue can interfere with vocal function and cause a great deal of pain and dysphonia (i.e. can’t pitch correctly).

In my opinion, from a technical perspective John Mayer has always been way too light with his chest voice. I’m talking purely technically and NOT stylistically. This results in a LOT of excess air passing over the vocal cords (which you can hear in almost every song). Functionally speaking, this results in insufficient stability throughout his voice, which then leads to strain at the top of his (chest) voice when he tries to gun it on the higher notes.

He also constantly flips between a light insufficiently stable (but regularly strained) chest co-ordination and his artistic use of falsetto. This kind of vocal habit can really wreak havoc on a voice. This is because the cords are constantly being strained and excessively taut one second, then being suddenly let go of like letting go of an elastic band the next. Such a constant flip-flopping can create a lot of wear on the voice and the connective tissues. Add into that an intensive gigging schedule and you’ve got a recipe for vocal disaster.

Adele & Sam Smith – vocal cord haemorrhage

A haemorrhage is a particularly unpleasant issue. It’s where the tissue of the vocal cords themselves rupture and bleed all over themselves. This also creates swelling, much like any other cut in the human body.

In Adele’s case, you can hear the amount of sheer pressure she uses when she sings. In fact, if you listen to her recorded version of ‘Rolling in the Deep’ you can hear her voice trembling to try and hold onto that very first high note in the chorus. This is indicative of a singer using significantly excessive amounts of air pressure to generate their sound and trying to retain that chest-like sound as high as possible. Sam Smith has vocal habits/behaviour a little closer to that of John Mayer.

Singing in a kind of ‘crafted yelling’ co-ordination or repeatedly cranking up the volume without adequate technique or rest periods in between is remarkably bad for the voice. I can’t even begin to describe how damaging it is, even for short periods of time, let alone entire concerts night after night. Continued misuse and OVER-use of the voice in this way is what resulted in this damage to her voice.

Michael Buble – nodules

A year or so ago, Michael Buble announced he had to cancel at least part of his tour to have vocal cord surgery to remove nodules. Nodules are like blisters/callouses on your vocal cords. These generally occur as a soft localised swelling on one cord initially, then hardening to a hard nodule (like a blister), and often result in a matching nodule on the opposite cord as the initiating nodule rubs against the other vocal cord during phonation. Soft nodules can occur quite regularly with even loud shouting at events, football matches, concerts etc, and so are not uncommon per se (though we should try to avoid even these). However, prolonged singing on nodules or adema (swelling) is what tends to lead to hard nodules.

Now while Michael Buble is not perfect technically, he doesn’t sing in ridiculous keys. He also doesn’t sing with dramatically excessive volume, nor does he experiment with vocal distortion. He is relatively clean when he sings and doesn’t jam his voice as hard as it will go as often as he can. In short, he’s not perfect, but he is a great example of what can happen when even as a singer with half-decent technique. Over-singing (gigs night after night!) can just create that level of wear in the voice. Gigging every night with inadequate rest can still lead to serious vocal issues.

Julie Andrews – Nodules, then surgery complications

Julie Andrews is an unusual case. She went in to have nodules removed, but the surgeon allegedly botched the operation. This resulted in a piece of her vocal cords no longer being there or being available in the way it once was. My recollection from conversations with other coaches was that the surgeon slipped during the operation, but I cannot find a reliable source to corroborate this. In any case, surgery is a serious route to go down, and the consequences never leave the voice the same again. Once nodules reach the hardened stage, they must be removed surgically, whereas soft nodules (the ones that are “merely” a localised swelling) can reduce with rest and corrective exercises.

The Upshot is…

You only get one voice – be smart about how you use it and look after it.

If you’re straining, stop doing it. If you’re repeatedly straining, DEFINITELY stop doing it. Whether you’re being too heavy and aggressive (like Adele previously), or light and flipping to falsetto (like John Mayer), or even whether your technique is reasonably together but you’re singing without adequate rest (like Michael Buble), you have GOT to respect the inherent requirements of how the voice is meant to work and how it’s meant to recover.

Learn More: Related Articles

If you want to learn more about vocal health and voice issues, you may enjoy the following articles:
Shouting masquerading as singing: Why so many singers are just yelling
Why vocal problems so regularly derail careers, permanently
Vocal Health Issues
My Singing Voice Hurts: 5 Habits for Vocal Health
Vocal Longevity: The Icarus Effect
Why do I keep losing my voice: Overuse, Misuse and Abuse
The Seriousness of Vocal Fold Nodules

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March Challenge: If you had no vocal limitations, what would you CHOOSE to do?

Here’s something interesting I’ve noticed over years of coaching.

People put themselves in boxes.

What do I mean by this? Well, in the main, people tend to classify themselves as one kind of singer (e.g. “I’m a soft singer-songwriter”, “I’m a hard rock shouty/screamy singer”, etc). And VERY often they are making this decision as an ill-informed choice based on their current limitations rather than what they are actually suited to… and when we remove those limitations, their TRUE preferences reveal themselves.

Let me explain with some based-on-true-singers examples…

Anna
Let’s say I get a classical singer (not trained) called “Anna”. She sings the highest soprano part in her local choir and NEVER sings the lowest notes. She says she loves singing in that part of her range and it’s where she sounds best.

OK, we’ll accept that for now and more onto our next example.

Bob
Let’s say I get a singer in called “Bob”. Bob has a soft voice, so he sings soft singer-songwriter songs, often very lilt-y and very breathy. He says he sings them because he likes that material.

Now it’s not that Bob is being untruthful, but it’s impossible to say whether he TRULY loves that genre of music because he loves it, or because that is ALL he can sing because of his current vocal limitations.

Carrie
Let’s say we’ve got another singer, “Carrie”. Carrie has a loud and full voice, so she tends to sing belting musical theatre with a narrow range because she finds she sounds best on the lower notes. Again, it’s not that Carrie is lying, but her current limitations prevent her from utilising her upper range, so she categorises herself as a particular type of singer to side-step that her vocal limitations have literally put her in a box.

Dana
Let’s say we’ve got another singer “Dana”. Dana wants to do riffs at every possible moment in every song, even when it’s not always appropriate. When we ask her to hold a note, she finds she struggles to do so, sustaining and vibrato is not present (some limitations there).

In Dana’s case, we’ve got someone who wants to riff all the time – but why? It’s the only thing she can run to in order to disguise her lacking vibrato and the ability to sustain notes.

In all of the above cases…
…these singers have categorised their musical output based on vocal limitations… which are not absolute, but merely their current vocal stage of development.

What tends to happen with these singers with training
Now I have had SCORES of people within each category, and there’s still more categories I could describe, but here’s what happens as we train their voice

As we fix the underlying technical issues, their REAL voice appears, and their REAL preferences start to emerge. The “classical” warbly singer suddenly discovers low notes are possible and they acknowledge they’ve always secretly wanted to sing gospel but never thought they could. The soft singer songwriter admits they always wanted to sing some belting pop. The musical theatre belter realises they want to still sing musical theatre, but they’ve always loved the extended range melodies that they thought were out of reach. The riffing wannabe superstar suddenly realises the power of simple ballads sung with quality and they realise they find the riffing far too fatiguing for the output they get.

Conclusion & Your Challenge
If we could erase your vocal limitations, what would you CHOOSE to sing?

Not because it’s the “in-thing”, not because you think other people want to hear it, but because YOU would love to sing it.

Just take 5 minutes (or maybe longer) to be honest with yourself, and really ask what you want to sing if you didn’t have the limitations you currently had. Seriously, be honest with yourself, and you may just surprise yourself.

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Vocal Longevity: The Icarus Effect

At the time of writing this article, I had one particular client who gigged regularly down in London. One of the issues they raised was that they feel that longevity and robustness is a serious problem for them. If they were doing a recording session, they felt they could deliver a handful of good takes and then the voice would just get weaker from that point on. If they were doing a string of gigs, they may even feel like they need months off to recover from them.

This performer’s age is relatively young, so it’s not an age related issue. They can hit all the notes they are trying to hit. They are also not overly aggressive with their singing, if anything they are slightly light with their voice. And they are not alone in this struggle – I regularly get experienced singers in suffering the same issues.

So what’s going on?

Many singers suffer from these issues to one extent or another, and it is increasingly common with younger singers. This is for reasons I’m going to explain. The best illustration I can give, is the Greek tragedy of Icarus.

The Icarus Effect

In Greek mythology, Icarus was the son of Daedalus, a craftsman who was imprisoned with his son. Daedalus built them each a set of wings made of feathers and wax to enable them to escape and to fly out of their prison.

During the flight, Icarus was amazed at what he could do with his wings and flew up high, far too close to the sun for far too long. This was despite warnings from his father. The prolonged exposure to heat from the sun melted the wax holding the feathers in place. Icarus’s wings fell apart, and he plummeted to his death.

The issue with many singers of any age is that they over-estimate their ability.

This is especially true with those gifted with a half decent instrument, but often a trap that hobbyists fall into. They keep running their voice into the red, biting off more than they can chew, until… well… they can’t do it anymore.

To be clear, I’m not talking about just merely hitting the notes – I’m talking about something several dimensions deeper than that.

– What does it take to hit a reasonably high note just ONCE in a song? Probably challenging but doable.
– What does it take to sing a final chorus where the whole melody is relatively high? Hmmm, tiring, but manageable.
– What about if the whole song sits in that range? Oh… that’s getting really exhausting.
– What about if you’ve got a whole set of songs that sits in that range? Errrrrr….
– What if you have got multiple gigs a week, with a whole set of songs in that range? Uh-oh.

But THIS is exactly what many singers do. They realise they can sing a high note once, maybe several times, then suddenly everything becomes about shoehorning every song into that area of their voice, without addressing how LONG they can sustain that kind of demand of their voice.

The issue is NOT how high someone can sing.

I’ve met untrained singers with great initial aptitude for higher notes all the time. The issue is NOT even how often they can sing those high notes. If there is a portion of the song that is lower that the singer can retreat to for comfort and ease between climaxes, then repeated high notes are really not too exhausting.

Why Icarus ACTUALLY fell…

Icarus didn’t just fall because of how close he flow to the sun, he met his fate because of how LONG he spent that close to the sun. It’s the duration at a particular level of exposure that we’re talking about.

If a singer insists on placing songs in keys where EVERY note requires application of effort, even if it’s only a tiny amount, the resulting vocal condition places the demand squarely in the court of how LONG can they spend hitting those high notes… i.e. how long can they spend in the sun without their wings melting.

THIS is an altogether different parameter to measure your singing ability against. It is absolutely possible to spend a long time in those places (correctly!), but it’s an ability that takes a long time to develop and control.

Truth be told, most OVER-estimate their ability in this regard. Most tend to be able to hit a note without strain a few times in practice, or look back on a gig and think “wow, I was NAILING the high notes at that gig”, and they become convinced they’re able to sing well there. I see this time and time again.

Some examples

In the opera world, Pavarotti talked about how challenging it is to keep singing those high notes and how the body naturally finds it harder to keep the system perfect the longer you are “up there’. You can read about this in the book ‘Great Singers on Great Singing’ by Jerome Hines.

In the pop world, you can look up Bruno Mars bootlegs on YouTube where the man with the biggest and most consistent live range of the early 21st century places songs just around his first bridge, or even just in chest voice.

The Take-Home Message
If you are a singer who is repeatedly facing vocal health and longevity issues in relation to periods of singing, it is very likely you are flying too close to the sun, hence my advice to you will be the same as to the client I had the other day.

Take your songs down several keys. Assess yourself AND your set-lists and the songs you sing. Your primary goal is to sound GOOD – don’t compromise on that. If you can’t sprint a whole marathon, if you can’t lift maximum weights in the gym with no rest, then you can’t sing every song at the tippy-top of your range – you will wreck yourself.

You must pace yourself, and make sure you don’t spend too long “up there” taxing your voice.

Learn More: Related Articles

If you want to learn more about vocal health and voice issues, you may enjoy the following articles:
Shouting masquerading as singing: Why so many singers are just yelling
Why vocal problems so regularly derail careers, permanently
Famous Singers with Voice Problems
Vocal Health Issues
My Singing Voice Hurts: 5 Habits for Vocal Health
Why do I keep losing my voice: Overuse, Misuse and Abuse
The Seriousness of Vocal Fold Nodules

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February Challenge

Here’s something I thought would be a fun feature, a challenge for you once a month, where I pose an idea to you, and (if you’re game, which I sincerely hope you are) you give it a go…

This month’s challenge:

Learn a song in a COMPLETELY different genre to your usual selection.

If you like rock, try some RnB.

If you like classical, try some pop.

If you like musical theatre, try some singer-songwriter material.

These are not restrictive choices, just some genre pairs that don’t typically go together to give you an idea of the direction to go in.

Step 1: Browse YouTube

Whatever you normally sing, try spending 15 minutes browsing Youtube (or even my blog!) for suggestions that might sit outside your normal repertoire choice.

Step 2: Listen to an album or playlist on repeat

Immerse yourself in an alternate genre. Notice how the music and singers have to do things differently. Either longer held notes, or shorter/more staccato notes. Perhaps the timbre is more aggressive vs more genteel. Whatever you’re used to, different genre’s ask different things of your voice.

Step 3: Have a go

Then, have a bash at it. And by that, I don’t just mean sing it once and give up or remain satisfied. Spend a bit of time learning it every couple of days, and try to polish it to a similar standard as your other songs. You may love it, you may hate it, but every song has it’s own little nuances that can make even the most hardened ear go ‘ahhhh, THAT’S new!’.

You’ll be surprised what you discover about music when you really try and capture another genre’s little idiosyncrasies.

Some of you will find yourself still not especially digging the song, but finding there’s certain things that are tricky or even cool about the alternate genre. Some of you may even want to modify how you do some of your more established pieces based on the new things you find out about the alternate genre… and in some cases you may even find an entirely new genre you want to turn your attention to… I had that exact experience when someone suggested I check out some old soul ballads – SO wonderful to sing.

Give it a shot, see what you come up with.

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Four Facts About Singing As You Get Older

So, bear with me here, our voices changing as we get older is completely normal, but we need to walk through a few things first.

Here’s something interesting you may not know.larynx

Fact #1

With proper training throughout adult life, the voice should actually be reaching it’s peak LATER in life (say, around 50) and NOT earlier in life (e.g. where most people start to struggle, around 25-30).

Why? Let’s explore this…

Fact #2

– The physiology of the larynx and the vocal apparatus changes over time. Ongoing training helps combat the negatives of these changes, and take advantage of benefits of getting older.

Wait… benefits? What benefits?

Fact #3

– As you get older, the larynx drops bit by bit. This imparts additional bottom end to your tone – relatively straightforward to grasp.

Fact #4

– The various cartilages in the larynx and vocal apparatus start to ossify… i.e. turn to bone.

That’s why things seem to get less agile and flexible as you get older in relation to singing – that’s because things DO become less flexible as you get older. That’s what makes this fourth fact particularly interesting. What this means is that the previously flexible cartilages that make up the housing of the vocal cords, that they are tensioned on and controlled by, start to harden and become stiffer and less flexible.

The first negative that comes along with this is that whilst you are young you may find you can sound great IN SPITE of great resistance in your singing, manipulation, etc, but as you get older, you’ll find things getter tougher and tougher, as if you are fighting your own voice to do the things you used to. People say this is just a reality of getting older, but actually correct technique from youth has the OPPOSITE effect, instead of negative it’s positive.

Rigidity is your friend

When the singing apparatus (i.e. your voice) becomes more rigid as a structure through the ossification process, the muscles are now acting on a physically much stronger structure than they were before. Provided singing is being done with correct technique and not just jamming the voice as hard is it will go (as is often the case and doable in youth), this extra rigidity makes things easier to achieve a more powerful and acoustically resonant tone.

Check this quote from leading voice scientist Ingo Titze – “certain age-related deteriorations may actually be beneficial to the larynx as a sound-producing instrument… We might speculate that a partially ossified laryngeal framework can better support the tension of the vocal folds because bone tends to deform less than cartilage under the same stress. Comparing the vocal folds to vibrating strings, it seems important to maintain rigid endpoints for tissue fibers to vibrate in simple predictable modes.”

And a further quote from an article within Link 2 provided below – “Although the voice itself remains stable, physiological changes do occur in middle age, most significantly ossification (hardening) of the laryngeal cartilages. In some individuals, these changes can actually improve the singing voice, since a more bony support framework in the larynx better supports the tension in the vocal folds. If you compare the voice to a piano, for instance, the strings in a piano are attached to solidly-anchored metal posts at each end. This allows the piano strings to stay in tune and make a predictable sound. At younger ages when flexible cartilage supports the vocal folds, there is a greater chance for unpredictability, but with stiffer, more bony supports, it is logical that the voice could perform more reliably.”

Conclusion
Getting older is a natural part of life, but in relation to singing, this is actually GOOD news, if you’re willing to invest in your voice of course. Don’t fight it, instead, work on your technique. To someone with ongoing technical growth, these changes are beneficial – to those who are just trying to repeat what they did in their youth, these changes are not beneficial. You’re just going to struggle and your voice is going to keep getting weaker and more of a beast to wrestle than a thing of great joy as it once was. The changes are going to happen all the same, it’s your choice whether they help you or hinder you.

If this has grabbed your attention and is particularly relevant to you, why not get in touch and explore what this means for your own voice?

You can get in touch and book your first session right here.

Link 1
Link 2
Link 3

Learn More: Related Articles

If you’d like to learn more about the voice and how it changes as it gets older, you may enjoy these related articles:
The perks of being an older singer
Why can’t I sing as high as I used to?
Vocal Tessitura
Maturing of Vocal Tone
How long does it take to train a voice?

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Legato of EVERYTHING

I was receiving some coaching on my own voice this week (yes, I absolutely still take regular lessons!) and a topic came up that we had discussed before, but warranted going over again.

Legato of EVERYTHING

What on earth does this mean? Well, let’s look at the definition of legato…

Legato is defined as:
“in a smooth flowing manner, without breaks between notes.”

…which is the opposite of…
Staccato which is defined as:
“with each sound or note sharply detached or separated from the others.”

When you think about what makes notes sound detached or separated from one another, it’s more than just having breaks between notes – it’s ANYTHING that makes one note sound different or incongruous to another. It’s all aspects of the notes. Speed and depth of vibrato across all notes, tonality across all notes, volume, intensity, and a myriad of other factors. If any of these are different to one another, we have a departure from pure ‘legato’ (connectedness, evenness, smoothness between notes).

Legato of EVERYTHING means to make everything as smooth, congruent and self-consistent as possible. Through doing this, we establish not only great quality of tone, but further establish mastery of our instrument in song.

This is a MASSIVE undertaking, but is an essential technical undertaking to chip away at to build your voice artistically.

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Five Songs From The Last Week

Here is another instalment of five songs from the last week. Have a listen!

1. Dance with my father – Celine Dion (orig. by Luther Vandross)
A long-standing client brought this in, and it never fails to choke me up!

2. Show and tell – Al Wilson
This is a song I’ve been looking at on and off, specifically the Peabo Bryson version, but the Al Wilson one is excellent as well!

3. Can’t take my eyes off of you – Frankie Valli
A client is preparing this as a first dance song for a friend’s wedding, so it was a very touching lesson to hear this done!

4. Thinking Out Loud – Ed Sheeran
This has been featured before, but a client has been trying more and more adventurous songs, and this is a big step up for them – well done!

5. Writing’s on the Wall – Sam Smith (from ‘Spectre’)
I was actually watching Spectre earlier in the week, and as a client who is a big fan of Sam Smith (and this song in particular) was also in, it was nice to be able to hear this again and figured I’d share it in this post.

If you’ve enjoyed this, have a search for more of ‘songs from the last week’.

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