Student: Stephanie J.
Date of Lesson: 2/21/14
Brief Overview of lesson: I began the lesson by pulling out the Malde book, I first showed her the diagram of our spine and pointed out that the lumbar is right in the middle of our body. I asked her how having that knowledge changed the way she carried herself. She answered by saying that it felt different because she was thinking about. But she wasn't sure if it changed the way she carried herself. I asked to make note of that this next week. We then turned to the diaphragm of our rib cage and diaphragm. I showed her the location of it during inhalation and exhalation. I also showed her the picture of the lungs and how they extend up all the way almost to our shoulders. She said that she found that interesting because she had always thought of them being lower and smaller than that.
I then turned to the page about breath control/support and read to her: "The concept of support can be divided into two categories: structural support and breath support. Structural support is the way that our skeleton to balances and supports the weight of our body. Breath support is about how the movement of breath facilitates the sound. If you allow your abdominal muscles and pelvic floor to release and stretch in inhalation the elastic recoil of these muscles continually contributes to support the flow of breath for exhalation."
"So here it is saying that the way we release will facilitate the breath and allow it to move freely."
She then said, "Okay, so it just supports better breath. But it's not that you are supporting the breath with the stomach muscles."
"Yeah. It also says that if you inhale well, your exhalation will enjoy constant support from the abdominal muscles, the pelvic floor, and costal cartilage. Where singers get in trouble is the regulation of exhalation--because we want to squeeze."
"So now I want to ask you a question: what is the muscle that contracts during inhalation?"
"Is it the diaphragm?"
"Yes, that's exactly right, I'm glad you remembered. So like we said as one muscle contracts the opposing muscle releases. So the diaphragm releases when we exhale--it's not like we are squeezing our stomach muscles, but rather they are coming in slowly by themselves, we don't make this happen, but it happens on its own."
"One more thing from the book: 'Instead of asking yourself for more support, ask yourself if you need to let the breath to flow more freely.' Is that a better way to you to think about it?"
"Yeah because when I'm trying to sing better tone, higher notes, and longer notes I also tighten up and it makes it just that much harder."
"Yeah, so let's think about having the air move freely throughout our lesson today."
She agreed.
I then placed her in the corner of the practice room so that I could see her clearly, but also be able to keep her from looking at the piano and getting scared when I play something higher.
Vocalizes: We began with yawning/stretching, to release her jaw and to get her into a more upright and happy posture. I asked her to feel the open and free feeling in the jaw. She continued to yawn.
Then I instructed her to sigh, being light at the top and letting it descend or fall. She did a few, but I could see that she was trying to match my pitch. So I told her she didn't have to match my pitch, but just let a sigh come while being light at the top. I asked her how she felt. She said great.
I tried to redirect my question by asking her how her jaw felt. She answered and said it felt loose, and that she wanted to continue to yawn. I let her do a few more and then we moved on to chewy hums 5432123454321. I instructed her to have the feeling of the loose yawn jaw, but also to make sure that not only our lips and teeth were moving, but also our teeth. I began her on A4 and then moved down a half step for three repetitions and then jumped up to D5 and continued this pattern. I liked the sound that I was getting because it was light, and seemed to be less labored than usual.
She stopped and apologized because she had a yawn come. I told her not to worry, because that meant that she was creating that space she needed. We continued for about 4 or 5 more repetitions. I was happy with that progress because it was much more free than I've seen her do that warm-up before.
Next I taught her a new vocalize [u] 535153515351. I wanted to use this so that I could help her elicit pitch, and also show her that she can sing in a way that is less controlling. I modeled the vocalize for her and then instructed her to keep the released yawn jaw while she did it, and to have the top note be light when she returns to it. I began her at C5 and we did a few repetitions moving down. She did alright; her voice wasn't as free as it was in the chewy hum exercises. I stopped her and asked her how her breath felt right now, because I wanted to get an assessment of how her alignment and posture feeling to her. She said fine, but that she keeps on yawning. I said that's fine, but that I wanted her feet to be shoulder width apart (I could see that her breath wasn't finding that low down and out place). She moved them and then we continued with the same exercise. She stopped and started laughing at herself. I said, don't feel weird!
I stopped and asked her to describe how her voice felt right then.
She answered by saying that she didn't know and that she had never described how her voice felt.
I tried to be more specific by asking her how she thought it was moving at the moment.
She said it was moving fine. And that maybe it could be moving better.
"Do you feel like it's free and easy or do you feel like its more labored?"
"Pretty good, pretty easy."
"Okay, do you feel like it's transitioning from note to note easily?"
"Yeah, but if I were to sing I would want to sing higher and lower notes because I don't feel like my voice is very warmed-up."
"I said okay, that's interesting."
Then I moved on because I could sense that we needed to move on to a different task. However, I made a note that I need to be more specific and clarify next time, "When we are singing freely, it feels kind of scary and like we are losing control because all we are doing is thinking the pitch, providing the air, and trusting that the pitch will come. Eventually the scary feeling will go away because you'll be used to finding that release in the voice. That's why I was asking how your voice felt it was transitioning from note to note because I wanted to get a sense of how you felt it was moving at that moment."
Next I saw that her tongue was getting bunched up in the back, and thought that I'd try to help her release it. I asked her to make the "ng" tongue posture, keeping the tip of the tongue on the bottom of the bottom teeth, and then having a high arch in the back of the tongue bringing it all the way forward and then biting on it. I asked her if she could feel that stretch. She answered, yes. I then asked her to hum on a 54321. I accidentally played the scale pretty slow and noticed that it was making her get stuck on each note. So I then played it quickly so it didn't allow her to dwell on any of the notes. This was much more released. We did a few repetitions, and she stopped to yawn. I was so happy that she was keeping the yawn jaw feeling.
I told her that none of these would sound pretty because our tongue was so far forward. I did sense some squeezing on the repetitions starting on or around D5, so I then descended and kept the rest of the repetitions in her middle range.
I then moved on to a different exercise. I had her sing "Who's new blue shoes?" 8531. I started her on E5. I told her to have the feeling of falling from the top, and to have a more speech-like quality. She did a good job with the speech like quality, but I don't think my instruction was clear enough that I wanted it to be light (child-like voice) on the top, and then become more speech-like as it got lower. As she began it was speech-like but not clear in pitch.
I told her that she was doing pretty good, but that I wanted her to find that space she had had when she had her tonuge in the "ng" position. She was matching the pitch better after that instruction. So I told her, "good, now I want you to add one more thing. I want you add the yawn jaw feeling."
She answered, "I'm trying to make it sound like I'm not singing though."
I said, "If it comes out that's fine, but this is one of the exercises where we want to remember to think-let-trust." I did another repetition, but it sounded kind of back so I instructed her to feel like it was falling down. We did a few more repetitions, and I realized that she had some constriction in her throat. I then asked her to imagine that she is going to walk to her car and she then sees someone hit it. I asked her if she felt that openness in her throat and body. She said that she did, but that she couldn't figure out how to sing with it and that she lost everything. She said that if she did that then she couldn't use her tongue to pronounce the words. I said then let's take away the words.
Before I had her try that I tried to clarify that that open feeling will be felt both in our breath and our body. I had her try th[u], that just made it even more covered and back sounding.
I stopped her and thought for a second. I asked her to think of the sound falling from out in front of her forward instead of feeling like it is originating from our VF's. I then tried to show her the difference by example.
I decided to use this idea of the sound falling out in front of you while trying to promote some energy in her body by having her think "Teacher teacher!" and then singing th[i] 54321. I felt like it found a better placement, but it was still pretty labored and controlled. I stopped her and asked her to start bent in forward fold and then come up as the begins the exercise and be standing as she gets to the last note. I did this because I was trying to get her distracted from the task at hand and to not look at the notes I was playing. It was much more free flowing, but I noticed the times when she wasn't releasing her neck made it sound held or stuck. I stopped her and asked her where her neck was that time. She said it was sorta relaxed.
I said, "Okay, what I saw was that you didn't completely release it so let's try it again while fully releasing the neck."
We did it again and it was much more free. I stopped her and asked her if they felt easier? She said yeah. I complimented her by saying that I really like the last one because it was free and felt like it was falling out right in front of her.
We then moved on to working on her song. We decided that it would be beneficial to go through the rhythms of the first 2 pages, and have her speak it in rhythm. I told her to have those to pages learned by our next lesson. I asked her to limit singing the melody at first, so that she could learn the words and rhythms correctly, but we ran through those two pages once so that I could play the notes for her.
We then established our three take-aways.
Assessment of student: I really see some improvement with Stephanie in eliciting pitch, specifically in the chewy hums. I think I need to loosen her up more though. I need to clarify that when we are singing freely it feels scary because we aren't used to that letting go aspect of it, but once we have done it consecutively it becomes less scary and less like feeling like you are losing control. I do recognize some tongue tension along with the jaw, so I will definitely continue to work on that.
Goals for future implementation: Give a more clear description of how think-let-trust works (letting go speech below). try stretching the tongue without phonating. Vampire speech "I vaaaant toooo suuuuck yoooouuur blooooood." Demonstrate how air flows freely, and how air moves in a down and out manner.
How will you modify your teaching based off of what you learned from the lesson? I am going to teach the [u]5351535153515351 vocalize again, but this time I will say, "it is going to feel scary cause you feel like you're losing control, and might not be singing the right notes, but if you maintain the yawn jaw and let you voice move by thinking the pitch it will come out, and be less taxing." I think that this will be a better explanation for her, rather than just saying keep it light at the top (this was a good instruction but I don't think it was specific enough). I just need to be more specific all around in my instruction and questions.
Questions for Cindy: Is biting your tongue while in the "ng" position raising the larynx? I would like to avoid anything that raises the larynx, but I was just trying to find something that would give her a stretch at the root of the tongue.
Takeaways for the student:
1. Have 2 pages of rhythm learned.
2. Falling from above
3. Feel like air is flowing more freely.
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