Lesson Record 3.7.14
I asked if he had done any of the
exercises that we discussed last week, and he said he hadn’t. He said that most of his singing was
just in the car, and I asked a question related to that: “How come I feel more comfortable
singing in my car to Michael Bublé than when I‘m singing a song I’ve practiced
in voice lessons?” The first thing
I thought of that his normal habits of singing feel comfortable to him, but
voice lessons require him to feel a bit uncomfortable in his voice for a bit in
order to gain some new skills.
That’s the first answer I thought of. I told him that sometimes when you take voice lessons, you
start to sound a bit worse for a while, and that is because there is a learning
curve in order to become even better.
He seemed to really relate to that idea.
We talked about his guitar lessons
for a little bit, and then we moved on to a breathing exercise. I had him lean over in a chair again
and feel his lower back. I told
him that when I’m doing it well, I barely feel like air came in my mouth at
all, it just appeared in my system.
He said he could feel that feeling, but he has trouble incorporating
that into singing. I told him this
exercise is a good bookmark he can look back to while he’s singing (“Remember,
like that!”). He said at that
point he had awesome “aha” moment, realizing that perfecting technique on the
guitar is just like perfecting your body’s technique for singing. Dude, if that helps him, right on! I shared the analogy of the mushroom
cloud breath that Gavin and I came up with, and Philip seemed to like
that. I also made sure it was
clear that he knows that the lower back won’t expand as much while standing as
it did when he was leaning over.
He told me that he frequently feels problems with running out of breath
at the ends of phrases. I told him
that this kind of low and released breath doesn’t feel as full as a gaspy
breath, but the released breath air will work more efficiently more
singing. So trust the released
breath! I told him what Cindy told
me “You have to spend air to receive air.”
Then we finally started
singing. But before we started he
had a question: He had a hard time going from breathing to singing, making it
fluid, in his words. I told him to
try the exercise first and see how he feels. It was a 5 note descending scale on “baa”, trying to make sure
he released in all directions on each breath. I used hand gestures to remind of the breath sensation. After a couple of attempts, I suggested
that he use that great released breath to rest the voice on top, instead of
using it all. We continued, and it
seemed to bring a bit more core to the sound. I said, “Imagine you are floating on top of the breath.” I noticed that the first attempts were
more successful than the rest, but that is probably because I’m not giving
enough reminders to keep the breath good.
I asked him how he felt, and he said that he felt that when he tried to
rest his voice on the breath, it was sinking and falling, which was bad to
him. He said that he really liked
the instruction to float the voice instead of resting the voice. He said he felt that the voice was
sinking into his throat. I told
him that sinking isn’t so good, but resting is. So we added something to the exercise. (By the way, I just love that Philip is
so open to describing his feelings in his voice; it gives me so much
information.)
We now did baaa ee, descending 5
note scale with ee at the tonic.
This time around I tried to play less quickly in between attempts, like
was suggested to me in class. I
reminded him to keep his jaw the same on ee as aa. It was a bit hard for him, but he had an awesome focus on
it. I tried to point out the
attempts I liked, and I also reminded him of his mushroom cloud breath. At this point, I went and grabbed
Tootsie rolls from Cindy’s office, because I wanted to see how they worked on
him for this jaw release thing.
With the Tootsie rolls in, his sound was immediately more full and
resonant! He said that he felt the difference too, and he said he sounded like
an opera singer! Woohoo! He wanted to try it again without
Tootsie rolls, so we did, but on [baip] (rhymes with pipe). His upper range is still quite
different than his lower range, but not cracking or anything. I think I need to try some leaping
ascending exercises with him next time, so he can feel the register shift… I
don’t know.
This is when Philip said something
AWESOME. He said that when he had
Tootsie rolls in his mouth, he felt that he had a large space in the back and a
small space in the front. Booyah! I told him that was a huge
discovery. I told him that when he
releases his jaw, he doesn’t have to hold it there, he just has to continuously
drop it over and over again. A
reiteration of sorts. I tried to
show him the dumb jaw and tongue voice that Cindy always does. He said that he was having a hard time
feeling relaxed in releasing the jaw that far; I told him that you don’t drop
the jaw straight down, but back and up almost.
We
tried [baip] descending 5 note scale again. When I gave him the instruction “let it drop” immediately before
he sang, the tone was clearer.
Reaction:
I thought this lesson was really fun, because Philip was
really open with expressing exactly how his voice was feeling, and he was
really creative in coming up with ways to express it. I’m glad he feels comfortable to do that. I think I can just keep reiterating the
concept we did in this lesson, and I next lesson I want to start with
descending exercises and then switch to ascending exercises. This will hopefully help him keep space
and release in high notes, which I think will make an awesome clarity in the
tone up there. But really fun
lesson, and I think successful lesson.
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