Student: Stephanie J.
Date of Lesson: 4/29/14
Brief Overview of lesson: We began by stretching a bit, and then I had Stephanie try some yawns to release her jaw. Once she felt released I asked her to try some sighs. She did quite a few in a descending motion.
I then reminded her about the silent breath of surprise breath that we had talked about in our last lesson. I wanted to start our lesson off with a released low larynx so I reminded her of it by saying "rose" then having her vocalize on an [u] 54321. I started her at B4. She had a hard time with onset, and I wanted her to think of having more depth. I noticed that she had some moment in the chest when she was inhaling, and then she kind of had a breath fart once she started singing. I instructed her to not breath with the chest moving, but to have a deeper down and out breath. I asked her to use her arms to direct the breath in that down-and-out motion. She did a few repetitions after that cue, and during those repetitions I saw that she was kind of using a vacuum sniff breath, so I stopped her and cued her to breath through both her mouth and nose nice and easy. She stopped me and said that she didn't know how to do that. I asked her to try breathing through both of her nose and mouth, so that she didn't constrict her naso-pharynx. During those repetitions she had some successful low breaths, but not consistently. I had her redo one on D5 because the first one there was a high breath, so she tried it again, and then I stopped her and asked her, "Why did I make you try that one again?" she said, "I don't know." I then said to her, "The first one you involved your chest, and the second one was a much lower and grounded breath." I hoped that by stopping her and pointing that out, that she might be able to gain a better sense of awareness in her breath and body.
She continued with the exercise, and I cued her a few more times with the word "rose".
I then moved on to some wobbles 535153515351 on [i]. She seemed to let go on the exercises, although, my piano skills kind of deterred her a few times. I continued with the exercise, but I had to remind her to think of something pleasant, because she looked terrified, and I think it was affecting her warm-up, and timbre, breath, etc... I also noticed that she was using the vacuum breath again, so I again cued her to breath through both her nose and mouth. She stopped me, and asked, "Can you show me? Because I don't really know if it is possible for me to breath in through both my mouth and my nose at the same time." I then said, "Okay, so right now you're breathing through your nose like you're sucking, than you're constricting your naso-pharynx. So allow the air to enter all the available spaces. So breath should be free and easy so that we don't close off our resonance space. Does that make sense?"
"Okay, so just keep that area open. But if I have both open am I breathing through my mouth or my nose?"
"You're going to feel like you're breathing through both."
Then Cindy said, "And you might actually be breathing through both. Or it might not feel like much of anything."
Then I said, "So you may feel that sensation, or you may not. But just imagine yourself as a tube, with your vf's in the middle. All you need to sing are your vf's and breath."
We continued, and I sucked at playing the exercise. She seemed more free, but I think there was still some constriction and a high larynx.
I stopped and asked her how she felt about those repetitions after thinking of the breath moving in both the mouth and nose, and the tube. She said, "I was trying to be more released, and a little less tense." I then said, "Yeah, I felt like those were more free, and I sensed that you're wanting to be more creative with your voice. So good job."
Overall with this exercise, I found that she found better release with the wobble exercise when she was in her lower range.
We then moved on to 8531 "So What!" and I instructed her to speak the last note. I started her at C5. We did quite a few repetitions, and I noticed she was focusing on the piano, so I asked her to look away. It sounded like the initial note on a lot of them were pretty constricted. I iasked her how she had felt about them, she said that she had to make a conscious effort to let go, and she felt better towards the end.
I decided to teach a new vocalize today: 54321 [u.i.u.i.u.i.u.i.u.i.] I thought this would be good to cue the low larynx, and help her keep her jaw open, with only the lips and tongue moving. I had her try it again, and she then asked me to show her how to do it. I tried my best to model it. I told her that this would be a great exercise to challenge her and help her find more release in her jaw.
We then moved on to work on her song. I know what I needed to turn around the phrase because it was an ascending phrase. So I asked Cindy how to do this since, I wasn't exactly sure at first. She said to have her sing the first note first, and then start the phrase with the thought of the space of the high note throughout. I then started Stephanie at the beginning. She sang the highest notes, and then the phrase. Things seemed pretty manipulated, and tight. I was trying to cue some release in her body, but not much was working. We repeated the first phrase a lot, and I had the thought that it was probably time to move on and let her sing through the whole song. I asked her to try to find a certain type of movement to do while she sang. She seemed really timid, and almost stubborn.
She kept on saying that she needed to relax because she is an intense and uptight person. So I kept on trying to connect with her by asking her to pretend like she was dancing, or painting, or wiping the white board at school in a very fluid and connected line. This seemed to help her keep energy in the breath, but there was still a high larynx and constriction in the pharynx. I tried cuing her with certain words and asking her to try to feel more buoyancy in her singing. I think this helped it to not be so manipulated, but the high larynx didn't go away. I did notice that once she started laughing at herself, the sound was much more carefree and fun to listen to. I told her that, hoping that would motivate her to let loose and have some humor or joy about singing. But it wasn't easy for her to do that, because whenever she forgot the words she wanted to stop and correct them.
After that I asked her to vocalize on anything she wanted to, it could be blah blah or a vowel, but she didn't need to worry about the words. I told her that she didn't have to care so much, and just try to be creative and explore what she could do with her voice. She tried this a little, but it was still hard, because she wanted to constrict still and sing with a high larynx.
We then made our 3 take-aways, and discussed some techniques to help her in her daily life.
Cindy's feedback: Encourage legatissimo for all scale patterns (except wobbles)
Sometimes she is chest breathing because she is not quite UP enough to begin with. Do some singing with one or both arms reaching toward the ceiling
She got kind of a glitchy start in the high. Maybe use wh instead of h as pilot sound.
Into the [u]
On wobble you need to learn to play it very fast and even and loose. I would use a more open, released vowel to start, maybe uh. Have her sing it in on "shut"
Do some ah-ee alternations so that she can find the ah space in the ee
Don't know that there was a big enough difference in breathing for her to sense anything.
Just LET it happen
So what 8531
Elongate ssssss while having her think pitch. Then just let mouth fall open into word without muscular change in throat from hiss to singing. She is constricting her throat for many of the starts
What do you hear? What do you see? What do you wish you would hear and/or see? How can you encourage or set up that change? Be specific.
[u-I-u-i]. What is goal. When you demonstrate make sure you're doing a non-Utah oo. Sometimes having student pretend to blow on their soup to cool it gets them to an oo shape that has molar separation and easy forward lips.
Talk about letting chin melt or recede backwards. She is jutting it forward as she sings. She could also just spend more breath (feeling of free flowing air in sound-not subglottic pressure increasing)
I think the movement idea was helpful. She loosened up some. Let her sing more and question less. Let her just have some trial and error time. Then at the end summarize perhaps what you noticed. With beginning or less intuitive students, we probably need to spend a little less time questioning.
Just sing thru the whole thing. Good. This is what I was just feeling needed to happen.
She could hold the music in one hand and swing the other one about if that helps since she can't remember the words and melody.
Have you ever just spoken directly to her about what is happening (throat constriction-control) versus (think-let-trust)
maybe have her practice melody without words on whatever vocalizations sound is easiest with her- not to see if she can sing the melody, but to see that if she has less to worry about, whether she can tell when/if her throat is constricting. She needs to develop more awareness of her pharynx, larynx, etc.that way she does not have to try harder, but she can develop a more Highly sensitized sensory awareness system.
She will need to have done some singing in the easiest part of her range to develop her model of what deconstriction feels like.
Assessment of student: Stephanie sang in a healthier place when she was light-hearted and laughing about something. Whenever she got to that point she stopped singing, because I think she felt uncomfortable or something. I wanted her play the recording back to her so she could hear the difference. Singing should be fun, and I talked to her about it afterwards. She said that she has always associated it with hard things that aren't always fun, so I tried to steer her towards experiencing music as a light-hearted and fun experience. Hopefully this will give her a different perspective to be able to let go and enjoy her voice.
How will you modify your teaching based off of what you learned from the lesson? After listening to the lesson I can hear that I was playing a lot of the vocalizes slowly, and I want to make sure from now on that I am playing the vocalizes, especially the descending ones more quickly and accurately. This will help my students learn to not grab or hold on certain notes. I think I may also need to be a little more light-hearted and fun in my lessons so that I can be an example to my students and give them a positive experience with music.
Questions for Cindy: How do you help a student like Stephanie who feels uncomfortable and is oftentimes stubborn to change?
Takeaways for the student:
1. rose breath
2. awareness of the tube
3. enjoying the journey, and letting go. Having fun and creative with her voice.
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