USU Pedagogy 3630 - F23

 Collegal: Rebecca Wright: I have always loved her voice! Her tone is so cool, but I feel like her soft pallet isn’t raised. I think raising it would help her on her high notes. They were still good, but I think raising the soft pallet would help her have cleaner transitions. Ashley Wallick: she has an awesome tone! It’s very forward. Very bluegrass/r&b. I felt like she did a good job controlling her voice, and not pushing. Emma Joy Diesen: I LOVE HER VOICE. She has really great positioning until the higher notes. Her low and midranges are so resonant, I can feel it resonating through her whole body. During the higher notes, there’s some tension and I can hear some air escaping. Personal: I’ve been sick, so I didn’t have a lesson this week :/

 Emma Diesen: I really loved her performance! She had some really nice float in her voice, sprinkled in with the belt. There were sometimes with some large leaps where should come off the voice a little bit. Not every time though, I think she nailed it on that octave leap on the word "somewhere". It's interesting to ponder though, I wonder if it is a question of breath flow, nerves, or something else. Overall, I found myself happily mesmerized by her performance In my own voice lesson this week, we talked about lift for high notes. Sometimes I am so focused on not carrying tension in my voice (something I've struggled with for a while) that I get too loose and the pitch will even sag a little. Thomas talked about remember to just sing bright and then darkening the vowel with the lips. he then recommended I watch Nicolai Gedda for an example of what "lift" in your face looks like. Man, watching that guy I am not even convinced it's him singing. His face j...

 In my lesson this week we went through pronunciation of my French songs. We made sure that I was pronouncing everything clearly and correctly. One note I got on my jury forms from my latest jury was that my schwa was not tall enough, so we made sure that those were pronounced correctly. We then went through the logistics of what I needed to do for my senior recital. We finalized my song order and organized what I needed to do this week to prepare. I need to get my venue and recital date reserved, and I need to start working on my program.  In VRH, I watched Justice Cruzan. She had a nice, clear sound, and clear articulation. It felt that if I knew the language I would be able to understand her. Her sound was very sweet and innocent sounding which seemed like it fit the piece well. I also observed Henry Silva. He too had a clear and beautiful sound. In addition to his sound, he weas also very expressive. There was a sincerity to his performance, and I could tell he knew and ca...

I felt like this week’s lesson was productive and gave me many things to practice. First of all, it’s becoming more and more clear to me that I tend to “swallow” the sound. As I watch the recording of the lesson, I can tell when I sing an exercise incorrectly—when I swallow the “ah” vowel or when the “ee” vowel is not sufficiently clear and forward-placed. On the other hand, the “new” way of singing sounds very strange to me. I think it will take some getting used to, and, in fact, the sound reaching my ears does not seem to agree with my previous notions of ideal singing. But these notions also appear to be false! It is apparent that my voice looses energy as I attempt to intervene to switch to a different register: my way is not quite right. I am excited to see what hard work under guidance gets me. In the lesson, we were able to achieve a “ring” in the sound at times—after reading chapter 5 of McCoy I’m inclined to think this has something to do with formants, but I’m not sure....

At first, I thought this chapter about resonance was interesting. Actually, I have previous experience with harmonics because of my amateur saxophone playing. When learning the saxophone, it is common to “finger” a low note—a fundamental frequency—while a note that primarily emanates from the instrument is a note belonging to the harmonic series for the note being “fingered.” It allows one to play notes higher than the highest note allowed simply by pushing buttons (“fingering”), and the practice is thought to instill control over the instrument. I wonder if the concept of harmonics explains, at least in part, why it is sometimes difficult for me to pick out the precise note that a baritone or bass is singing. Perhaps, as McCoy points out, the fact that a harmonic other than the fundamental frequency is stronger than the fundamental frequency contributes to this. Reading about the Male Passaggio, I thought about my most recent lesson. Thomas and I talked a bit about a type of “tran...

 I had a bumpy start to my lesson this week because when I walked in I was experiencing symptoms of what I now know is a stomach ulcer. This made me very anxious, so we just sat and chatted for a second to calm my nervous system (I'm assuming) and then jumped right into some easy and light warm ups so as to not exhaust my voice after these symptoms. I feel very foolish because I forgot to record this lesson, but I loved how those specific warm-ups released so much tension in my anxious voice and body. After that, we moved to the song I will sing in voice recital hour which is very much on the mix-belt side. I sang this last semester so we really just hit some of my trouble spots. Specifically, the D5 at the end. I was singing it with a very closed, juvenile sound mostly because I'm so frightened that if I don't close my mouth, it's not gonna come out the way I want to. However, voice lessons are here to challenge us, push us to be our very best and, thought it took me a...

 I'm going to be completely honest here: the first section went right over my head and I was very confused because I didn't feel like enough examples or explanations were being given. So, I was very relieved when section two opened with how singers can apply the information about the formants and harmonics we learned in section one. He used three examples which consisted of the male passaggio, the female upper passaggio, and a personal example of intonation. I love the consistent reference to the singer's vowel shape and how significant of a role this plays in producing resonance and harmonics. In the female upper passaggio, he talked about subtly shifting the shape of the vowel and in the intonation example, he discussed how vowels make a big difference in our ability to blend and tune to the other singers we perform with. I had a teacher once and during my time with them, I really struggled producing resonant sound through my passaggio and higher. This really confused me ...

 I will admit, I am very confused about the information in this chapter. What exactly is a formant? Is it certain positions that our body makes to form different vowels? I don't know If I quite understand how they work and their relationship to vowels. I understood the example question given about which harmonic would be the more amplified when singing C4 on the vowel e, but what about the vowel u on C4? the next closest harmonic in the series is C5 which does not align with either u in F1 or u in F2, is this where vowel modification comes into play?  I understand that vowels need to be modified so that the harmonic series can be heard, and the right pitches amplified, that part made sense to me. It finally explained why using certain vowels at certain ranges don't ring the same as others, and we want to keep that sound consistent. I also understand the difference between "singing for yourself" and "singing for others". Heather and I have discussed this in l...

I really enjoyed Allison’s performance of “après un rêve” by Fauré. I thought she had a nice tone and good moments of legato. She seemed to be breathing and that translated well into her performance. Her last note was so rich, I felt like it was such a beautiful ending.  Overall a very good performance! In my lesson I worked a lot on releasing the back of the tongue and having more inner space. I sang through "Lusinge piu care" by Handel and we worked on a few of the phrases regarding breath. We did a cartoon voice to help with the air flow, and this helped a lot! In between each phrase, Cindy had me stick out my tongue. This released my mouth and also helped me remember to reset so that each phrase can be beautiful. There is a lot of melismas, and so to break those down we added beats between each one and then also switched up the rhythms to practice. Next we worked on "Love" by Ned Rorem. I did the same tongue-sticking out in between each phrase and this was v...

  It’s important to remember that resonance sounds different in our heads than outside. That’s one reason I think it’s so strange to hear a recording of myself. How we feel resonance might be different person to person as well. When teaching, it’s think it’s important to not limit your student to feeling something one way, because they might feel it differently. They might also not even recognize that there is a difference in the sound or how things feel. It was interesting to read about formats too and how they enhance resonance, especially with the specific vowels.   I was a little surprised to read that the best solution to help males in the upper register is to do nothing. For women modifying the vowel is something I’m familiar with, but I’m definitely not as well versed in male voices. I am interested to learn more about how this works in singing, and how to fix different habits that people might have in regards to tension in the larynx.

 This week in my voice lessons I employed a lot of the techniques from the McCoy book. One in particular that worked well for my breath support was expanding the ribs out with the diaphragm and holding your hands there to sustain and control how quickly your ribs retract. I was working a particularly difficult climbing series of triplets that I cosas continually losing breath to get good ring. Dr. Hart asked me to breathe a little deeper so I thought low and outward. I put my hands on my ribs and distinctly considered the change in pressure and slowing it down. This gave me enough support to get good placement and ring despite the staircase sensation of the song. I would recommend this for anyone as it helps you get to a ceiling feeling instead of a climbing out of the basement feeling when ascending. Another thing we worked on was snorting to lift the soft palate and create that exact placement. Since then in my practice and warm-up, I have been deep-practicing this sensation with...

 In my lessons this week, we talked about masterclass on Tuesday, and applied that knowledge to the lesson. I stretched my muscles and body on an exercise ball to "open up", and focused on breathing through my body (gut, lungs, etc.). We worked on "Lady of the Harbor", which is a new piece for both my teacher and me. We discussed using more lip as I sing to emphasize a more "rich" and "expensive" sound. Including this, we worked on "spinning" and adding more "sparkle" into the notes, instead of singing straight tone and THEN adding vibrato. This method keeps the pitch from sagging. At the end of my lesson, I applied all of these to my piece, and there was a huge difference from where I started! I'm excited to grow more in my next lesson, and see how what I applied on Wednesday will help me next week! For VRH today, I wanted to highlight Grace Hanni's performance. Her voice is so beautiful and powerful! Her control over...

 This chapter talked a lot about voice analysis, and different ways to view the voice through graphs. I really like how the author emphasized that a computer "can help its user understand what is happening in a voice; in cannot, however, tell if the sound is beautiful or musical". These tools are supposed to be used to view the technical characteristics of the voice, and how changing different parts of the voice reflects on the shape/size of the graph. Because of this, I do believe that it is best to use these tools as a teaching aid. At some point, the brain and ear must learn how to make certain changes on their own. Students cannot be dependable on computers alone.  In theOnset/Offset of tone section, the author talks about how spectrograms can reveal significant information about how sounds begin and end. I though it was funny that the author "called singers out" for continuing the habit of "scooping" or "sliding" our pitches. In middle/high ...

 This chapter mainly focused on the muscles of the face and jaw and their function in expression and singing technique. I had two main take away from this chapter: 1. Your face placement and how you look really IS the sound that will be produced and 2. It is not simply psychological.  McCoy explains that usually singers are looking for a brighter, more forward tone so creating a bright look on your face such as surprise or excitement usually puts not only our facial muscles but our soft palate and larynx in the places they should ideally be to produce that kind of sound. Hence why when we tend to sing lower pitches, our eyebrows crease downward to create this push from the face muscles toward every other muscle/ inner body function. In simple terms, McCoy asserts that as we look is how the sound will resonate.  This leads me to my next point that I always figure that when we sing and are told to raise our eyebrows or think about the sound resonating in the frontal mask of...

 One thing I loved about this chapter was how it talked about harmonics. I laughed when the author compared the importance of harmonics to sex. They said that "when you sleep with someone, you also are sleeping with everyone that person has ever slept with". Similarly, the text stated "when you sing a pitch, you are not just singing that note; you also are singing every harmonic in the series above it". It's a unique and funny comparison, but it's so true! It's extremely important to be aware of the harmonics that soar from your mouth as you sing. Including this, the book talked about how the first harmonic always is the loudest part of the sound when the sound leaves the larynx. After this, every additional harmonic grows weaker. This reminds me of chamber choir, when we sometimes sing on a quiet "oo" in unison, then grow to a loud, rounded "ah". Right as we would hit the "ah", and our pitch was immediately balanced, the ov...

 There were a lot of things in this chapter I thought were surprising and interesting! First, the vocal folds are SO SMALL. Literally the size of a DIME in women and a QUARTER for men?! I don't know why I thought they'd be bigger than that, but still! The vocal folds are responsible for sound production, and can produce a sound loud enough to be heard over a symphony orchestra. That is insane to know just a tiny portion of our vocal folds create such a strong, powerful sound. Another subject I want to touch on is the glottal onset. Listening to the example given, the attack of the note sounds really harsh. When reading about this, I was surprised to see that these onsets can lead to vocal nodules. On the opposite side, an aspirate onset lacks energy, and sounds airy/breathy. There's little no none air support and flow in the voice. In doing this an excessive amount, it can also lead to voice problems, such as "chronic incomplete glottal closure and muscular tension dys...

Similar to the last chapter, this focused on the muscles and bones that are involved in phonation. If I’m being completely honest, I find these chapters very difficult. I’m a very kinetic learner and I think I would benefit from something more physical. I think there should be like a little puzzle of pieces that we can put together to learn how it works. One of my biggest fears with teaching is rooted in my inability to literally see the instrument I’m working with. It’s all very interesting, but I still feel like I couldn’t explain anything except for how the vocal folds lengthen and shorten to generate different pitches. 

I thought it was interesting to read about the several layers of the vocal fold: in particular, the simple fact that there are so many! Also, I did not know about the existence of the vocal ligament. I guess it makes sense that there would be something to limit the extent to which the vocal folds can be stretched, but I wonder how the strength of this ligament compares with the muscles which can stretch the vocal folds: can you pull a ligament with the cricothyroid muscle? I also would like to ask about intensity control in class tomorrow: is there technically more air that passes through the glottis in loud singing?

  Overall takeaways: Keep head up and straight ahead Use cold air on the soft palate to help with better onset. Don’t turn the shoulders when singing, since it will change your sound and the character you are trying to portray. Feel the simultaneous depth and length in your sound. (Think a higher and lower feeling in the body happening at the same time. Acting Thoughts For both pieces, be very aware and conscious of why the character is saying what he is and what potential sound differences that would cause in his overall tone. 

 Ch. 4:  This Chapter was a lot easier to follow. I never truly realized just how complex and intricate the different aspect of the larynx is and it is truly amazing the type of sounds it can produce, given how small it is. When McCoy mentioned how tongue/jaw tension affect the voice, my mind was blown. I didn’t realize that they were all physically connected in such an intimate/subtle way. But that relationship does explain quite a bit about way it it so important to fix those unnecessary tensions. I also was fascinated by the technical reasons behind a voice crack. Switching registers has always been an interesting/mysterious concept, so learning that the lack of control of the CT and TA musicales can cause those voice cracks was really cool! Lastly, this chapter really helped me better understand onset as it pertains to vocal health. I never truly realized how damaging a harsh onset/offset can be to your vocal folds. But now I can see that the constant harsh stopping and st...

 I find it so helpful to know exactly what is going on in someone's voice to know how to fix it. I have had multiple students who need to know exactly what is happening physiologically in their voice to understand how to make the correct sound. I have never quite known what to tell a breathy singer to do to sound clearer, now I know that they need to work on tightening their glottis and starting and stopping the airflow when the glottis adducts and abducts.  I like the examples the text gives for changes in intensity. I understand the relationship between volume and adduction speed and closed quotient. The example given was clapping one's hands both in slow motion and then faster. The intensity of the slow-motion clap is lower; therefore, the resulting sound is quiet and muted. Clapping faster increases the intensity and results in a louder clapping sound. I plan on using this in my future lessons when a student struggles with projection and volume.  I also never understo...

 I think reading about how stuff works inside our body is interesting. The fact that my vocal folds are 18 millimeters is crazy! I wonder if that’s why men sing lower, because their folds are slightly larger? It’s also wild that our folds oscillate hundreds of times per second when we sing. I was amazed to read that the when singing the F6 in Queen of the Night, the vocal folds vibrate 1400 times. I don’t feel the vibrations when singing so it’s strange to think about. I think it’s amazing the sounds we can make through the larynx, which is only the small size of a walnut/pecan.  It’s important as teachers to consider onset and phonation. If our students are singing with excess breath, we can know one of the reasons might be their vocal folds aren’t completely closed. It’s also important to consider the difference between adduction and abduction, and basically what the body requires for the voice to sound balanced. 

 To quote my dad from a couple of weeks ago: “so  starting to realize that singing is really hard!” This chapter is all about the larynx and how your vocal cords stretch and contract in order to create just the right sound. Something that really impacted me in this chapter was the amount of times McCoy uses phrases such as, “perfectly synchronized” and “constant interplay”. I am continually amazed by how difficult singing truly is, just the act by itself, never mind the added anxiousness, stress, and rush of performing.  This is particularly noted when McCoy is discussing the change in range that occurs through the TA and CT muscles. He discusses that if they do not align absolutely perfectly, there is a break or crack. I have been working a lot on broadening that range and I am constantly adjusting the way these two muscles work with each other over each note till it is seamless, yet I didn’t realize this is what I was doing. I also think this plays into how he discusses...

 This chapter certainly threw a lot of anatomy talk at us, much of which kind of went over my head. Frankly I did not understand why any of the information was relevant until the section about application. Some of my prior assumptions about breath support were corrected. For example, I recall a masterclass that Venicia gave once, and she talked about breath support. She described that belly breathing was not the ideal way to breathe when singing, so I had to unlearn that. In that class she also taught how to do a balanced breath, but I think I extrapolated her explanation a little to far, so as to assume that the diaphragm was supposed to flex outward and expand the ribcage. Knowing what I do know about all the muscles that provide antagonistic pressure against one another clarifies the efficiency of "appoggio" breathing.

 This chapter had a lot to discuss! It talked about the physical structures of Respiratory Anatomy (bones, muscles, organs, etc.), and the different breathing techniques that singers use. I found it really interesting that the Spine was listed as the first important structure of the respiratory framework. I didn't understand it at first, but I realized the form/placement of the spine affects our breathing in so many ways. If our spine is collapsed, or not in its natural s-shaped curve, we won't be able to have enough air support as we sing. I remember one voice lesson when my voice teacher told me to lean against the wall, slightly bend my knees, and place my feet forward in front of my body. We then sang the excerpt of my piece again in this position, and I could feel a huge difference. My body had a greater foundation in the lower section, and my ribcage expanded so that I had more breath support. I was very happy to read this exercise in the textbook, confirming to me that w...

Ch. 3: Man this chapter was a lot, but I think I understood most of it. In my own lessons, I've been told to have a more Thoracic approach to breathing, which makes perfect sense. My old teacher was a heavy advocate for abdominal breathing, so it has been a bit of a learning curve in terms of changing breathing techniques. But from what I've found, a balanced breathing technique actually helps me with pitch and approach a lot more than either one on their own. But the key thing that I think is important to remember is that no matter which technique is used, doing any of them strenuously will be a massive detriment to the performer. On a side note, it was actually nice to learn why Cindy wants me to have better posture. It completely affects EVERYTHING about the way you breathe and the way you portray a character. 

 I loved reading this chapter because I have always had a fascination with how our bodies play a role in our voices. I took an anatomy class my freshman year of college solely for the purpose of applying my newfound knowledge of my body to my singing ability. Luckily, this did make the reading very easy to understand all of the anatomical language, but the direct application to singing and breathing made it much more satisfying than my anatomy class. I was fascinated by the discussion of the three different ways to breath and what muscles are being used.  All of this made me think of my upbringing in Kansas City, Missouri which I now feel very lucky for. My choir teacher did focus a lot on the anatomical difference between men and women--which was discussed briefly in the chapter--and how that affects our breathing and he actively taught that difference so we could improve individually. He also spoke a lot about the diaphragm and the fact that he hated it when people said "Bre...

 In terms of singing, the breath is our power and the lungs store air. Posture is incredibly important to singing and it isn't always what we think it should be. The diaphragm and lungs function as a vacuum to bring in air. While many teachers tell students to breathe from the diaphragm and feel their belly, that is actually just everything else being pushed out by the diaphragm, as the diaphragm is not something we can feel. While the diaphragm muscle is voluntary, it is not something that most people control. Additionally, it will do its job without someone controlling it. The diaphragm itself does not push air out during exhalation. One of the goals in singing is to delay the contraction of the intercostal muscles. When singing, the glottis is a type of valve for the air we are controlling. Breath support is not just what happens with air, but also how it interacts with the voice. Appoggio breathing is considered the best form of breathing for singers, which combines the thorax ...

 As I was reading this, I thought about my last vocal teacher a lot before coming to college. She would constantly talk about raising my pelvic floor to sing which I thought was attached/connected to the diaphragm. However reading this was really fascinating to learn that they are two separate entities that create two separate functions and therefore affects the same sound in different ways.  In this chapter, McCoy gives a general overview of the muscles in your body, especially diving into the ones in your abdomen and lung areas that have the greatest impact on singing. He also discusses the different methods for breathing and how each type of singer uses a different one for what kind of style they are looking for and their own voice type. I remember us vaguely discussing this in class one time, but it got me thinking about how when I have a studio, I really should specify it to maybe only a couple styles of singing and voices after a while. This is to ensure that it won’t be...

This chapter takes you through the muscular and skeletal level of the body that is used to breathe. I chuckled to myself a bit when reading about the spine because I was kind of surprised at first, but then I remembered that I have lower back tension that affects my breathing. Reading about the different types of breathing and how they help or hinder singing was very interesting. I enjoyed trying to recreate each type of breathing, but since I was thinking about it, it made it difficult to recreate some. I hope that we watch the breathing videos in class because I feel like I would benefit from seeing them each compared to each other.

 I had to take extensive notes on this chapter. While reading, all the different yet similar names of all the muscles and organs that connect and influence each other to create a functioning respiratory system, I will admit the words seemed to blur together. The main things that were surprising or shocking to me was how little the diaphragm moves during restful breathing, and that the diaphragm cannot be felt on its own, but rather by the other muscles and organs that it is influencing. This makes belly breathing and the noticeable difference in types of breath make sense. I was always taught by both my private instructor in high school, and my choir teacher that the diaphragm is directly responsible for both inhalation and exhalation, but now I know that both inhalation and exhalation is an effort carried out by a plethora of different, interconnected muscles and obliques.  I like the way the text describes the difference between breath support, and breath control. All those ...

 Reading about the spine in particular made me think about how breathing and posture are affected. I had a friend that had scoliosis, and she found it helpful to lay on her back on the ground to sing because it gave her support. I personally like singing with my back against the wall, like McCoy suggests. I'm sure there are more ways and methods for different people, but I think it is important to remember that we must keep the spine elongated so we have space to breathe.  I discovered one of the things I'm trying to fix right now is how I'm breathing, particularly in the release. McCoy says we must release the tension in our abdominals before we inhale. Especially after a long time, my abdominals seem to lock up and it's hard for me to get a good breath to set up the next phrase. Seeing the diagram of the lungs and muscles helps me understand what exactly is going on.  The three types of breathing are also helpful to remember. I think most students start by clavicular ...

 In my lesson this week we learned about switching between operatic singing and legit singing in my contemporary art songs. I was worried that my lower notes would not be heard when I was singing specifically "The Usherette's Blues" and I wanted to know how to get those low notes as resonate as well as the higher ones. Heather told me that in art songs, although we are trying to stay in a classical style, they allow for a more legit sound in the lower range. We practiced switching, and also experimented with some different colors in the sound to accent to comedic nature of my songs.  In VRH, I fell in love with Maiya Lloyd's performance. She had very good resonance and richness in her sound that was carried even into her higher notes. Her sound was not swallowed, vibrant, not nasal, and more dark than bright. In addition to her lovely sound, the emotion she was able to put into her performance was captivating. I was drawn into the story and the emotion of the piece de...

 I know this chapter was really to begin to explain the complexity of the voice as a mechanism, but man did I feel a little overwhelmed reading it all. I tried explaining the part about how many different things have to happen anatomically to have a conversation to my wife, but I stumbled because I was suddenly conscious of my own voice performing all these functions. (Like semantic satiation, but with my body). This begged a question for me: How important is it that we explain these kind of anatomical concepts to our students? I know that with my own lessons, I always am curious about what my voice is doing. But is that because I am both a student, and a teacher? On the other hand, when I think about relaxing my jaw when I sing I usually end up forgetting other things, or finding that i can't do the task. It's the "don't think of elephants!" phenomenon (if you're like me, you thought of elephants). However, understanding how our voice is designed to make a ki...

The thing I found most interesting in this chapter was the use of paired/opposite descriptors in the table to describe sounds of the voice. It provided a fairly understandable outline of what the sound was for each singer listed in the examples, and also was able to go across multiple styles without too much confusion. This comes from my own classical-taught perspective, however, so these descriptors could just be classical centric examples that happen to make sense to me across different styles. The examples given also showed a majority of classical singers, which could also be the reason for using those descriptors.  Another interesting thing this chapter briefly covered were signs of damage in the voice. Some of the examples made sense, like uncontrolled raspiness, but something like having a very wide vibrato being a sign was something I had never heard before. It is interesting how many little things in the voice can mean something is happening that you can sometimes pinpoint ...

 This chapter really centralizes on the anatomy of the body and how this helps to create specific sounds or breathe control, or even just actions that we produce as we perform. I have always been fascinated by this part of singing because I have a hard time reminding placement once I am out my lessons. Knowing that the specific way I turn my head, use a muscle, or create connections between my breath and the larynx makes me wonder if I should be taking video recordings of my lessons instead of just audio recordings.  Laurie always tells us to exercise and I always thought it was just because it was healthy for you, which it is. However, through this chapter, I realized it engages core muscles that believe it or not, we do in fact use when we sing! Although, it does make me wonder if the gym is necessarily the best kind of work-out we could be participating in. McCoy mentions how the primary muscles used for singing are skeletal muscles and the parallel between muscles that mus...

 Many of the bodies processes happen below our subconscious, but singing requires a lot of conscious thought, and it is a pretty involved process cognitively. There are a lot of muscles in the body that contract, and most of them are paired. I find it interesting how it talks about how much the brain has to do, because I have been reading lots about chunking. The brain does all those processes listed but as a chunk, which is why it is not a huge cognitive load, as working memory can only process so much at once. I like that this book talks about anatomy accurately. The phrase "breathe from your diaphragm" has always bothered me, as it actually is just a suction process. I get that there is a need for visual, but I think it could be different than that. I didn't know about the two unpaired muscles, that is really interesting to me! I also think it is interesting how all the muscles are named. I didn't ever take anatomy, so this is all new and interesting information to...

For this week’s blog, I would like to offer a positive critique of this week’s VRH performance (in French) by Kate Wilson. Overall, I was impressed with her voice. In the language of the previous chapter in McCoy, her voice sounded quite clear to me. I have been working recently on developing a more clear voice, so it was particularly nice to hear. I also thought she exhibited skill in moving freely though many notes quickly: that is also something I am personally trying to improve. Lastly, I just want to comment that I thought the French diction was good: the vowels were quite French and not American, it seemed.

Reading chapter 2, I got the feeling that I am going to be referring back to it from time to time. Primarily, this is due to the “anatomical views” discussed in the chapter: when we’re told (later) a diagram is a “sagital section” of the larynx, I may have to refer back to this chapter to recall what that means. Of course, it doesn’t help that there are sometimes multiple names for the same anatomical view. I also thought it was interesting to read about the different muscle types. I knew that there were muscles in the heart, and it makes sense (and I’m glad) that these muscles are less sensitive to fatigue, but it makes me wonder why other muscle groups (like quads) don’t have that feature: is there an advantage to skeletal muscles being used for quads as opposed to a cardiac muscle for quads? I guess this is more of a design question for the human body.

 I absolutely loved Kate's performance of Vielle Chanson! She sang really well and there were a few things I really enjoyed. I felt like she was breathing really well, which I know is especially hard in front of other people when nerves get involved. She was also engaged, her voice was smooth and there wasn't any hiccups of sound. It sounded really easy. I was also impressed by the movement and trill!  This week in my lesson we worked on "Und Gestern hat er mir Rosen gebracht" by Joseph Marx. Before we even began we sat down and just focused on breathing for about 10 minutes. It was really helpful because I felt more connected to my body, and honestly that lesson I was in a zen mindset. After a few more breathing exercises, I was able to sing through longer phrases and it just felt easier. Then we worked on Majenka's aria from The Battered Bride. The focus was on legato and more space. One thing that has helped me find more inner space is feeling the muscle in my ...

     I think the physics behind sound is really interesting. The thing that stuck out to me the most was the fact that in order to be heard speech has to be 20 decibels higher than the background. It makes me want to be careful at loud events to not scream too loud for too long. Reading about timbre and overtones makes me wonder about a singer’s core sound. I want to see a graph of my own singing different ways just to see the overtones that came out of it. It’s really interesting to read about the different effects that can come in singing, like glottal stops. I also think it is good to know all of the signs that there is a vocal disorder. As a teacher I wouldn’t want to hurt my student, and it’s good to be able to identify something is wrong so that I can help them fix it.  

 This Chapter was pretty short, but was filled with so much information. Something I found interesting and honestly eye-opening were the amount of steps your brain goes through to answer a simple question, such as "Are you thirsty?". The author listed out 9 steps just for that question, and they said that was the simplified version! It didn't even occur to me that the brain is the most important singing organ in the body. I would've said the lungs, or the heart! I remember in my 10th grade anatomy class learning about the diaphragm. We did an in-class project where we built lungs with 2-liter soda bottles, and used another object (I can't remember what) to represent the diaphragm. The goal was to imitate the contraction of the diaphragm as the "lungs" breathed in. I had forgotten about this process until I read this section in the textbook. I find it really interesting that voice teachers tell their students to "support from the diaphragm!", wh...

Collegial: Kate Wilson was very resonant and her tongue posture was nice and high. I could also tell her soft pallet was in a good posture since her resonance wasn't in her nose. Carson Linder had a really nice speech-like quality to his voice that fit his song very well.  Voice Lesson: In my voice lesson we focused our warm ups on keeping the sound where we wanted it. Like keeping the deep resonance for lower register, avoiding nasality, etc. We mostly worked on "Look at Me" from Violet. We worked on keeping the sound centered, but not nasal. We also discussed how emotional connection can help realign the vocal track. We learned about shifting the pharynx while leaving the larynx.

 This week in my lesson, we worked hard on getting the same throughout each note on ever piece and finding the right placement for each vowel in order to accomplish this. We actually discussed chiaroscuro in my lesson and how we develop this nice middle ground for every sound. In Après un Revés, we worked through one or two measures in particular leading up to the high note by singing through the word ‘thee’ and after this had nine ring, laying against the wall and doing wall push ups while simultaneously singing up to the note. This helped me relax and be focused on something else while singing. I am still working on how to set off that circuit for when I actually perform the song and can’t lay against the wall, but it was very helpful! Voice Recital Hour today was amazing! We have so much talent in this college and I am so grateful for all of it that inspires me to be better. Kate Wilson’s performance of a French piece entitled “Chanson” by George Bizet. She had a very deep tone ...

 I had my voice lesson today on 9/21 with Thomas and in terms of vocal exercises, we ended up primarily focusing on warm-ups that would improve my registration. We discovered that connecting my chest voice to my head voice (moving up) is a lot easier than connecting head to chest (moving down). To help with this, we did a yodel exercise: jumping between octave pitches, rapidly switching from chest to head to chest, etc. I really love how this exercises makes my voice feel, it brings ease in both registers. We also did exercises with glissandos from chest to head, first a fifth apart and then an octave to which we then did scales with glissandos. In this exercise I was able to hear my improvement in registration from these exercises and it felt very open and free rather than insecure which is what it used to feel like. We touched on the Italian pieces composed by Scarlatti ( Voglio Amar and Sono Unite A Tormentarmi ) and worked on pronunciation and a little bit of translation as wel...

 Personal voice lesson: This weeks lesson was over zoom, not ideal but still pretty good. The bulk of the lesson was spent going over the german for the first 3 movements of Dichterliebe. It's interesting, in my own practicing and in todays recital hour I noticed it is difficult for me (and others who sang today) to stay on the voice for the "in between" words or vowels. It is especially true with musical theater as opposed to classical, but still we have to stay really on top of ourselves for that. Other than that, he corrected and taught me a few rules about german that informed my practice. VRH critique: Man, there was some real awesome performances today! Shout out to Lauren, Emma and Karin who crushed it! I think I'll write about Kaitlyn Kingston's performance, because it ties into what I was mentioning with my own lesson. From the beginning, I felt that she had a strong physical presence. She was happy, confident, and having fun which showed in her gestures....

 Maiya Lloyd -very full and dark sound -well fleshed out character -nice dynamic contrast and crescendos -consistent vibrato -the points where she delayed getting to the center of the pitch were actually really well thought out and added to the emotion -even the breaths were so purposeful Bailey Oleson -using a bit of a breathy tone to sing the quieter parts -forward tone  -vibrato is stylistically used Kate Wilson -bright and full sound -consistent vibrato -projects really well -nice crescendos Carson Linder  -style and story is all there -make sure to sing loud enough to not be covered up by piano -not using vibrato -a bit of an airy sound -asking for a line and still getting right back into it - great performer Kaitlyn Kingston  -some notes have really great brightness, though there is also a lot of breathiness and nasality at points -intonation is good for most of it, but tone on the high notes is sometimes a little rough -fantastic character

 In voice lessons this week, my teacher and I focused on tension-free warm-ups. Because I was sick last week and my voice still had "flem" and was tired, it was hard to sing. During warm-ups, we focused on "sucking a thick milkshake through a straw", and lifting the soft palate so there was no room for tension in the throat. After using these warm-ups and switching between "oo" "a", and "e" vowels, my throat did not feel tight or tense, but it was very tired. We went over pronunciation for a French piece, "Offrande", and discussed how French is more "nasally", and can be very challenging to learn. I'm very excited to learn and sing a new language! For VRH, I want to describe Lauren's performance! She sang "Breathe", from In the Heights. I love how she prioritized her lower notes with the higher notes! Even though they were more chest-voiced, the breath support was strong, and her voice projected thr...

   -open up more backspace Before the higher notes -generous air always -practice in small sections for breath - also practice on ee vowel -plug nose practice also

 Ch. 2: First of all, it felt like I was in 10th grade biology again reading this. Biology usually was my scientific strongpoint, but I'll have to sit on just how much information is dumped on you in this chapter. I appreciate that McCoy establishes these things before actually talking about the nitty-gritty of the voice, but it was still a lot to process. I think one thing that really caught my attention was when he mentioned the misconception of the diaphragm helping your breath control. This was something I was told CONSTANTLY when I first started taking lessons and it is crazy how the moment I started Uni, this was essentially un-taught to me. But I know that it still does serve a purpose in the grand scheme of singing, so I'm intrigued to see how it really helps. But overall, I am really excited to learn more about the biology and anatomy of how the voice works.

 I Was especially interested in this section reading about the phenomenon of vibrato. Of course, it only represented an example of what McCoy was getting at: There is a often a difference between the way singers describe a voice, versus what is actually happening in their body. We have discussed this in class a little bit already, as it applies to teaching. We can't necessarily just tell the student how to manipulate the voice, because many of those muscles are autonomous, or hard to control/identify. The vibrato example struck me, because I did not (until the end of last semester) have very much control of when I sung with vibrato. Of course this was related to my own development of vocal technique, but when I would ask different teachers about how to go about developing it, all of them gave me distinct answers. Some told me to do "ghost wobbles" (whatever that means) others gave different strategies. Ultimately, I just came down to focusing on resonance and freedom from...

 Overall takeaways: -  "Wenn mein Schatz" (Mahler)      -  Stand tall and proud      -  more sob in the onset      -  more released space - "Mab" (Gounod)     -  phonate French vowels     - practice phrases silently a few times while hearing the top pitch, then go for it without worrying about        the pitch     - faster airflow on high notes - "Bob's Aria" (Menotti)     - Think about the adverb of each phrase as it pertains to the story of the aria.     - Think about the character of Bob and why he is singing about the things he does at this specific point          the opera. 

Ch. 1: The fact that the first chapter acknowledges different vocal styles was honestly a breath of fresh air. I once heard a story about how Death Metal and Opera use fairly similar vocal techniques. They had a professional from both ends try to teach each other and, surprisingly, they were able to pick the specific techniques from each style. I also think it is very interesting that during the critical listening part, there wasn't a single person who was majorly dark in their vocal timbre. Usually, it would just come down to if they were fully bright or not as bright. I also thought it was interesting how all of the crossover singers had a high rating on "non-stylistic." It is fairly challenging to stylishly sing a genre you aren't familiar with. Even in Anastasia, I've had a little bit of trouble changing my stylistic approach to the music, as the show is definitely closer to being a more "modern" musical theater style. But overall, I really enjoyed h...

I thought it was interesting to read about the paired descriptors (bright/dark). That being said, I feel that there is a potential danger in my reading this without access to the audio examples: it could be easy to come to believe that my own voice falls under certain descriptors which may not be accurate. For example, my tendency to think of my voice as relatively “dark” may influence the way I sing without particular regard to the natural sound and behavior of my voice. I did find youtube recordings of many of the singers cited in this chapter, and I thought it was interesting to practice “critical listening,” trying to pick out the appropriate descriptors in the different voices. I think I can agree with the notion that Placido Domingo’s voice is darker, while Luciano Pavarotti’s voice is brighter. I had forgotten about the “nasal” test of pinching one’s nose while singing: I think I will try that as I continue to practice. I will say that the tables of expert ratings are som...

 The human voice exists by chance. Describing the voice is hard, varied, and subjective. Voices usually contain elements of multiple things (even bright and dark together). Damaged voices can often be determined by unwanted noise that is present. Vibrato is normal in free singing.  I really liked that there was expression of some objective terminology, and also that the book acknowledged just how subjective and wide-spread describing the voice can be. It didn't call anything bad, as many times things that are 'bad' to some people are just stylistic. I did find it interesting that it switched to good and poor later on, as again, it definitely can be subjective. I also found the ratings really interesting. I think that the difference can really show how it is so subjective listening to the voice.  Is there a way to listen to these recordings? It feels like I am missing a lot.

  What I found fascinating about McCoy – Chapter 1, was how it probed deeply into the science and art of critical listening. As we consider the questions posed at the end of the chapter, it helps to reflect on the main themes within. The author draws a distinction between listening to music for critical assessment purposes versus listening to music solely for enjoyment. Critical listening aims to analyze and evaluate music objectively, requiring attention to detail and often, a deeper understanding of musical concepts. The outcome of critical listening is typically a detailed assessment or critique useful for musicians, producers, or scholars. In contrast, listening for enjoyment prioritizes personal satisfaction and emotional connection.   I was enlighten as I studied this chapter to the many nuances of vocal sounds. I better understood from where the human voice emanates, the vast array of vocal sounds it can produce, and how to identify and embrace the distinctions of an in...

 This chapter talks about sound qualities, and gives lots of listening examples to connect the descriptions with real-life examples. Something I found interesting was the paragraph regarding healthy vs damaged voices. I love how the author emphasized that some artists use raspy sounds for stylistic purposes--such as jazz. Louis Armstrong is known for his raspy voice in his recordings. Some reasons explaining these symptoms is simply due to aging and extended voice use. Frank Sinatra was listed as an example of this, as his later recordings have a gradual increase of a raspy, throat quality. The audio paired with this paragraph was the most shocking sound I've listened to thus far in the book. At first, the healthy voices are played first, with the operatic singers singing clear and healthy. Next, a woman's voice singing "Happy Birthday" is played. My jaw DROPPED to the FLOOR, and my hand flew to my face to cover my mouth. This young girl's voice sounded injured, p...

 I took some time to look up the sound examples they had in the book, and it was so interesting! At first I was a little skeptical because I have a hard time hearing the difference in dark/bright, etc in voices. I also thought it was super interesting how they explained nasality! I have never had that explained to me, so now I understand a little better what is happening inside when I go nasal. I tend to nasalize ‘L’ and it causes problems, so I’m hoping to become more aware of my soft palettes position so I can rectify that issue. I thought it was cool that the reading gave purpose to all forms and styles of singing, whether it is considered “healthy” or not. 

 While chapter 3 was relatively short, it was packed with information. It discussed different ways to view the body, such as anterior/posterior, cranial/caudal, lateral/medial, and so forth. Ot then discussed the three types of muscles we have in our body, the cardiac, smooth, and skeletal muscles. Finally, the chapter went over the different names that muscles can be classified under. While I don't have any questions because most of the information in this chapter is purely factual, it is going to take several read throughs to fully understand and remember this information.

I actually think I've read this book, if I remember right this was the book we used in the last vocal pedagogy class I took a few years ago. So this has been really fun to read again after already going through it once. I thought it was interesting that McCoy says that what seems "free" can be subjective depending on the subject. I would like to learn more about that, because I thought that free singing feels and sounds easy and I would say that many contemporary singers are not as free as they could be, but it seems like he argues that to someone else they would disagree depending on the type of singing. That would be interesting to study.  I like McCoy's definition of chiaroscuro, and the idea that balance is bright and dark, loft and twang, and forward and back. I also had an epiphany about nasality, when the soft palate is not raised it can create nasality in the sound. When singing a song in French, I had a teacher that always said "think nasal but don't...

 In chapter 10, Coyle talks about forming connections with your students. This was something I found interesting because he made it seem like you would be able to form a connection to any student regardless, or I suppose that is the ideal at least according to the example of the football coach. It is certainly ideal, however some students just won't connect to some teachers, and in that case teaching does become more difficult. However, learning to try to connect with your students because you do care about them is a good skill to learn. It goes along with being able to read a student and understand their needs.  The epilogue had some interesting bits that stuck out to me. One part was where Coyle talks about the U.S. being divided in opinion over whether phonics, learning a language by groups of sounds, or Whole Language was better for students to learn to read. This was interesting because, in my linguistics class, we recently discussed almost this exact debate, where people...

 These sections focused on the teachers/coaches rather than students. One thing I found interesting in the beginning of chapter 8 is when Coyle mentions surprise at knowing the best coaches/teachers weren't loud leaders but rather more quiet and reserved. This detail was unsurprising to me, as I always assume the better teachers don't have to preach and brag about their skills to everyone, rather their intent is to help the student. Besides that point, Coyle points out in the same chapter the cello teacher, Hans Jensen, and his methods of teaching. They were different for each student who came in, some to whom he critiqued often and some he was more gentle with. Beside the rather mocking tone Coyle had towards the Danish teacher here, the idea Jensen had is to cater the instruction to each individual student, rather than expecting them to thrive the same way as another student. This takes a lot of practice on the teacher's side on how to read your student quickly, learning ...

 These were an interesting, if rather redundant, read. The first principal Coyle discussed was that of primal triggers. This topic explored where motivation to deep practice came from, and it often comes in bursts, from some significant event, person, or circumstance that inspires someone to pursue something. The comparison of the trigger coming in bursts and myelin sheathing coming slowly over time with deep practice. This means that the event/trigger has to be something significant enough to encourage someone to continue deep practice for a long time, not just feel like doing it once.  The second section talked about the  Curaçao experiment. It was interesting to read the part where they mentioned that no one expected some nobody from a random small place to be amazing at something that has other big names in it. This is very interesting to me because, since so many people believe that anyone can be good at anything if they work hard, why would it be such a shock that s...

 These chapters mainly focused on myelin generation/wrapping. Firstly, this section discussed talent hotbeds and how they form and why they pop up where they do. In general, it seemed that talent hotbeds have a tendency to form in areas where people can just mess around and do what they like. There were an absolute excessive number of examples given in these chapters about different talent hotbeds popping up in unlikely places, and all of them had in common that people were able to experiment and be free to mess up. The Brontes, the skateboarder kids, and more all just loved what they did and, more importantly, felt free to mess up and experiment. The Brontes were terrible writers in youth, but their books became standard literature many years in the future, all because they were able to experiment and then finesse their work over and over. The environment that allows for mistakes to be made and learned from is the optimal environment for growth. An interesting point I found in the...

 Ch. 10: I found the sentiment at the start of this chapter to be very interesting. The idea that a teacher's job is to get you as far as they can while teaching you how to be self-sustaining is beautiful in a sense. There is a quote in the movie School of Rock  that weirdly fits this chapter and honestly a lot of the previous chapters. When Dewey Finn is talking to the school teachers, he says, "Those who can't do, teach. Those who can't teach, teach gym." Now aside from the humorous second half of the quote, the first half is very true in a way. I mainly thought of Linda Septien when I heard the quote. She didn't make the big time, but many of her students did. The idea that teachers walked so that their students could run is pretty accurate. As a teacher, I would want my students to be able to go farther than I ever could. Even if I were to be incredibly successful, I'd want my students to have the capacity to go even further. Epilogue: The fact that Co...

What I love about Chapter 10 is how Martinez talked about how he connects and teaches to "students". He emphasized that if YOU are doing it for YOU, he can work with that. If, however, you are doing it because someone else wants you too, your growth is not going to be a fast process. I think this is SO important because you're most likely NOT motivated most of the time if someone else is motivated for you. On the other hand, you're fueling your own ignition and motivating yourself if you know that you want to work towards a specific end goal.   I love at the end of the Epilogue when the author brings it all back to myelin. I especially love how the author wrote that "each wrap of myelin is a unique tracing of some past event". To me, this quote shows that everyone has specific moments that create this wrapping process. Whether it's playing a game with family, studying for a test, or practicing for a voice recital, each wrap of myelin corresponds with an ...

It is important to forge a connection with someone you are coaching, or it won't work well. Long story short - there needs to be master coaching and some kind of ignition into deep practice to create talent. Response: The things that interested me are what applies to teaching. The idea that things should be coached on every repetition is good to realize. In addition, it talked about the use of tactile, personification, image, and physical, which I think is a useful checklist. I also thought that the idea that you need to forge a connection is important. The age old saying of 'people don't care how much you know until they know how much you care' definitely applies here. However, there is a level of being professional that also applies - if you have respect because of a standing, there will be some that they probably care about. But I do think that connection is very important

These two ending chapters really resonated with me. They were a general overview of all that had been talked about (GPS, circuits, myelination, skill versus talent, hotbeds, KIPP school tactics, ignition, etc.). Yet what really stood out to me this time was the graph at the beginning of the Epilogue that showed ignition to deep practice and deep practice to skill (talent). What I love is how long the ignition is and how  grandiose the deep practice bubble/ball is. It takes a lot of healthy, supportive ignition over a long time to actually arrive at the point of deep practice. When I was younger, I really struggled through math. My parents were fairly good at math but they had also reached the conclusion that perhaps I just wouldn’t be. They didn’t mean it in a harsh way, in fact, they meant it in a highly supportive way. Yet, this hindered my ability to progress rapidly in math until I reached high school and decided to take an honors math class where I was retrained that I wasn’t ...

I really enjoyed reading the football story inside of chapter 10. Martinez had a way of reaching and connecting to the kids, and I think that is one of the best things to do when teaching someone. It reminded me of the piano teacher that all the kids loved going to because she genuinely cared about them. Martinez learned who the kids are and how they thought, and then the reason behind them wanting to be taught. He taught things specifically for them, and often had to think of which way they would learn best quickly. He said "Sixty percent of what you teach applies to everybody, the trick is how you get that sixty percent to the person." I think this is so true! In a voice lesson, most students are going to be taught about breath, tone, musicality, etc but each person learns differently so hopefully a teacher has a few tricks up their sleeve to help each student individually.  The epilogue was very interesting. In the business section, we learn that Toyota makes thousands of ...