When I heard this expression for the first time, it was tossed of by a previous voice teacher in a way that in no way highlighted its relevance or foundational connection to the process of learning to sing or understanding physical activity of how the throat is set into motion as a producer of tone. My teacher, when discussing what I think might have been a reference to overtones and resonance said, "You see, the tone goes under and through the vocal cords, bouncing of the false cords, working its way through and around in some way. It is what they call the Bernoulli effect." It sounded so technical to me. I was delighted. It seemed like secret knowledge as I was carving the words in stone. Less than a year or two later in a conversation with my friend who ultimately taught me the foundational principals of the voice, Dr. Bennie Middaugh. We were talking shop (like I knew anything at that point) and I mentioned, Bernoulli's principal, to which he responded with a raised eyebrow, "Tell me about the Bernoulli's principal" I said, " You see, the tone goes through..." I laugh to myself every time that exchange with Bennie goes through my head. He said, "No, Bernoulli's principal is what makes an airplane fly, it is a flow dynamic." While I loved my previous voice teacher who had helped me in so many ways, I realized at that moment, while I had many successes as a singer and had been singing relatively well, I was seriously lacking. I see from what I encounter all through the industry of singing and teaching singing the evidence that many are unaware of the relevance of this fundamental reality of the vocal impulse.
I have to be careful to not be too snarky here, but I flinch when I hear voice teachers say "you've got to have really good support" or "singing is all about breathing" or I hear of high-school choir directors admonishing the whole choir to flex their diaphragms as the tone: ascends, is out of tune, needs to be soft, needs to be loud, needs to be articulated etc. The concept is mis-understood by most, even the "experts". Not only this, the assertion of diaphragmatic breath support by teachers as the way to sing is in my opinion, the primary fault that leads to most vocal break downs. A student who is having problems finds another teacher, they get in for a lesson and the new teacher starts in with their diatribe on what the diaphramatic breath really is, and here we go again; the same concept, different spin, still flawed.
To understand how wrong diaphragmatic breath support techniques really are, one must consider the multi-functionality of the throat musculature that I have hinted at previously. The throat is a valve, period. It is a miraculous wonder that let's air, fluids and solids in and out of the body, it can release air and allow us to make sound as it excites the vibratory dynamic of the vocal cords, it can also hold air in to allow is create physical leverage against the contained pocket of air in the center of our chest cavity. The throat is a wonder of functionality. But, to sing or phonate, tone must be set into play, sound waves must fly. While in and of itself the tone itself is resisting gravity as it has to make its way through the atmosperic pressure of the air around us. An infant when crying at birth is attempting to resist gravity by crying in the new pressurized envioronment of the the Earth's atmosphere; its all they can do in their unstrenghthened, but wondrously knit body that is stregthening itself more and more with every flex; inahale, resist, inhale resihhhhhhhhhhhhst. This sound impulse and how we assert it as humans is imprinted on us at this moment; as we learn that sound happens as a gentile (but pontentially loud and shrieking) gesture that is simply the vibratory action of the vocal cords being excited by the release of airflow past them; causing them to draw together and squeak, like making a balloon speak.
Another function of the valve is learned by the young human later in their development when they are learning to walk. I am often amazed by birds when I, being reminded of my childish imaginings of why we cant fly like they do, realize the we don't have feathers on our arms, and that our pecs would never be strong enough to lift our enormous bodied from the grip of gravity. If we were able to fly physically, we would look very funny. Babies experience this pilates moment in their developmental process when they begin to experiment with the skill of getting up on their legs; like pulling themselves up onto a sofa to be with a beloved sibling or pet. They grunt, and tug, making faces. Digging to find every scrap of their available strength to help leverage themselves higher than ever. Still learning to resist gravity but on a different scale and in a completely different way. Again employing this wonderful valve in the center of our throat, but in a way that is the polar opposite to the way it produces tone; stifling Bernoulli's pricipal to acheive more leverage by closing the vocal folds (a better name for the cords in this function) firmly, the body closing off the release of the contained air like a multi-door bank vault, to use the contained air to wrest ourselves physically toward whaterver the goal may be. Bennie and I had an aha moment when we mused that this was why the false cords were above the vocal folds. The false cords were not vibratory but necessary as a final closing gesture against the throat muscles for extreme exersion such as a woman in child birth or world weightlifting records or getting up on the sofa the very first time by oneself.
Diaphragmatic breathe techniques teaches the singer to mingle the bi-functionality of the way the throat processes air. Like driving with the gas and the brake on at the same time. Singers may argue that with out breath support there would by no power for getting the voice out over the orchestra. But, the power of the voice comes through resonance and amplitude. The power of the voice is a gentle assertion of human strength balanced against the exponential wonder of acoustics through understanding vowels and harmonics along with a strict discipline to NEVER impede Bernoulli's principal as it sets the initial motor of the voice into its tonal revving. Understanding this is the key to keeping your voice healthy for a lifetime.
Monday, August 5, 2019
Friday, August 2, 2019
The Vibrator
If I were to go in order; Actuator, Vibrator, Resonator, I would have
to spend time expounding on its interdependent relationship to the
Vibrator and the relational intrinsic musculature helping it to do its
job as it relates to human expression through employment of vocal
sound. You see, we don't just make mono-chromatic noises; through the
voice we express delight, sadness, caring, wit, anger, fear etc. All of
these vocalisms draw on the voices ability to raise and lower pitch,
vary texture and timbre by managing the amount of breath allowed in the
tone, and create dramatic fluctuations in volume. One can think of all
of these vocal acrobatics as engagement of the machine or motor; the
voice (motor) runs on released breath. Hence, Bernoulli's principal.
Like an otter swims, the voice vocalizes; the otter manipulates water,
the vocalism manipulates air. It is how it is manipulated that warrants
some discussion.
The "intrinsic" musculature of the throat, as it relates to vocal-ism, is a system of interconnected muscles that respond to the release of air through the vocal cords (thyro-arytenoid, vocal process, vocal folds, glottis). This system manipulates the opening and closing of the valve at the top of our trachea; the same valve we use to speak, exhale, lift heavy objects and cough. The varied functionality of this system of muscles is why there are so many approaches to singing technique. I contend that there are only two approaches to developing or repairing a voice; in my opinion, only one is correct; the other has variations, but is largely the same. If you take the wrong fork in the pedagogy road, there will be blood.
As it relates to vocalism, however, the focus for the moment will be understanding the basics for how pitch rises and falls in an unimpeded way as the vibrator responds to the passing of air in vocalism, and how this unimpeded singularity of a sorts allows a bubbling and effervescent play of emotions in the tonal vortex that is created in the human desire and assertion to express something vocally. The keyword to highlighting the action of this process is equilibrium.
The vocal cords are two bands of muscle tissue that are attachtched at a single point on the inside surface of the adam's apple (thyroid cartiledge). These muscles pull against the back of the adam's apple when contracting. Muscles when activated can only contract, they have to be acted upon by the contraction of another muscle to return. Every muscle has an opposing muscle; think bicep-tricep in the motion of moving ones hand toward and away from the chest. The opposing muscle to the vocal cords (thyro-arytenoid) is the crico-thyroid muscle. It is attatched on the inner and bottom edge of the adam's apple and runs downward to the top outer edge of the cricoid cartaledge at the top of the trachea. So when speaking, there is a playful tug of war going on between these two muscles, sort of like lightly challenging a dog with a chew toy. After the vibratory process has begun we can intesify the contraction of the vocal cord and relax it; causing the voice to rise and fall in pitch and volume based on the emotional assertion being expressed vocally.
The pitch rising and falling is related to the mass of the vocal cord (string); think of a violin and the the action of the violinist's fingers. A lower pitch is created by more vibratory surface being allowed into the action, and a reduction of mass causes the pitch to rise; this happens by the action of the crico-thyroid muscle. How would you warn a young child, who out of curiosity might be reaching to place their hand on a glowing red surface such as an electric stove burner? How would you impulsively say "Hot!"? Starting at a raised pitch, stretching higher and then lower, not a gentle action, but one that is allowed through equilbrium at the vocal cords; the intensity of the intial action yeilds abit to the release of the the contraction. As the crico-thyoid allows the mass to reduce, the cord is allowed to retreat slightly which allows the vibratory mass to reduce (like a glissando on a violin)
If the equilibrium is impeded, the action of the play between the vocal cord (thyro-arytenoid, heavy mechanism) and the crico-thyroid (light mechanism) is confounded and made more difficult by its action being stalled. The equalized balance between the involved parties of this intrinsic musculature of the throat is the seed where healthy vocal ism is either nurtured or destroyed. The lens through which this action is evaluated and developed is in the observation of the actuator; Bernoulli's principal. If this action, that has programmed our human vocal-ism from the moment of birth, is impeded in any way, even slightly, we have stepped off the path and into the weeds. This is what I feel so strongly about in the process of developing the voice; it is what I embrace when I assert that there are really only two methods by which to develop the voice, and that only one of them is correct.
The "intrinsic" musculature of the throat, as it relates to vocal-ism, is a system of interconnected muscles that respond to the release of air through the vocal cords (thyro-arytenoid, vocal process, vocal folds, glottis). This system manipulates the opening and closing of the valve at the top of our trachea; the same valve we use to speak, exhale, lift heavy objects and cough. The varied functionality of this system of muscles is why there are so many approaches to singing technique. I contend that there are only two approaches to developing or repairing a voice; in my opinion, only one is correct; the other has variations, but is largely the same. If you take the wrong fork in the pedagogy road, there will be blood.
As it relates to vocalism, however, the focus for the moment will be understanding the basics for how pitch rises and falls in an unimpeded way as the vibrator responds to the passing of air in vocalism, and how this unimpeded singularity of a sorts allows a bubbling and effervescent play of emotions in the tonal vortex that is created in the human desire and assertion to express something vocally. The keyword to highlighting the action of this process is equilibrium.
The vocal cords are two bands of muscle tissue that are attachtched at a single point on the inside surface of the adam's apple (thyroid cartiledge). These muscles pull against the back of the adam's apple when contracting. Muscles when activated can only contract, they have to be acted upon by the contraction of another muscle to return. Every muscle has an opposing muscle; think bicep-tricep in the motion of moving ones hand toward and away from the chest. The opposing muscle to the vocal cords (thyro-arytenoid) is the crico-thyroid muscle. It is attatched on the inner and bottom edge of the adam's apple and runs downward to the top outer edge of the cricoid cartaledge at the top of the trachea. So when speaking, there is a playful tug of war going on between these two muscles, sort of like lightly challenging a dog with a chew toy. After the vibratory process has begun we can intesify the contraction of the vocal cord and relax it; causing the voice to rise and fall in pitch and volume based on the emotional assertion being expressed vocally.
The pitch rising and falling is related to the mass of the vocal cord (string); think of a violin and the the action of the violinist's fingers. A lower pitch is created by more vibratory surface being allowed into the action, and a reduction of mass causes the pitch to rise; this happens by the action of the crico-thyroid muscle. How would you warn a young child, who out of curiosity might be reaching to place their hand on a glowing red surface such as an electric stove burner? How would you impulsively say "Hot!"? Starting at a raised pitch, stretching higher and then lower, not a gentle action, but one that is allowed through equilbrium at the vocal cords; the intensity of the intial action yeilds abit to the release of the the contraction. As the crico-thyoid allows the mass to reduce, the cord is allowed to retreat slightly which allows the vibratory mass to reduce (like a glissando on a violin)
If the equilibrium is impeded, the action of the play between the vocal cord (thyro-arytenoid, heavy mechanism) and the crico-thyroid (light mechanism) is confounded and made more difficult by its action being stalled. The equalized balance between the involved parties of this intrinsic musculature of the throat is the seed where healthy vocal ism is either nurtured or destroyed. The lens through which this action is evaluated and developed is in the observation of the actuator; Bernoulli's principal. If this action, that has programmed our human vocal-ism from the moment of birth, is impeded in any way, even slightly, we have stepped off the path and into the weeds. This is what I feel so strongly about in the process of developing the voice; it is what I embrace when I assert that there are really only two methods by which to develop the voice, and that only one of them is correct.
Friday, June 21, 2019
Onset equilibrium
My esteemed teacher, Dr. Bennie (Benjamin) Middaugh, was the first to point me in the direction of the perfect balance of vocal ism as demonstrated in the speaking voice. As a singer who had enjoyed some success, I had hungrily absorbed concepts that kept me on track; maintaining 2800 (singer's formant), lots of breath support etc.. While some of what I had stumbled onto heretofore as a singer helped me to realize a tremendous potential for singing and understanding the voice, I was beginning to have trouble. I was losing range and both ends, finding it difficult to stay in tune, I could not ascend the scale with out having to increase the volume (effort) and was losing the ability to demonstrate vocal subtlety, some would argue that subtlety was something that had always eluded me. Regardless, I had found myself working on an MM at a local liberal arts college near my home town where my friend of several years at that point, Dr. Middaugh (Bennie) had been teaching for three decades at that point in the early 90's.
In his vocal pedagogy class, he went through the William Vennard book, "Singing: The Mechanism and the Technic". If you know this book, you'll recall it has no narrative, it simply breaks down the technical components encountered in the processes of the voice through an outline of Breathing, Musculature, Vowels etc.; each section containing bulleted statements on research, practice, concepts and the scientific verification available at the time. Bennie went right to the bone as he enlightened us on the principals of our craft; admonishing us to stick to the facts and stay out of the weeds when working to develop singers and our own voices. I fondly remember this time as a miracle unfolding in my life and am deeply grateful for my now departed teacher. Bennie changed my life in the first couple of sessions of this course.
The first thing he pointed out to us were the "Principals of Tone"
1. Actuator
2. Vibrator
3. Resonator
He then said, "Lets start with defining a tone: A sound that has a measurable frequency (herz, pitch) and amplitude (volume)." So, we gleaned that the sound made by a book falling onto the floor is not a tone, but rather noise. Then the stage was set for a miracle to unfold for me.
The actuator is the power source, what initializes and begins the tone. The vibrator was the vibrating entity that maintained the measurable frequency. The resonator is what empathized with the frequency and amplified the tone. A piano's actuator is the arm motion of the pianist throwing the hammer, the vibrator is the piano string, the resonator is the sound board. A violin: arm- bow, string, case. An organ: wind, opening in the pipe (think the top of a coke bottle), the pipe itself defines the pitch through its size and space for vibrating air, and is the initial resonance that is further expanded on by the room in which it is played, hopefully containing no carpeting. Thus, the human voice then is Air, Vocal Cord (thyro-arytenoid), and the vowel sound.
More specifically, the Actuator in all wind instrument, of which the human voice is one, is the air-flow. It sets into motion a physical principal referred to as Bernoulli's principal. You have experienced this dynamic when you play against the wind flow around you hand outside of a moving vehicle, or in the water in a moving stream or while in a boat or canoe. It is a flow dynamic where anything flowing (water, air, lava etc.) encounters an obstruction and the flowing material seeks out the path of least resistance creating a differentiation of low/high pressure. The vibrator is the thryo-arytenoid muscle (cords, vocal folds, glottis). The slit in the middle of the two thyro-arytenoid muscles inside our larynx is adducted (drawn together) which then sets into motion a vibratory cycle that is replicated over and over as the air moves through the vocal folds. And lastly, the vowel sound, which is unique to our time and space inside the earth's atmosphere as humans and further, how we can manipulate the varied vowels sounds available to us with the spaces and cavities above and below the larynx.
I imagine that the baby must allow some of our atmosphere into the mouth cavity when the mouth is opened, even slightly, this first teaspoon (if) of air is used through the devices of Bernoulli's principal to eek out the first spark of sound. This then is followed by the first full breath and that really gets the party started. It is a miracle! It is a divine spark! It is also maintained by a physical marvel and balance that imprints on our tiny body and our budding awareness the basic simple impulse to express our being through the marvel of balanced physical principals and sound. Like riding a tiny bike for the first time. An infant has no other strength at this point. It is our first attempt to resist gravity as we push out against the pressure of the Earth's atmosphere. The vagus nerve and the newly stimulated sympathetic nervous system ( the miracle) begins interact with these first attempts to resist gravity in the only way possible for us at this point. Breathe, scream, breath, scream, breath, scream, breath scream. Not causing vocal fatigue, but rather, strengthening the laryngeal musculature with every vocal gesture after every new breath; developing an awareness of vocal equilibrium as it is this that dominates and maintains vocal-ism; it is balance not exertion. While exertion can be mingled with it, it is purely impedance as we haven't learned how to refine the process at this point. We haven't learned how to control the resonator. This is done as we age and imitate the sounds around us. We, as infants at this point are engaging the spark of our voices as it relates to this new physical world we have just become aware of. It is this onset equilibrium imprints on us, and dominates our speech patterns for a lifetime. To consider this equilibrium is of primary importance in developing a healthy singing technique and for maintaining a healthy voice for a lifetime as it serves as a vehicle for vocal expression through our individual and highly dynamic voice.
In his vocal pedagogy class, he went through the William Vennard book, "Singing: The Mechanism and the Technic". If you know this book, you'll recall it has no narrative, it simply breaks down the technical components encountered in the processes of the voice through an outline of Breathing, Musculature, Vowels etc.; each section containing bulleted statements on research, practice, concepts and the scientific verification available at the time. Bennie went right to the bone as he enlightened us on the principals of our craft; admonishing us to stick to the facts and stay out of the weeds when working to develop singers and our own voices. I fondly remember this time as a miracle unfolding in my life and am deeply grateful for my now departed teacher. Bennie changed my life in the first couple of sessions of this course.
The first thing he pointed out to us were the "Principals of Tone"
1. Actuator
2. Vibrator
3. Resonator
He then said, "Lets start with defining a tone: A sound that has a measurable frequency (herz, pitch) and amplitude (volume)." So, we gleaned that the sound made by a book falling onto the floor is not a tone, but rather noise. Then the stage was set for a miracle to unfold for me.
The actuator is the power source, what initializes and begins the tone. The vibrator was the vibrating entity that maintained the measurable frequency. The resonator is what empathized with the frequency and amplified the tone. A piano's actuator is the arm motion of the pianist throwing the hammer, the vibrator is the piano string, the resonator is the sound board. A violin: arm- bow, string, case. An organ: wind, opening in the pipe (think the top of a coke bottle), the pipe itself defines the pitch through its size and space for vibrating air, and is the initial resonance that is further expanded on by the room in which it is played, hopefully containing no carpeting. Thus, the human voice then is Air, Vocal Cord (thyro-arytenoid), and the vowel sound.
More specifically, the Actuator in all wind instrument, of which the human voice is one, is the air-flow. It sets into motion a physical principal referred to as Bernoulli's principal. You have experienced this dynamic when you play against the wind flow around you hand outside of a moving vehicle, or in the water in a moving stream or while in a boat or canoe. It is a flow dynamic where anything flowing (water, air, lava etc.) encounters an obstruction and the flowing material seeks out the path of least resistance creating a differentiation of low/high pressure. The vibrator is the thryo-arytenoid muscle (cords, vocal folds, glottis). The slit in the middle of the two thyro-arytenoid muscles inside our larynx is adducted (drawn together) which then sets into motion a vibratory cycle that is replicated over and over as the air moves through the vocal folds. And lastly, the vowel sound, which is unique to our time and space inside the earth's atmosphere as humans and further, how we can manipulate the varied vowels sounds available to us with the spaces and cavities above and below the larynx.
I imagine that the baby must allow some of our atmosphere into the mouth cavity when the mouth is opened, even slightly, this first teaspoon (if) of air is used through the devices of Bernoulli's principal to eek out the first spark of sound. This then is followed by the first full breath and that really gets the party started. It is a miracle! It is a divine spark! It is also maintained by a physical marvel and balance that imprints on our tiny body and our budding awareness the basic simple impulse to express our being through the marvel of balanced physical principals and sound. Like riding a tiny bike for the first time. An infant has no other strength at this point. It is our first attempt to resist gravity as we push out against the pressure of the Earth's atmosphere. The vagus nerve and the newly stimulated sympathetic nervous system ( the miracle) begins interact with these first attempts to resist gravity in the only way possible for us at this point. Breathe, scream, breath, scream, breath, scream, breath scream. Not causing vocal fatigue, but rather, strengthening the laryngeal musculature with every vocal gesture after every new breath; developing an awareness of vocal equilibrium as it is this that dominates and maintains vocal-ism; it is balance not exertion. While exertion can be mingled with it, it is purely impedance as we haven't learned how to refine the process at this point. We haven't learned how to control the resonator. This is done as we age and imitate the sounds around us. We, as infants at this point are engaging the spark of our voices as it relates to this new physical world we have just become aware of. It is this onset equilibrium imprints on us, and dominates our speech patterns for a lifetime. To consider this equilibrium is of primary importance in developing a healthy singing technique and for maintaining a healthy voice for a lifetime as it serves as a vehicle for vocal expression through our individual and highly dynamic voice.
Wednesday, June 19, 2019
Vocal onset energy
The first vocal sound created by our bodies happened before our ever having taken the first breath. What was this impulse met by physics that created our first shaky vocal tantrum before the first lung filling plop of air into our body; dropping like a stone into the recesses of our half-pint sized lungs that had quite recently been filled with fluid, before this fluid was squeezed out of us as we invaded this plain of existence, time, and experience?
This sound creaking from our acorn sized (if) larynx was our first attempt to resist gravity; pushing against this new weighted blanket that is the earth's atmosphere (remarkably new digs compared to our previous address). A spasm-ed, sphinctering gesture of protest that eeked out a dribble of a vowel sound, then, and inward gale of God given breath, filling us to draw back and do it again, but stronger than the first; trumpeting our arrival, like the first swimming strokes of a newborn sea creature, but internally driven and externally experienced as sound, while we pulse and lunge with our newly experienced pure waves of tone rather than the newly experience body moving strokes that thrust a newborn dolphin's body through a resisting watery atmosphere. These waves of tone, what principals these? What is vibrating? What is its fuel source? Why is it so loud?
This sound creaking from our acorn sized (if) larynx was our first attempt to resist gravity; pushing against this new weighted blanket that is the earth's atmosphere (remarkably new digs compared to our previous address). A spasm-ed, sphinctering gesture of protest that eeked out a dribble of a vowel sound, then, and inward gale of God given breath, filling us to draw back and do it again, but stronger than the first; trumpeting our arrival, like the first swimming strokes of a newborn sea creature, but internally driven and externally experienced as sound, while we pulse and lunge with our newly experienced pure waves of tone rather than the newly experience body moving strokes that thrust a newborn dolphin's body through a resisting watery atmosphere. These waves of tone, what principals these? What is vibrating? What is its fuel source? Why is it so loud?
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