Lloyd,
I do not intend to describe the laryngeal registers (as opposed to
the acoustic registers) in terms of the associated sound or timbre,
but rather in terms of the mode of vibration of the vocal folds,
which can be either heavy ('rolling' movement with high vertical
phase difference and high closed quotient) or light (lateral movement
with little vertical phase difference and lower closed quotient).
You describe the registers in terms of what c a u s e s the different
modes of vibration of the vocal folds (the function). As long as
there is a unambiguous relation between function and mode of
vibration, we should both come to the same conclusion.
For the 'pure' head voice and 'pure' chest voice there is no problem:
An active vocalis and passive cricothyrioid leads to a heavy vibration
pattern. An active cricothyroid and a passive vocalis leads to a
light vibration pattern.
The crux of the matter is that a mix between light and heavy
vibration patterns is very unlikely (though theoretically possible).
While it is perfectly possible to have a continuous transition
between completely dominant vocalis and completely dominant
cricothyroid, it is unlikely that the two modes of vibration
will mix.
Also it seems that the point at which the mode transition will
occur is not exclusively determined by the ratio between the
activity of the two muscles. Other factors such as adduction
force / subglottal pressure as well as resonance can influence the
point of transition.
I therefore conclude that since there is no clear and unambiguous
relation between 'cause' and 'effect' as described above, it is
preferable to define the laryngeal registers in terms of
the effect: the mode of vibration, since this directly relates
to what the listener will hear.
I hope you don't mind me nagging about this. We can at least
agree that we disagree :)
Maybe Taylor can enlighten us on what Ingo Titze has to say on the
subject ?
Wim Ritzerfeld
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