>Dear mary Beth and Vocalisters:
You wrote:
>Comment #2: In my previous post I was referring to the transitions
>from chest voice to head voice, not chest voice to falsetto.
>Although all three involved different employ different modes of
>vibration, falsetto is a form of vibration that is divorced from
>chest and head modes. This is also why Miller refers to chest and
>head voice as heavy and light mechanism. Therefore, I find that it
>is fruitless to try and develop a function that ultimately can't be
>smoothed out because of it's unique mode of vibrating. Hence, the
>perpetual flip or crack that occurs as the voice slams into a fuller
>mode of vibrating. The only way to cover up this crack is to do it
>extremely quietly, and really the crack doesn't get covered up, it
>just can't be heard because of the soft dynamic. Further, a
>falsetto function can be produced anywhere in one's range male or
>female.
Although I agree with your comment about different modes of
vibration, I am a bit surprised by your implication that I was
attempting to promote the falsetto to chest voice transition. My
comments about the transition from falsetto to chest voice were in
answer to your previous post in which you described working with a
particular student. I quote you"
Sorry not to reply sooner...........I don't have much time now either. But
basically if you are encouraging, or giving preference to, one mode of
production over another the voice is going be out of balance. Allowing the
voice to transition as it wants to is not always an accurate or healthy
thing. Case in point is a new student that was in my studio this
week........if I let his voice do what it wanted, he would have been in
terrible shape. His "lighter-head-voice" was "actually falsetto"
(quotes are mine) , and when he
carried that tone down, right below middle c, his voice would actually
abruptly pop into a heavier production and drop an octave. Now obviously, you
are not encouraging this, but it is an extreme example of allowing the voice
to do what it wants.
I do not agree with your "Further" statement about falsetto function
being able to "be produced anywhere in one's range male or female".
I know of many men who are unable to produce a falsetto below A below
middle C. Falsetto in women's voices is also questionable. It is
possible for them to produce a tone with the vocal folds kept open
with a consequent breathy quality but that is not the same tone
quality as male falsetto because of the shorter length of the female
vocal folds. It is for this reason that tenors often do not have a
falsetto.
>Developing male voices: This is a point I disagree on also. By using
>the correct exercises, I am able to get all of my male students into
>head voice, irregardless of age. The emphasis is on learning the
>co-ordination first. All voices function anatomically the same,
>therefore to say that some voices don't/can't learn a co-ordination
>until a certain age, is to make a wrong assumption. However,
>although the co-ordination can be learned, the amount of
>sound/weight one puts on the voice is completely commensurate with
>age.
Yes, the age factor is a strong determinant in the ability of the
male voice to produce a ringing tone in head voice. Many would say
that a soft head voice in an immature voice is another form of
falsetto with a slightly closer approximation of the vocal folds. In
lower male voices this is often the case.
>To avoid learning the co-ordination until a set age, would be to say
>that a young adult male should not start exercising until he reaches
>a certain height or weight because his body would not be completely
>developed until then. Certainly, one would not ask a 15 year old to
>sound like a mature 30 year old dramatic tenor, but he can learn the
>co-ordination at a young age and build strength as the growth of his
>larynx allows.
I would agree with the idea that the coordination should be learned
as early as possible. But it will depend to some degree on the
potential coordination factors available to the individual student.
To borrow from your analogy, most physical exercises are selected to
match the maturity of the individual athlete. I would add that there
is no set age for individual maturity levels.
Admittedly, this discussion is a kind of hair splitting. Having the
singer learn the necessary coordination for head voice is a desirable
goal and especially so when done as early as possible. But I do not
want to imply that this can be achieved for all male singers at an
early age. The lower male voices are possessed of much large vocal
folds and the muscle systems that are these folds and control these
folds are not usually as developed as the cartilages in which they
are housed. Many young basses and baritones find themselves in the
same dilemma, vocally, as the post puberty male who has increased in
height dramatically within the past year. Both are clumsy because
the muscles systems have not yet caught up with the more solid
structure growths (bone and cartilages)>
A good discussion. As always it is good to have this exchange.
--
Lloyd W. Hanson
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