> >NOW, three of them are tenors, and I have never had a tenor to teach before. > I have always worked with sopranos and mezzos. Odd, but true. > >So, those of you who have experience teaching tenors, if you have any >particular tips to pass along, I would love to hear them. >>Suki T
Suki, see if you can locate a copy of Richard Miller's _Training Tenor Voices_. It will be a great help.
Here are a few things which you might want to keep in mind. These are observations based on my studies with a baritone and a tenor, my reading and my own teaching and singing.
-Closed position vowels are your friend. Close the vowels in the middle voice/ pre passaggio area. My experience is that this is a better treatment of the transition into head than is "cover." This will help to wean the chest/heavy mechanism out as the line ascends. My experience is that "cover" often induces extra vocal weight. Maybe it's just tenors in Virginia but I think not. So much depends on how you teach and how the singer thinks of the sound. It could be that you have more success inducing sensations of head voice/resonance with cover than with closing the vowels. I say try one and if it doesn't work, try the other. Once the singer finds head you can do the fine tuning.
-It does take more breath pressure for a tenor to sing high notes than for sopranos and mezzos. So don't be alarmed if you notice it. You will probably know when "enough is enough."
-Male middle voice is quite short compared to yours. The important transitional area for us women ( roughly b1-f2 Helmholtz) in which we need to avoid over-opening vowels to wean chest out of the mixed/ middle voice - is roughly the same as the male middle voice. It's an octave lower though, b-f1 Helmholtz. There is a need to keep the vowels slim, narrow, a bit more close position to make the transition into head.
-Once through the 2nd passaggio into head the difference is vowels. Your tenors can and should sing clear, clean vowels. Women can't sing clean vowels in head. It's an acoustical thing - not as many partials as male voices. We are particularly lacking in those which give us vowel clarity. We must open the vowel positions. They are somewhat vague or distorted. We sing glorious mush in head, your tenors will be singing glorious, clean vowels. It's not fair. It just is.
- This is a little aside. I don't know if you've worked with men before but there's a visual difference which might give you pause. Generally the male skeleton has a greater distance between the bottom rib and the iliac/ pelvic crest. IF you ask your tenors to put their hands on their lower ribs you might think they're fudging. To us women, whose ribs may slide into the pelvis when we bend to the side, it almost appears that the men are putting their hands about halfway down the length of the ribcage. You'll get used to it.
There's a section in the Miller book which I particularly like. I don't have the book at hand so I can't tell you the pages, but it's the section in which he considers how to learn "Dies Bildniss" from _Die Zauberfloete_, He uses onsets throughout all the rests. Something like this: dies Bildniss ist bezaubernd schoe' oe' oen, Each iteration of the vowel in 'schoen' is followed by a sip of air. Using onsets combined with the light breath recoveries helps the singer stay in the vowel position through what would be a rest. Instead of a rest it becomes a breath recovery in the vowel position. Such a simple idea and so useful. I use it all the time and with all voices.
Onsets, appoggio, closer vowels in the passaggio. That's it from me. Good luck with your TIT's (tenors in training ;-} ) Have a great time.
Cindy Donnell
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