GWendel wrote:
>My first teacher would say to me "You
>are a baritone and certainly not a tenor." and then we would really struggle
>with high notes. After a short while with my current teacher, he asked "You
>are a tenor. Why are you trying to sound like a baritone?" It wasn't a
>long time afterwards that the high notes appeared; very thin at first, but a
>little stronger and fuller every day. Tessitura that were once high for me
>are now the easiest place in my voice to sing. Subconsciously, I needed
>"permission" to sing high.
Of many singers I often wonder "Why are you trying to sound
like...?". As part of a learning process it is valuable to play games
of sounding like all sorts of things, but I say that then all of
those things must be given up and we just sing. Now that you consider
yourself to be a tenor I suggest that you do not fix that identity
for yourself. When rehearsing, continue to pretend that you are
sometimes a baritone, sometimes a tenor, sometimes an alto, sometimes
a soprano (even coloratura!). And then, just sing! To fix our way of
functioning is to turn our performance into characature. Let me push
the idea further. When singing opera, must you sound like an opera
singer? How about singing opera as if you were a rock singer, or a
folk singer, or a Flamenco singer, or a jazz singer? But that's just
for rehearsal. In performance, drop all of that nonsense and just
sing the music!
All the best,
John Link
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