Voice Technique
Technically speaking, clear, healthy voice depends on the
interplay between three major systems: respiration, phonation and
resonation. So in voice work we address, among other things,
breathing, voicing and resonance.
Breathing
Many of us have developed a constricted breathing pattern.
Students often say “Well, I obviously know how to breathe.”
Indeed! But breathing for life (or sports or yoga or even singing)
isn't necessarily the same as breathing for speech. Form follows
function, and we need the muscles to behave in a particular way for a
given task. So, if necessary, we work on freeing the breath.
A common pattern of constriction includes shallow, high
breathing. That means that we take frequent, small breaths rather
that full, deep ones. It also means that the breath goes higher in
the lungs than is ideal, involving extra muscle usage around the
collarbone and upper chest.
It is surprisingly easy to change a breathing pattern, because the
body gravitates toward what is natural. Releasing constrictions is
physically easier than holding extra muscle tension. This is
particularly helpful for people with asthma, whose bodies have learned
that breath is in short supply. Breathing deeply and easily has the
added benefits of creating relaxation and stress
reduction.
Voicing
The act of making sound with the vocal cords (or vocal folds) is
called phonating, or voicing. Many people develop muscle use
patterns that can create vocal discomfort or injury, and voice work can
change that.
How to the vocal folds work to make voice?
The vocal folds are little muscles covered in several layers of
increasingly more gelatinous tissue. They are located in your
larynx (Adam’s apple for men), and they run front to back in the
body. When they are open, they look like a letter V from above,
with the closed end at the front of the body and the open end at the
back. They sit directly on top of the trachea (windpipe), and
serve as the guardian of the airway. So when they're open, air
passes freely between them and we are able to breathe. When we
hold our breath, the vocal folds close, and they look like two letter
I’s next to each other. They make a seal.
When we make voice, the vocal folds close, and air comes up the
trachea from the lungs. The vocal folds are blown open, but the
back stays together. So when they are open, they look a little
like an oval, or an elongated letter O. They then open and close
many times per second as air continues to come up from the lungs, and
with each cycle, a little puff of air is released. These puffs of
air are what actually make sound.
So, the word “cords” is misleading; it may lead us to believe that
we are a string instrument and voice is made by the vibration of the
cords, like a guitar. But this is not the case; we are a wind
instrument. The vocal folds act as the reed in a wind instrument
as it valves the air. So the breath is the source for voice; the
vocal folds shape it.
The vocal folds vibrate about 200 times per second for women, and
about 100 times per second for men, on average. The higher the
pitch the higher the frequency (rate) of vibration.
The puffs of air are then directed to different locations in the
neck, face and head. Depending on where the air stream hits, it
causes different vibrations and sounds. Voice quality is strongly
affected by what bones and spaces in the skull are set into vibration by
the air stream, so voice
work relies heavily on directing the
sound to particular places in the head.
Resonance
Resonance is the key to manipulating the voice safely. In the
context of voice work, resonance refers to the bones or cavities in the
head and neck that are set into vibration by the air stream that has
been shaped by the vocal folds. Resonance changes often gives the
illusion of pitch changes. Many people think their voice is “too
high”, but find that they are simply using only their higher resonators
and missing the lower ones. The pitch of their voice doesn't
change, but adding lower resonance makes the voice sound deeper, richer
and warmer.
We also use resonance to affect what happens at the level of the
vocal cords. By feeling for a particular resonance trained in
voice work, we know that the vocal folds are closing in a healthy
pattern that creates vocal power with minimal likelihood of vocal
injury.
