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I think when i first started singing i was wrong.

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Zion1744

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Lately i've been experimenting with head a chest voice, if you haven't already seen my thousands of previous posts about nearly the same topic.

Well here's what's going down. Since i've been singing i've distinguished the difference between head and chest voice. Then after know what head voice was i thought i could sing super low in my head voice, pretty close to how low my chest voice can comfortably go. When i'm doing this, i'm completely relaxed and there's nearly no tension. I can say that this is a huge difference when i'm singing in my chest voice.

Or so i thought..

What i've been starting to realize is this isn't my head voice! It has power like my chest voice does however i've just been an idiot. It's honestly the quickest fix i've ever made to my voice. Once you find you head voice, hum stuff. If you can hum it relaxed you can learn to sing it.

What i always thought was my head voice being capable of going low is really just my head voice transitioning into chest but with me not straining. I cannot sing like this yet, however i definitely see this as a possibility. Before my larynx rose all the time and since i've developed my mix i've started letting go more. But now if i just start letting go entirely i have this whole "different" voice. Much different from my regular talking voice.

The reason i noticed this was because of all these exercises on the internet worry about tension and all that stuff and the only thing that i've ever had no tension with is full head voice. When i'm in pure head voice the only thing i feel working are my chords and stomach.

Hopefully, i'm not completely wrong with this new "technique?" I've just recently stumbled across? Any ideas on this from you vocal gurus on this forum? :P I'm going to put the test to work tomorrow when i start some good scale exercises.

Secondly, are there two ways to sing? Because, singing in this new way really seems like a completely separate voice for now. I hope it's just like my mix voice where I can add strength as I go but still maintain the relaxation to it.

My mind is blown! Somebody please tell me if i'm just being a novice and freaking out over nothing i'll have a video posted as soon as i can.. :P

btw, i can tell the difference between: falsetto, head voice register, chest voice register

So finally, just to clarify: "It feels like i'm singing in a lower head voice"

Oh and on top of that! Since the ct and ta work in unison to make your voice you "technically" have only one voice. Sooo if i'm singing lower in this "head register feel" and slowly add chest to it i can slowly tweak my voice into the power i want right!? Which would then be better than going from a powerful chest voice that has heaps of tension in it and tweaking in head voice. So it's good to start with the essence then work my way to a better sound. Technique > sound while starting out! :P

Thanks, sorry for the total babble here, i feel like i could make a nice breakthrough with the tension of my voice and free up the strain and get rid of some of the major headaches! :D

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Breakthroughs are always good. It's an overlooked aspect, that it's important to practice in different directions of your voice. As far as I can tell, head voice will have trouble getting lower than middle-chest, so you are probably right about it not being your head-voice. But what you probably stumbled upon was your resonance.

There's always way you shouldn't sing. Like, not using the diaphragm properly. Destroying your resonance by pushing your throat, pulling chest, pulling/pushing larynx. Using incorrect vowels/formants for your material. Dampening the tongue too much. Keeping your voice too high for lower passaggios.

Singers "make it sound easy", but the voice is a lot more complex than most of us first realize.

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At first I had no idea what you were talking about, but when DoverOs mentioned resonance it sort of clicked. Once you know your voice well, you don't have to think about words or devices to describe what your doing. You can sort of think in feelings and sounds instead of anatomies, terms, etc. The voice becomes more cohesive and easier to use. Things can transition more fluidly, and emotions flow much more freely. I think that's why some of the best singers are lousy teachers. But with time and effort, it does all get easier. It's a matter of coming into your own. For now, it's good to think the way that you are thinking.

To answer one of your questions, maybe there are two ways to sing, maybe there are 1000? I guess that's not an answer. Maybe you have two distinct sensations that you are feeling, maybe there could be more?

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I think he said it perfect. Before this new thing, i was using way too much throat. Which explains about a billion of my problems! I have huge tension issues and when i start singing higher it gets harder (obviously) It got easier when i found my mix voice, which is less tense then singing in my high chest. Basically a lot of my high chest notes i turned into mix which dropped a lot of tense, bad singing habits i had. And with this new revelation, i think i can use my throat a lot less.

The way i learned to sing was purely through myself. I picked up a guitar a few years back but never sang and this past year i've been working on it. The first half of the year though was all me, which explains all these stupid horrible habits that need correcting.

But he said it perfectly i'd say! I'm using too much throat and this new thing, if i can develop a feel for it, will release the strain in all my voices.

Who would've thought it'd help me to find my head chest and mix before i found how to release tension and resonance. Don't teachers always teach that backwards? Release tension make sure everythings easy then whip out the crazy high notes :P

Thanks a lot i'll get back to this thread tomorrow after practice and see if its such a breakthrough i have another freak out :D

Anyone experience something like this themselves?!

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Hey Zion, it sounds like you have found the mechanics of what I like to call my mantra. Motion (if necessary, and sometimes, it's necessary) in the abs, note in the head, nothing in the throat, ever, amen.

My warm-ups (which I got from a classical instructor) are hums.

Someone else who uses hums to warm up and find resonance - Bruce Dickinson. In his own words, he wonders around backstage with a maniacal grin while humming and people give him the weirdest looks.

The value of head voice, among other things, is that its function will teach you breath management. Breathe and pitch are always something in motion, not static. Therefore, you should not be static.

One of the things I value from Frisell's method is that, at least for a tenor, though I think he prescribes the same things for baritones, is that your volume and strength are up top. Your lowest notes should also the lowest volume. Most people's problems come from approaching it from the other way around, though there are people who can do that.

Whatever floats your boat, I suppose.

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zion,

please get this...

if all you do is sing using 100% head voice musculature, you will never grow the power and strength in the performing voice.

the reason it feels so free and wonderful up there is because you are not instigating chest voice musculature to join up with your head voice.

that's fine for now to just work your falsetto till it starts to adduct better and more consistently. but you still have to eventually learn to quell the antagonism that exists between chest and head voice musculature.

at the early stages of training chest has an upper hand most of the time. to sing exclusively with chest voice musculature is both very difficult and somewhat dangerous if not done under supervision.

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ya aside from resonance, vocal balance is important. Pavarotti was a master at balancing between dramatic and lyric vowels. Which made him a class above the tenors who only practiced lyrically. Which made those lyric-style tenors effectively undermine their entire voice.

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Which lyric tenors? Just an interesting statement that you made that piqued my curiousity. I was wondering which lyric tenors underminded their voices by not trying to sound like baritones. Even better, if you could present samples of their singing where you feel they did a disservice to their voice or their art.

I liked Pavarotti, as do many others. And many another opera singer felt that he was detuned and using incorrect technique, especially later in life. Which doesn't matter to me in my appreciation of his singing, even if he was considered the "rock" singer of opera. But Jussi Boerling, for example, produces more harmonics than Pavarotti but didn't have as much "bottom end" to his voice.

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Well just for starters, I am not singing in falsetto. There is definite tension, i would like to say then if falsetto is 100% head voice or all TA? Then what i'm doing is probably maybe 10% CT + 90% TA? It's like i've got falsetto then i just add a little more umph lol. It's hard to explain probably just more edge.

That's why i have the hope i can add more to it and still control it. It's definitely there and i'm fully relaxed with my neck muscles. So, if i'm at 10 90 ish right now then i can slowly hope to work for a 50 50 or since you can't really have them equally hopefully like a 49- 51+ Chest < Head mix. Totally just came up with this <--- lol i'm not very sure how to describe dominance when it comes to your ct and ta muscles. Is there like a fancy way to do it or is it really just estimated percents :P

Which leads me to my next question

I want to be able to sing this high, i can hit these notes.. However i cannot "sing" them. Without a mic, the notes are weak and hard to control? By control i guess i mean there are clear breaks and i'm not exactly sure how high to go. I know in time this will improve but honestly i'm flipping into majority head voice.

I know when i'm in my mix as to compared to a nice whimpy head voice as to a full falsetto. So, i can probably sing the high notes in the beginning in probably 10 90 maybe 15 85 Chest/head but in other songs in my mix i can clearly hit notes with a close to 50 50, i know i'm still in my my mix when i still sound like myself and now some kind of awkward sound i'll actually post a clip of me doing it it's sooo ridiculous sounding and honestly i feel like it could not be used.

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zion, just keep practicing. Your head mix will go through a lot of stages as it develops. But in general you will get better and better at accessing the voice(more coordination), and bridging without ever having to do a strained belt. It's helped me to attempt to sing in an octave above a normal song, but that's your preference if you want to attempt that or not. I'm a baritone and I can sing up to e5-f#5 with decent coordination. Also your low headmix notes are hard to get until you smooth out that bridge, as far as I can tell.

and a tenor singing like a baritone is impossible.

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