What does it feel like to sing above your break?

[EvilSoup]

For those of you who can do it well, what does it feel like to sing in your mix/curbing/covering/twang register?

Try and be as specific as you can regarding how and where you're breathing, where the sound resonates, how much air pressure you're using, how much vocal compression you employ, how the mouth is positioned, ect.

Also if you used to not be able to sing above your break well, how did that feeling change when your technique improved? Would you say the change was more of a change of coordination, building of muscle strength, or a combination of both?

Thanks. :D

[Sun]

I can't sing above but during recent days I have been starting to get the thinning of the folds going and got a couple of notes higher.

It freaks me out how low effort is actually required to phonate above, if you are used to pushing your voice and straining, you expect a huge tension/strain increase there around F4-G4 and then when you get there it's like lifting a empty milk box you thought was full. The struggle is not supposed to be in your throat at all.

The way I found it was by practising scales with medium volume (crucial) and not allowing any strain in. It took me about 35 minutes of playing around below E4 before I started feeling the connection.

[jonpall]

Take the best o#$m you ever had, multiply it by a thousand and you're still nowhere near it. It feels like your vocal folds are being played by the pick of destiny and you're riding with the metal gods on the highway to hell.

[Felipe Carvalho]

lol The pick of destiny.

Not much really, considerably more pressure on the support muscles, more overall energy applied (as if I was going really loud against my own head) and the feeling of the voice resonating kinda shifts towards the top of the head as the tone rises. Begins around D#4/E4 and goes up from there until B4 (.above middle C. so E3 - B3 on non american notation)

[bigfoot]

I get a massive buzz inside the top part of the head.. in the sinuses and towards the back.. My stomach and back muscles tighten a bit, throat remains relaxed (there is a slight tension to produce the right vowel, but no strain that will HURT the throat).. When I hit a note above the break, it takes getting used to cuz it feels like the note is floating on nothing, with no base as such (as Chest voice normally has), and FEELS like it may come out like a falsetto sound coz there isnt enough Force being put into the note.. But thats exactly how it should be.. The more force you apply, the less likely you are to produce the note properly.

[VideoHere]

a lot of it depends on your vocal intentions...are you singing with a light registration or a heavy registration?

for me, each note up produces a different sensation. you call the shots how you want to sound up high, and what notes are we reffering to?

[D.Starr]

This is an interesting topic. I also thought it would take more effort as you go up.

I feel my voice lighten as I reach C4 and sometimes I can lighten up a little afterwards but there is a lot of tension in my throat. Its really frustrating. Its hard holding back the volume as well, I want that curbed, R&B sound to my voice.

[VideoHere]

This is an interesting topic. I also thought it would take more effort as you go up.

I feel my voice lighten as I reach C4 and sometimes I can lighten up a little afterwards but there is a lot of tension in my throat. Its really frustrating. Its hard holding back the volume as well, I want that curbed, R&B sound to my voice.

it all depends...after a certain level of proficiency is reached (patience) you will learn how to add or subtract vocal weight, but it comes after a lot of repetious practise which will build muscle memory and if you stick with daily workouts you'll find the voice will want to go places and it will be strong enough and coordinated enough to just go to places it needs to go.

i am a believer that throat tension and proper support are inextricably linked.

[ronws]

Above the first break, more subtle than you think and you absolutely have to get away from thinking that you are going sound like you think your speaking voice sounds. That is what causes most people to carry the "chest" controls too high. Above the second break, totally weightless and supersonic. A thin, focused laser beam thumbing it's nose at Einstein.

[Mr Bounce]

Everything here pretty much rings true. Especially what ronws said about getting away from the speaking voice. In fact, getting away from any conception of how you think you should sound. I'm still on the pathway to mastering this beautiful area of the voice, but the days when it works right, it feels like I'm floating on my support and my throat is free. It doesn't feel at all like speaking, or shouting, and mostly importantly, it doesn't feel in the body like it feels emotionally when I listen to a great singer!

For me that has been crucial, to recognise that the emotions and the power don't come from the throat or really anywhere physical, only from your heart (awwwww). When you try to make those feelings physical, you get problems (for singing that is)

edit: typo

[gogoriviera]

- This is an awesome post- the most illusive topic I think for most singers- I am still struggling to figure it out- I am still either in a windy falsetto or a pulled up chest feelling on notes above E-F4

[Robert Lunte]

Feels great. Imagine that chest voice is what it feels like when you are walking, using your legs and can feel your feet planted on the ground... it has a familiarity to it, a kind of primitive stability to it, but its clunky, not fluid.... now imagine moving 50 yards without your legs... Imagine that you are floating without the sensation of your legs and bigger extrinsic muscles and limbs involved... imagine no clunky resistance, but just a "glide" for 50 yards... that is what singing in your head voice can feel like... Add to that, head tones definitely do resonate in heady spaces... you typically feel pressure in your resonate cavities, in heady places... the low head tones can definitely be felt in a low, back of the head position.

Chest voice grinds more, it feels throaty... head voice no longer deals with the primitive tissue grinding and configurations consistent with speech mode, barking and shouting... head voice is pressure and oscillations and pulsating in heady spaces.

Head voice feels kind of like Falsetto voice... after all, Falsetto and good twangy head tones do share the same resonant placement, so if you sing falsetto, you do get the "no legs" sensation I'm trying to describe above... but you feel more wind... when you add intrinsic anchoring, twang, larynx dampening, tongue leveraging, the windiness goes away for real meat... In a way, its the best of both worlds... a floaty, free sensation with meat and "boom" to it.