Finding pure head voice

[D.Starr]

OK so singing is going absolutely amazing.

Just still can't seem to find that pure head tone and it's hindering me singing above G4/A4.

Think it may be cord closure because my tone can become breathy and holding a note up that high can be difficult.

I still have falsetto as well which I would like to get rid of.

I was just wondering if anyone had any exercises to do or advice or ways they found head voice or thinning of the cords around G4/A4.

I have:

4 Pillars

Singing Success

Mastering Mix

Frisell's book (Baritone)

[Sun]

Try one thousand hours of careful practise, that probably will do the trick.

Thinning the cords happen naturally if you just relax the throat, modify right and make sure you get maximum resonance. You just need the muscle memory to be worked in, but it's real hard, takes several tons of practise.

[Robert Lunte]

? what are you talking about?! We had a lesson together it it was amazing. After letting me show you what you need to be doing, you immediately bridged to your head voice and sang big notes in your head voice over and over again for an hour. I'm assuming you continued to practice what I showed you? If you had, you should not be posting discussions about, "I can't find my head voice".

I totally think you ARE IN YOUR HEAD VOICE and you don't realize it. Make sure you are not confusing head voice with falsetto vocal mode. Remember, Falsetto is not your head voice! its a vocal mode. You can sing falsetto or other modes like twang, in your head voice. I'll bet your singing twang in your head voice and its probably so good, you don't realize its your head voice and are confused about what your head voice should sound and feel like.

When are we going to train again and really address it?

I thought we had been through all this before and finally concluded the saga with one lesson in about 20 minutes?

[D.Starr]

Hey Rob, yeah we did get to some crazy notes. I just feel my voice doesn't have the same heady quality I hear in your videos.

Finding it hard to stop pushing again, feel my neck tense up and everything. I do carry the embouchure right through the siren.

Not sure when we can next have a session on Skype because the company I work for are having a extremely rough patch and facing administration and my hours have been greatly reduced. Lucky if I have a £100 to last me 2 weeks.

[ronws]

Yo, D, singing is mental. Listen to Robert, for he can hear you outside of yourself. You can only hear yourself through bone. And even if you listen to a recording of yourself, you are still listening through your own psychological filter.

Singing is mental. It's okay for a head note to feel boomy and sound chesty, rather that whatever you think a head note is.

Singing is mental. Did I say that already?

[D.Starr]

Yeah probably is all mental.

The main thing that is hindering me is the neck muscles and the muscle under the chin, digastric muscle.

Finding it hard to let go of these neck muscles and try and relax, feel like I'm forcing the tone.

I'm supporting my voice as I sing though.

[ronws]

Zen and the art of being Ron.

Motion in the abs, note in the resonators, nothing in the throat, ever. Sing as if you have no throat. Om mani padmi um ....

What is the sound of one hand clapping? Bart Simpson answered that. Who needs a koan, anyway?

Basically, if you are feeling strain, and I don't mean the warm glow of working something, but actual strain and distracting tension, something needs to be addressed, imo.

[Keith]

Yeah probably is all mental.

The main thing that is hindering me is the neck muscles and the muscle under the chin, digastric muscle.

Finding it hard to let go of these neck muscles and try and relax, feel like I'm forcing the tone.

I'm supporting my voice as I sing though.

I did that when I started the TVS workouts. The solution for me was to realize that I was forcing my tongue into my teeth and flexing all those muscles with it. You are going to have some flexing of muscles going on because thats how the embrochure keeps its shape, but if you are jamming your tongue against your teeth instead of gently pressing it, then knock it off lol.

~Keith

[Guest]

Not purely singing advice but I think the principle applies. It's about "technique."

In my experience I have found that while technique is important in many tasks in life, it can also hurt if you don't understand how to use it. I have trained people that get stuck because they are caught up in technique.

Technique is best learned, mastered then forgotten. Sometimes we get so focused on the technique that we lose sight of what the technique was meant to do.

Watch a baseball player at the plate. Each one has a different stance and it sure isn't like anything they show you in batting fundamentals! But his technique is good, and has been absorbed and become part of him. So when the ball comes at him, he doesn't think...he just does. The technique works. he doesn't spend time dwelling on it.

When a problem arises down the road somewhere he may go back to fundamentals to find the hitch, then fix it.

Tommy

[Trip]

Yeah, that's how it works with the body, most of the time.

The mind is a different thing though Ask a writer, for example, if technique makes his task any easier. Speaking from experience, it doesn't. It might make the result better, but the process is just as trying as when you put your first words to paper

That said, singing definitely has an important mental component, but it doesn't (and it shouldn't) have so much to do with controlling technique as with controlling attitude, mainly taking care of your composure and confidence while you're doing it.

[Guest]

Yeah, that's how it works with the body, most of the time.

The mind is a different thing though Ask a writer, for example, if technique makes his task any easier. Speaking from experience, it doesn't. It might make the result better, but the process is just as trying as when you put your first words to paper

That said, singing definitely has an important mental component, but it doesn't (and it shouldn't) have so much to do with controlling technique as with controlling attitude, mainly taking care of your composure and confidence while you're doing it.

I think that is what I was saying The original poster was talking about cord closure and technique etc.

I was saying, as I think you might be, that getting too caught up in technique sometimes hinders us.

Unless I'm misunderstanding you :)

[D.Starr]

I can understand that it can partially be mental but at the same time I still think technique is as much to be to blame.

I support with my lower abs and lower back, as well as keeping my chest expanded.

I can always feel my neck tighten as I go up the scale, I stop so I don't keep going but it just seems to creep back it. Think it's an issue with thinning out the cords and bringing in the neck muscles to compensate.

That being said I don't know many exercises to relax my neck and use thinner cords.

[Quincy]

Think it's an issue with thinning out the cords and bringing in the neck muscles to compensate.

That being said I don't know many exercises to relax my neck and use thinner cords.

As I was reading your post, I was thinking just that. Thinning your cords as you go up. It is a delicate and precise balance you have to find between the air you are supplying and the continuous thinning of cords at the same time.

Personally, I've found I have to really watch the air and reduce it paying particular attention to making sure there is NO LEAKAGE. Like trying to think of 2 things at once. Just keep playing around with it and you should find it. Do it over and over each day and it will become more automatic. But give it time.

[VideoHere]

basic exercises, lip bubbles, scales, arpeggios, mays, all those basic exercises, descending head voice slides, swelling exercises, do them an awful lot, and i promise you things begin to fall into place.

d, how long in have you been daily exercising the voice?

is it at least 2 years? because that's about how long it's taken me to get results...and i cannot wait till i hit 4 years.

however, some the the results are mental results, discoveries you are going to make that you cannot pre-acheive! you cannot even imagine or dream you'll get.

[D.Starr]

I lip bubble up and down with ease, no effort no strain, no neck tensing.

Soon as I vocalise, BAM! neck tension.

I lip bubble throughout the day, 7 days a week. It's the neck tension that is the biggest problem. Choke up on notes easily.

[VideoHere]

but you didn't answer my question....how long, the amount of month's or weeks whatever, have you been regularly and consistently exercising the voice?

a series of exercises, nearly daily?

[D.Starr]

2 years

[VideoHere]

2 years and you still have neck tension? respectfully, i find it hard to believe. then it's time to consult a teacher.

[D.Starr]

Well 2 years on and off.

Consecutively for the last 5 months I've been practising everyday.

[Sun]

Respectfully, if you were practising free from strain then you would know how to incorporate that into your singing. You might be bad at doing that but you would still know what to do and how to practise it.

You need to work with a teacher and put in the hours. This whole thread is a bit misdirected IMO. If you are not finding the right setup to go past G4/A4 then you are already too high with the wrong setup. You already have all the information, there is not that much to it. No little tweak will let you soar all through your potential range, do you really think it's that easy?

[Trip]

I think Sun may be right about being too high in the wrong setup - if your tension-related problems are mostly unsolved after 5 months of regular practice, you're probably taking chest too high. Unless you're a pure and rather high tenor, you should not even attempt chest voice above D4. Even better, leave it lower, around C4, I'd say, or even B3.

The thing is, the higher you take chest, the less willing your body is to let go of that heavy mechanism when you try and change into head. Psychologically it could be similar to carrying a huge weight on your shoulders and being afraid to put it carefully down because it might slip your fingers and land on your feet. So you just drop it in panic, at the same time scrambling out of its way however you can. Maybe that same sort of panic kicks in when you're high in chest and it activates all those tension-inducing reflexes in your neck and articulators.

[VideoHere]

i wish we could all realize that the head and chest voice "musculature" has to be developed to allow a synergy to develop in the voice where you can take it where it needs to go. you become the master of how much chest or how much head musculature you choose to involve.

it kind of similar to doing a simple dumbell curl. when you first lift up the weight you feel the heaviness, but as get past the middle and head up towards the top of the rep the weight gets lighter.

now when you let the weight back down, and stop right in the middle you feel an entirely different feeling, and feeling of strength and balance.

that strength and balance is exactly what you need to sing with between e4 and b4 depending on the singer. it's a place where both musculatures synergize.

this is how i look at it.