Everybody wants to sing high,are we embarass to sing in the low range

[Ivenado]

I have always loved Barry White's voice since the first time I've heard him. He didn't have the greatest voice but there was something to it- the bass.

I have hardly ever heard a singer who could sing in the scale of the C2-B2 's as a basic foundation and then reach an high " C.

Do we have to work out as much in the low range as in the high range?

Do we have a natural voice placement that differ from each individu?

Some say that if you can reach notes from C2 to C5 as an exemple, that the middle of your placement should be around G3b and that whatever the note you can reach, you shouldl always come back on your natural placement?

[Sun]

To sing a solid C2 that is not a quiet croaky mess is not something many can do at all. A voice like Barry White's is really really rare, but of course it can be done.

I don't think anyone is afraid to sing low, personally I can sing well down to F#2 or so, maybe two notes lower with less power but I only do this for effect sometimes, IMO the voice really soars in the C3-C5 area and around here give or take is where a trained singer will sound most brilliant regardless of timbre.

E2-E5 give or take a few notes is not such an unusual range but honestly to be chilling below C3 all day would sound painfully boring (in general) IMO unless you have a monster voice like Barry White.

For most male voices singing in their lower range is easier than fudge and doesn't need practising.

[Kari]

Hi, i guess you are a bass yourself ? like me. Im not an expert so i cant answer your questions, i can only speak for myself and i think its interresting to compare and share some experience.

Im a low bass, C2 is easy, on a good day its A1 and after i was sick i reached F1.

I dont practise down there but i do warm it up. When i practise a lot in the upper ranges im not so comfortable

in the lower and vice versa. Is it the same for you?

Im not embarresed to sing low. From the start i couldnt otherwise, and i think its fun to be able to do something that others cant do. (not so many)

I started to sing Leonard Cohen and Johnny Cash, iv never thought of Barry White.

Iv listen to his songs and its not easy to imitate his style, what songs do you like of him?

Have you listen to Josh Turners songs? The country guy, its good fun to sing them!

And yes like Sun said its a bit boring to sing only low stuff, thats why i started to study the voice.

I will have lessons so i can reach that "magic" C5 and hopefully more, today its a A4 on a good day.

About the comfortrange, mine is app. F2 to E3, at G-A3 i have my first brake. Where is yours?

To sing in "your natural" placement, isnt that a opinion from classical teachers?

Id like to take the American approach on that "the sky is the limit":)

[onprcntr]

I have to agree. When I first wanted to be a a musician I idolized Axl Rose but I never had the confidence to be upfront so I hid behind my hair and guitar and decided that lead guitar was just enough out front for me. I was a closet singer and when grunge happened and high pitched singers and guitar solos were out I discovered I could sing in a low voice. Still not wanting to be in front though I only played guitar. Then in about 1998 I sang a George Strait song to the amazement of my friends and I found my voice and confidence. Singing low comes very natural and easy to me like strumming chords but singing like Axl or Rik Emmett or Robert Plant is like learning an Yngwie solo and when something takes that much effort people notice.

[Snejk]

Everyone can learn how to sing as high and powerful as they want. But the bottom is not something you can "practice lower". You can learn how to get a note or maybe two by just relaxing and humming but you can never add "an octave lower with a strong boomy sound". Anyone who claims this is lying through their teeth and have no clue about the vocal anatomy

Also, high notes just sound so awesome. Lower notes are just easier to get women wet with ;)

[Ivenado]

Sorry kari if it took me quite a while to answer. A1 is very low. I myself can't go further than E2. I like almost all Barry White's songs, and I think that he had a special voice even if he couldn't sing higher notes.

So the way it seems is that a singer doesn't have to vocalise in the low range. When doing the exercices I tought that I had to work trough the high range and also the low range, but I don't know on which notes that I should stop in the low range? I have approximatively a range from E2 to A4. I don't want to spent time working in the low range if it doesn't do anything technically.

[DoverOs]

ya Ivenado, what range you work in is very important, and I refer to it as texture. Some people are most comfortable with their low texture, while some people work better with a higher texture. The tricky part is, that these two areas have very different kinds of production.

So if you want to sing low notes, I really recommend that you use your low range, and get a vocal instructor to teach you proper support at the low ranges. You can also learn to use your vocal fry. Like it was stated, your modal range will not go lower than E2, but your vocal fry can go extremely low. Some people can go an octave lower in their fry range. One of my teachers is a contralto, but she can go down about 9 more semi notes and be on par with me, and some basses have been known to go down to C1 and lower in their fry voice.

On the other hand, singing in your higher range/texture is good to strengthen high notes and the easiest to learn support in, but the problem is that your lower range will really start to lack in the deep booming tone that you really need for low singing.

So it's really important to get a vocal teacher, or have the diligence to keep your texture in balance.

and ya it's very important to exercise your ENTIRE range, you just need the diligence to settle with a low or high vocal weight.

[Kari]

Dont misunderstand me, i dont practise the lower range, because it messes up my high range and thats i guess is because im a newbe and dont have the tecnic. For me its more importent at the time to practice the higher parts to develop that part of the voice, the low parts i already have. And of course i could always do better there also tecnically and i guess i will do that in the future. One thing that iv noticed is that my low range has a more "full" tone than before iv practiced the high part.

When i want to sing low i warm up low, and when i want to sing "high" i warm up high, some times i start high and the voice drops and i continue low, but never the opposite. Cant do that.

[jonpall]

Taking time to work on your low range is well worthwhile. Even though those notes are generally easier to HIT, singing isn't just about hitting the notes and also not just about hitting them with power and a good sound.

It's also about coloring your notes with all sort of things like vibrato, bends, rasp, air, volume changes, etc. You CAN do amazing things with your voice that really touches people's hearts without ever going past your passagio.

[VideoHere]

well said jonpall.

[JensTP]

I'm definitely not afraid to sing low, but the resonance starts dropping off at about C3, so notes below that have to fit the music to work (in folk and choral music I can get away with an F2, but anything electrically amplified is going to give issues with dynamics). The amount of time I spent on my lower voice is probably mainly due to the fact that I only had a falsetto head voice, but I still prefer the timbre in the lower range to the wailing high notes (I'll keep practising).

Still it's annoying that the popular perception of "having range" means being able to sing high notes. That's just wrong (especially since it's just as much or even moreso about timbre.)

The funny thing about Barry White is that his singing range in songs I've heard (a compilation and that's all) I've registered a singing range of F2-F4. He does plenty of low, resonant speaking, but never with a sustained pitch (which is integral to my perceived definition of singing as opposed to making other noises using the voice). It's led me to the theory that some voices have natural lower extension where fry "mixes" with the full range obscuring the difference. Of course that's probably nonsense from an anatomical perspective :rolleyes:

[Ivenado]

Thank you all for the answers, it shure does help me a lot, but there is one question that I didn't quite get an answer: well I think!

Some say that if you can reach notes from C2 to C5 as an exemple, that the middle of your placement should be around G3b and that whatever the note you can reach, you shouldl always come back on your natural placement?

In september I will try to join a special programm in singing by one of the best school in Canada. It is for all ages and there is an audition just to take singing lessons.

I have already met with the directrice of the programm and there is one thing that I remember in my visit. She told me that when you wear 8 for the size of your shoes, you will always wear 8, even if you extend your vocal range.

[Felipe Carvalho]

Do we have to work out as much in the low range as in the high range?

Do we have a natural voice placement that differ from each individual?

Yes. And yes.

Note that placement is not a physical thing. Its a technical definition of sensations. Two people with the same overal kind of voice may have very different sensations when doing the same thing. Mapping these sensations for an optimal posture is "placement".

As for working low range or high range. Within technique its almost the same.

But yes, outside technique, its less demanding to just squeeze your voice out on the lower notes, so you MAY have a singer that can do things with a certain quality for a certain period of time.

[Ivenado]

Should placement be connected with a physiological configuration ( stable larynx, tongue position, elevated soft palate...) when singing in a specific key ( ex:Ab 3) and that all these concordances to that point makes everythings sit in a perfectly kind of symbiose, and by doing this you can extrapolate on either sides of the range.

I know that with time you can extend your range but I guess with certains limitations to it. My sensation is quite different when I am trying to sing an high C. I guess that one day I will be able to sing it but I feel that i am almost at the end of the gauge. I can't hardly moan this note so I am wondering how my voice could get higher. I tought that C5 was high, some on this forum can sing up to the 5's and beginning in the 6's. Wow! that to me is amazing. There is a technical aspect of it but I think that there is a physiological one to.

One of the thing that makes a good swimmer is the sensation in the palm of his hand, but another swimmer who has a similar sensation with a bigger palm will swim faster.

I am working hard on it and I wish I could reach higher golds but my sensations tells me different.

[Felipe Carvalho]

Ivenado, a C5, without requirements for dynamic or tonal quality, is not such a big deal ONCE you get the middle of your voice working fine. And THATs the real problem. Those notes, from D3 to A3. Thats where you will need to ballance your whole voice, and when you get that done, the rest is really piece of cake.

As for people singing high notes.I do read a lot of claims to hit whatsoever notes but it never translates into actual quality on the songs sent, with very, very few exceptions. On the other hand, I do hear a lot of beginers who dont even go near the passagio sending much better and consistant material.

Are you working with a teacher right now?

Because for real, trying to achieve this on your own is impossible, you will just waste your time. In the best you will be able to hit your long dreamed C5 but will not be able to sing anything decent with it because the rest of your voice will simply fall appart.

Simple and generic stuff like, send your voice forward, send it back, send it up, relax, thin up, cry, make a witch voice, hold or breath, let it out, or whatever is an over simplification. Those are crude references used to BEGIN the work and start changing the coordinations, its not even close to the whole process. For real, if it was this simple, unless we take others for idiots everyone would figure out how to do it.

Take the swimmer example, what we are after are the fine tunnings in that sensation in the palm of his hand that he will develop through repetition and trial and error, refining his movement to make him faster and more resistant. The difference is that we are not aiming for raw speed, but for coordination, fluidity and agility.

In the beginning, you will not even work with this. The start of the work is to decouple everything you dont need from the thing you want to train, the larynx. The work to decouple emission of uneeded tensions is boring, long and absolutely necessary to have a stable ground to develop from. Without it, its impossible to even begin thinking about placement and resonance because there will be too much on the way.

[gno]

Ivenado - you have all the tools to sing a C5 and C6 and beyond.. it's not like swimming.. But you can only aheive this if you work really hard at the right things. And like Felipe said it is nearly impossible to do this on your own. There are some very rare exceptions - von smith is one -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZjsIZl9zrM

He claims to never have had a lesson. This may be true but both parents were singers.

[ronws]

I agre most with what Snejk wrote. Because it matches my experience of hearing. Though there are some exercises to strengthen one's low end, it works nearly the same as strengthening part of anyone's range. I've seen it written that any voice can achieve any pitch. Well, I've never been able to sing or speak as low as F#2. Even at G2, my voice is barely able to fry. C3 is doable if I am starting out with intrinsic anchoring. So, those that can go that low are mostly those who's genetic gift includes thick folds and a large diameter throat.

I've also admired Axl Rose for he is a bass who can also sing high. Some of his vocal work I cannot match in pitch. If any of you have a chance to listen to the album Chinese Democracy, listen to the song "Shackler's Revenge." That's Axl singing bass as a lead vocal. And I have never been able to sing that part. The higher stuff, I could sing that all day long until everyone has a headache.

[Ivenado]

I have a very good online teacher as Robert Lunte and also following step by step the 4 Pillars 2.0 course. I've had my first lesson via Skype and will get another one in a few days from now. I have forgot asking him those questions the last time I had a course.

Before I tought that to reach any notes, you should be able to moan it before ( cry) or get some sort of a sound. but I am happy of the contrary. It does motivate me. One day when I will sing a C6, I will open a bottle of champagne.

So thank you everybody for the info and support

[WebAndNet.com]

I think singing low is more challenging than singing highs. First, lower frequencies simply require more physical power and chances are, one's mic isn't well designed for lower frequencies, particularly if one doesn't have power behind the lower tones to move the mic's sensors. Second, in my case, I've noticed I have more controls and tissue measures (upper vocal tract vibrations, shape and vibrations of upper tract organs) on high notes than on low notes. Having less controls cause more challenges. Third, to get a low that is a full sound (that is, it also carries the high tones), requires far more control, because the objective is to create a long resonating tube. Though to get a higher tone with depth also can utilize this long resonating tube, the sound effects are much more noticeable on lower tones.

[ronws]

From what I hear, a Shure SM 58 handles lows pretty well.