Support: Epiphany or Illusion?

[MDEW]

I was thinking of a responce to another post on Screamo. I know that the sound is either false folds or soft palate.(That part doesn't matter) I know that if you are feeling it in the throat you are doing something wrong.

I remembered imitating Grandpa Simpson. I would kind of hold my throat closed and the air would build up. Like holding your breath and talking. The sound was not coming from the vocal folds but from the false folds.

I can feel the lower ribs spreading when I do this. This is not something I try to do. It is something that happens when I make the sound. I had never even tried to make sound with the vocal folds while doing this.

But today I did. It felt like my lower ribs were being pushed up and out from underneath. I was not trying to push it. It just happens. Does this sound right for support? Or does this sound like something that will hurt me?

[Felipe Carvalho]

mdew, what does it do to your breathing and your voice? what do you feel besides the expansion?

[MDEW]

No tension in the throat. Clear note from voicebox. I did not have the time to check with full song only a couple of phrases.

I did not consciously expand ribs or tense muscles. It would just happen from the sound.

[Owen Korzec]

mdew it seems right in isolation, but now you have to implement that same sensation into your normal clean singing. You may have to make further adjustments to go from the holding breath sensation to an efficient moderate exhalation force without the ribs collapsing again. i think among them would include pulling in the abdomen faster.

In other news, i'm now fooling around with that up and out from underneath visualization and it causes me to really hold my breath and build a pressure similar to that of a cough...which as far as I know is part of good support.

I'm still figuring it out so I could be wrong.

[benny82]

What you induce in "Grandpa Simspon"-mode is what CVT calls "the hold". Pretty much an action of strong support. It is also induces by the imagination of "moaning while lifting something heavy" for example. When you make a clean note out of this hold it puts you into Curbing mode or what is sometimes called "the mix, cry, etc.".

This sensation is the strongest version of support there is. It is basically pushing and holding back at the same time. Compared to this Netral is more about holding back and Edge/Overdrive are more about pushing in terms of breath management.

Imo this is a pretty good start for support. If you can make the Grandpa Simpson sound without getting hoarse, you are probably supporting correctly. Just add a little twang to that and activate the real folds and you are in a quite balanced mix.

[Martin H]

This sensation is the strongest version of support there is.

That will depend on the individual. :)

[Felipe Carvalho]

Can you hold your breath just by using it? As if your breath was stalled and your throat remains in the same inhaling posture?

[MDEW]

Thanks all.

Feipe, Yes I can stop breath without closing the glottis. I could do this before but could not apply it to sound.

Benny, I never quite understood what was meant by the HOLD. I had started a thead last year trying to figure it out. Any time I tried that I would get the Granpa voice or HULK HOGAN type of distortion.

I new I was using either False folds or artinoid squeeze(thats probably not right either). I new it was not true folds creating the sound.

I watched a Video of Tony O'hora. In it he demonstrated a Type of distortion. Which was above true folds. He also demonstrated the underlying sound. Which was in head voice using true folds.

For me the Grandpa voice appears to be vibrating above the true folds. This time I tried a true fold phonation instead of the squeezed grandpa phonation which is above the true folds.

That should make things clear as mud. :P

[Rachsing]

I watched a Video of Tony O'hora. In it he demonstrated a Type of distortion. Which was above true folds. He also demonstrated the underlying sound. Which was in head voice using true folds.

I'm pretty sure that Tony is only using the true vocal folds in that specific demonstration.

[MDEW]

I'm pretty sure that Tony is only using the true vocal folds in that specific demonstration.

That is merely what gave me the idea to try the true fold phonation while keeping the rest of the setup for the Granpa Simpson voice which feels totally different from my normal "Total physical setup".

[Felipe Carvalho]

From the description, you found the "brake" pedal as Rach describes it...

Try to develop some control over it if you intend to develop support in this way.

Inhale low, and coordinate it so that when you end the inhale process you hold the air in using just this movement. Repeat it during the day for two or three weeks.

Then move on to inhaling and controlling the release on SS, aiming to take away the pressure from the throat and tongue, oppose the exhaling movement. Aim to make the ss sound stable. Its much harder to do it like this than simply applying all the pressure on the SS.

Keep in mind its just one small part.

[Owen Korzec]

MDEW, some things I learned about the hold from reading the CVT book:

You shouldn't use too much hold or too little. It's about a balance. If you use too much you distort.

I think it is similar to how I've heard KTVA Glottal compression described.

It's essentially partially holding your breath. Not just with the vocal folds or just with the support but both.

You will feel it in your larynx, it feels like a very slight intrinsic pressure.

Cough and map the sensation the instant before you attack the cough, you'll feel the hold.

Hope that helps demystify it a bit.

However, anatomically, even CVT hasn't really given a clear answer. Someone asked that on the CVT forum and a CVT teacher replied with a bunch of technical terms about the position of supgrottal structures but also said it's more of a name for an intermediate position, not the action itself. If you use too much or too little of it, it's not a hold anymore.

Much much easier to approach it from the standpoint of a sensation, it's harder to get through scientific understanding. IMHO.

[MDEW]

I can understand how hard it is to describe these things. I have been doing this "Hold" for years with different character voices. Before when I would try to use it to sing with I would not be able to let go of the False fold sqeeze. I could not understand how people were using it to sing. Tony mentioning the underlying tone in his distortion gave me a different way to think about it. So I loosened up on the throat and Consciously allowed sound from the true folds.

A word of caution to others who try this. Years ago I thought that the Grandpa voice was what some books were alluding to when they gave examples of Lifting something heavy or grunting when you use the bathroom.

It is an a way, but DO NOT SQUEEZE WITH THE THROAT LIKE MAKING GRANDPA VOICE. you can get high pitch sounds that way but it will damage your voice. Long ago I tried that. It did not hurt my voice at the time. I did not feel any pain at all. No indication of any ill effects until I tried a normal phonation. The mid part of my range was scratchy and week and felt like the folds were vibrating at a different rate from each other.

This may be a way to find what the stomache and diaphragm need to do but not the voicebox.

[Martin H]

Yes, the "hold" is merely a sensation associated with a specific vocal fold and vocal tract coordination. :)

[bigmike092]

What you induce in "Grandpa Simspon"-mode is what CVT calls "the hold". Pretty much an action of strong support. It is also induces by the imagination of "moaning while lifting something heavy" for example. When you make a clean note out of this hold it puts you into Curbing mode or what is sometimes called "the mix, cry, etc.".

This sensation is the strongest version of support there is. It is basically pushing and holding back at the same time.

i've been doing a pranayama breathing exercise called bumble bee breathe before ever starting to sing, and i wonder if what your describing is the same thing since i use it as a method of naturally holding back the breathe. basically, without singing, you focus on making a loud hissing sound in the throat on the exhale, and id imagine the louder you make the hissing noise, the more air compression and support when incorporated into singing, or is this not a good method to practice breath management?

[VideoHere]

this "hold" is developed by learning to actively oppose the return of the diaphragm. here's an exercise i do....that helped me so much...

bear down like you are going to the bathroom, not that you are constipated, it doesn't need to be to that degree, just firm and consistant. hold that sensation of bearing down while you mentally visualize the diaphragm staying in a opened (lowered) position. don't let it come up during the exercise.

as you do this, read from a book, or magazine or whatever and be certain nothing in your speaking is tight or constricted. if you feel any sign of constriction anywhere in the vocal tract you are doing it wrong!

if you have tension in the vocal area, try to mentally visualize taking the tension and sending it below. if you do this right, you will feel your whole vocal tract relax.

try to hold the diaphragm down while reading for 20 seconds, building up as you get stronger. for this exercise keep the diaphragm down even during your inhales as you read and you will develop a sense of how little air needs to be let in (not sucked in) for singing.

it will be very physically demanding for some folks, so just do what you can do each day.

if this exercise doesn't give you a strong sense of what support "can" feel like, i don't know what else to tell you...lol!!!