Feel the tickle!

We are not supposed to listen to ourselves when we sing - we all know this. Sing from sensation! So that little tickle you get when your inner ear accepts those vibrations from your pharynx? I am talking about what it feels from the inside - not the outside. Well, when you take a look at the relationship between the Eustachian tube and an elevated soft palate, that may explain why when that tickle is pronounced, you have a very open throat and elevated soft palate as a result. I know my neck and throat are relaxed and open and ready to respond to the air I am sending when I get that tickle. And soft pharyngeal surfaces being the most flexible, we can move that voice around with a lot of freedom (flexibility, agility, volume, etc.). My voice feels like it is coming out of my ears and does that feel good! So go for the tickle sensation. Start in the middle voice (as you always should) and with closed vowels. Concentrate on releasing up and inside as well as down during inhalation which is in and of itself a state of relaxation. Even given tense muscles, deliberate vocal warmups can influence those muscles to relax. Then feel those good vibrations! https://otosurgeryatlas.stanford.edu/otologic-surgery-atlas/surgical-anatomy-of-the-ear/eustachian-tube/

Just like working out…

Just as you would work out to keep your body in shape, so does your vocalis muscle need to work out - and not always just the warm ups you are doing for that weekly choral ensemble or cramming for a performance. You can’t lift heavy weights without building up to it. Your voice needs to be treated the same way. Consider a daily regimen that gradually brings those folds together and then stretches them up and down the range and through multiple vowel shapes and phrase lengths. Even if you don’t have time for repertoire, put your voice through the paces of onset, resonance balancing, agility, sustaining, and voce di testa. Richard Miller has some of the best!

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