Learning Projects

This week I continued practicing the falsetto with and without last week’s song. During the lesson, my teacher shared a few clarifications on how to practice the falsetto. I learned that it was okay to go high, but not really high (beyond the high C). I discovered that it was such a thing as a low falsetto register (I never knew about that). My teacher showed me how that sounded with his voice, and then I tried it myself (you can listen to a recording down below).

In the lesson, we also tried different vocalizations derived from the ‘I’ to ‘O’ exercise. I found it interesting that, as he showed me the exercises, he changed from ‘I’ to ‘O’ very quickly. Somehow, I thought I should stay there for longer. My teacher also mentioned that this register was important to round up the voice in general. Now that I know that it goes lower than what I thought, this makes a lot of sense.

[Read more…] about Singing in German (Week 9) – Falsetto (part 2)

One of the side benefits of taking singing lessons is that you start noticing new things in the music you listen to. That can happen even with songs you’ve already listened to dozens of times. Sometime during last week, it occurred to me as I was listening to All night, all day, by Lawrence Brownlee. There’s a part in the song where he sings with the UH falsetto-sound, I used during my lessons. Or, at least, it seemed to me! 😄

My idea here was to use this fragment of the piece to practice falsetto myself. I know by experience, that making a practice session or routine more fun or interesting always pays off. My goal was to make the practice time more entertaining. To add one more reason to look forward to it. This one is not in German, but hopefully, it will help me with the other songs!

[Read more…] about Singing in German (Week 8) – Falsetto Practice with Songs

Now that I have a repertoire of vocalization exercises, I thought it could be a good idea to put them all together and create sort of a daily routine. I asked Patrick about that, and he suggested an order based on the exercises that we’ve seen so far in our weekly lessons. Down below in the recording section, you can listen to my brand-new routine 😄.

When I started this project, I had anticipated that I’d probably improve some aspects of my German skills as a secondary benefit. After the seventh lesson, I can say that the German ‘gains’ in this regard are already greater than I had already expected. I’m expanding my vocabulary and getting comfortable interacting in a lesson in German all the time (we almost never resort to English; usually only when introducing new words, such as Gaumensegeln (soft palate). The main thing, though, is pronunciation.

[Read more…] about Singing in German (Week 7) – Vocalization Routine

One of the recent challenges I faced during this week of practice was connected with singing ‘A’ vowels in the high register. After talking about this with my voice teacher, he mentioned that is a common challenge for most students. Good to know that! 😄 But knowing others have the same problem shouldn’t be enough of a reason to get contented. There’s work to do. Opportunities for improvement!

During my daily practice, I noticed that I had it especially easy with the ‘I’ and the ‘E’. That’s one of the reasons I decided to stick mainly to those vowels in my vocalizations. Using just these vowels makes it easier to keep a forward sound and avoid the pitfalls of singing with the throat (which I still do!). I also noticed that when I keep that forward sound, I tend to rely more on a good appoggio (better breathing support).

[Read more…] about Singing in German (Week 6) – Vowel Transformation

One of my favorite teaching devices is using analogies and similes to explain something. I appreciate that a lot also as a student. In the past weeks, my voice teacher has used this resource multiple times. For lowering the larynx, I’ve been told to think of yawning (even, starting a yawn). The second one was thinking of the facial gesture of someone who is crying (the cheeks slightly upwards, the eyes a bit closed). This is great for inducing the kind of larynx placement we are looking for.

Speaking of crying, it seems like the body mechanisms involved could facilitate voice production for singers. Just hear a baby crying! They can get very loud and cry for long stretches of time without needing any voice training. When a person cries, there’s an emotional element already there that is part of this body mechanism. For that reason, it would be a good idea to remind ourselves of singing as an act of emotion sharing. We could even bring this to our vocalizations!

[Read more…] about Singing in German (Week 5) – Der Neugierige

This week I had my fourth singing lesson. The practice goes well, even though I had a couple of days when I didn’t do any vocalization or singing. I continue keeping track of the days I practice as a way of trying to keep a longer streak. The goal is to make a long chain and not to break it by missing days. I’m getting there! 😊

Speaking of practice, it’s interesting to see the differences among this project, Chess in Italian, and Pen Drawing in German. When practicing chess, I kept a log on a Google Docs document where I wrote down what I practiced every single day. When practicing pen drawing, I also kept a lot, this time in the pad I used to draw. In both occasions, I would write down the date and starting/finishing hour, day by day. This way I managed to practice most days at the beginning of the year (Chess in Italian), skipping the practice days for around a week at the end of January, due to a family emergency. With Pen Drawing in German, I didn’t miss or skip days.

[Read more…] about Singing in German (Week 4) – Falsetto Voice