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After reading my last post, I wanted to make sure that it is understood that polyps and nodules do not occur often. It takes REPEATED, HARMFUL ACTION, OVER A PERIOD OF TIME to the vocal folds for nodules and most polyps to appear. So yelling yourself hoarse at one hockey game, while not good for you, is very unlikely to create nodules!
Here are the basics about polyps and nodules: 1) Polyps form one at a time on one of the vocal folds. Nodules, on the other hand, form two at a time, one on each of the vocal folds. 2) Nodules almost exclusively form with women. Polyps, on the other hand, occur for men and women. 3) Polyps usually form AFTER a vocal hemorrhage, when a blood vessel ruptures in the vocal folds. Using cameras, we can see polyps are extremely large and they greatly inhibit singing, almost always requiring surgery to remove. Fortunately, they usually occur on the top layer of the folds, and therefore can be removed without harming the voice. THIS IS GOOD NEWS FOR ADELE, HOPEFULLY! 4) Nodules, on the other hand, tend to be small and can be unnoticed through most of the voice. You can still sing with nodules, but a good voice teacher will notice that certain activities, such as singing high notes or inability to sing staccato, will occur. Nodules do not always require surgery; they can go away with better vocal technique and consult with a vocal therapist. Those are the basics. There are other types of abnormal growths on the vocal folds, but they occur less often and singers rarely worry about them. Fortunately, good technique and smart use of your instrument can reduce most of the risks. Have you noticed I love talking about the medical background of the voice? Go figure - my dad is a chiropractor! DWS PS Most of this information comes from an excellent vocal resource by Scott McCoy, Your Voice: An Inside View. If you have been reading entertainment news, you may know that the pop singing sensation, Adele, has undergone vocal surgery. I thought I might explain, from a voice teaching perspective, how such a thing might have come to be.
Singing is a huge physical workout when it is engaged on a daily, professional basis. Singers like Adele, opera singers etc...spend hours singing, practicing, or using their voices in some way to further their career. And just like any athlete, singers can have vocal injuries if they subject their vocal folds to harmful use repeatedly over a period of time. While pop singing can be done in a very healthy manner, most pop singers have not undergone rigorous vocal training, often because they fear they will lose some individuality to their voice. This lack of training, combined with the tremendous physical demands of a concert tour, may result in the buildup of polyps or nodules on the vocal folds. From a health perspective, a polyp and nodule are two different phenomena. However, they both tend to have the same cause: excessive stress on the folds due to poor technique. These polyps/nodules are simply 'bumps' on the vocal folds that inhibit the folds from closing completely while singing, which often results in a breathy or raspy tone quality. Now, please let me clear: I LOVE Adele. She writes great music and sings with tremendous passion and insight. HOWEVER, she puts herself under extraordinary stress because of the constant touring and vocal mannerisms that have made her so popular. This probably caused one her polyps to hemorrhage, and resulted in her needing to completely stop singing and undergo laser surgery to remove the polyp from her vocal fold. Thankfully, it appears Adele will have a full recovery, but she is going to need to be very careful for the next few months. Here's hoping she gets the help she needs to prevent this from happening ever again. DWS Next blog: I will talk about WHY pop singers sometimes want polyps to develop, and ask some questions of my own. Last week, my wife and I got to visit "the happiest place on Earth," Walt Disney World in Florida. It was a lot of fun and I thought I would give you all an idea on the many live, theatrical performances at Disney.
Most of the live performances we saw were at Hollywood Studios and Animal Kingdom. I must say I was EXTREMELY impressed with the singers at Animal Kingdom. The Lion King show, in particular, featured some great voices. The dancing and acrobatics were also wonderful...visit this show if at all possible. It was a little hard to tell with the Nemo show, as the music was geared toward young children, so the singers sang with very bright, no vibrato tones that kids tend to favor. However, the acting and puppetry were wonderful. At Hollywood Studios, results were mixed. The Little Mermaid show's Ariel sounded a bit tired and perhaps bored, but certainly she knew what she was doing. Unfortunately, Beauty and the Beast was disappointing. The girl singing Belle was not a strong singer: very nasal, and often wandered off-pitch. It is possible she was sick, but colds tend to reduce the vocal range and stamina. Intonation (matching pitch) and nasality can be worked through even when you are sick, unless the cold is REALLY rough. Gaston was a little better, but it was obvious he was hired because he looked the part...his singing and acting were average. DWS Possibly the most annoying thing I have heard as a singer is: "oh, you are so young for an opera singer...you will be great for this role in (2-5) years!"
The reality of the situation, though, is this description can be completely accurate and appropriate for every singer. Singing may be the only instrument that takes time to mature physically, and we have to have patience for our body to catch up with our ambitions. One of the biggest traps a voice teacher can fall into is demanding something from a student that they are not physically capable of at their age. An egregious example is giving an opera aria to a 16 year old, but other mistakes are made. Giving a soprano a song with nothing but high notes. Demanding that a young singer sing 'louder' than they are ready to sing. Asking a young tenor to sing most of a piece in his passaggio (future blog on that word in the future!). It is not that these singers will not be capable of very difficult technical feats, but that it takes time for their voice to mature so they can handle it without hurting their instrument. A good voice teacher will recognize where a singer's voice is developmentally, and develop a curriculum of songs to fit that singer at that stage of their life. DWS Picking the right music school requires a little more effort than applying to universities that have good academic reputations; you really need to invest the time and energy to look at the criteria listed below (most important to least important).
1) Voice Teacher: This is the MOST important criteria. Your voice teacher will be the most responsible for crafting you into a legitimate professional singer. If at all possible, you should interview and take a lesson with several professors of different schools to determine which voice teacher is best for you. 2) Money/Financial Aid: If a music school wants you, they will offer considerable aid. PERIOD. If they do not offer you any financial assistance, then they are planning to make a lot of money off your tuition, and will likely not cast you in prominent roles and help you with furthering your career. You also need to graduate with as LITTLE DEBT as possible. Music is not a career in which you can expect to make a lot, or even decent, income at first. It is almost impossible to get a music career off the ground if you have substantial college loans, because you still need to spend lots of money after school for auditions, additional training, marketing etc... 3) Caliber of School Productions: You want to go to a school that offers a lot of high-level productions, as most of the music and acting crafts are learned by doing. If possible, sit in on a rehearsal or actual show. Meet the acting/directing professors. Go to a school where you KNOW you will be cast. 4) Reputation of School: While not nearly as important compared to law schools, the fact is that attending a school with a sterling reputation will open some initial doors to auditions otherwise closed. While attending Julliard will not get you hired, it will probably allow you to score a few auditions other young professionals cannot get due to their lack of experience. 5) City the School is Based in: While you will do most of your work with the school, it helps to have a very active theater community surrounding the school. That's why schools on the East Coast are so popular; you can start building professional contacts before you even leave school. DWS There is a lot of confusion about what song to sing for an audition; and it boils to down to a few factors:
1) What type of audition - are you auditioning for a professional opera/musical theater gig, college music major auditions, church position, or concert? Each of these auditions has widely different criteria on what songs are appropriate for those auditions. In addition, each type of audition puts more emphasis on different factors. For instance, a theater job will care more about your acting, whereas a straight concert gig only cares how you sing. 2) Sing your best piece FIRST - Once you determine the type of audition, you should ALMOST ALWAYS sing your best song/aria first. There are no guarantees you will get to sing more than a minute or two. Make the best possible first impression. Those first fifteen seconds often determine whether you get the job or not. 3) Create a diverse package for each type of audition - For each type of audition, you need 5-8 selections you can draw upon for an audition. While you use your BEST song first, the rest of the pieces need to be diverse in terms of tempo, acting, musical challenges, and time period in order to show the panel your breadth of talent. There is an exception to this rule: if you don't do something well, don't put it on the list. Judges seem to be very tuned into Murphy's Law - if they can pick the bad piece, they will! 4) Know any specific requirements/repertoire this company typically sings - Just like any job interview, you need to investigate the company you are auditioning for. Do they typically program a season of Mozart, Sondheim, modern English composers etc...? This is the one exception to rule #2. You need to sing a song that the company might actually want you to sing on their stage. If you sing Mozart's "Hai gia vinta la causa," but the company does not perform Mozart, you are wasting valuable time to introduce yourself as the right candidate for the job. In many ways, auditioning is exactly like a job interview: Prepare, Put yourself in the best light possible, and know the company you are working for. DWS For the vast majority of college auditions, judges are not expecting a "finished product." Otherwise, why would you need to spend four years of your life studying music? However, there are several areas college professors look for in selecting their next class of musicians:
1) Talent/Voice Quality - Within fifteen seconds, (perhaps less!), music judges know if your voice has the talent level and/or vocal training to compete on a collegiate level. This is why it is absolutely CRITICAL to perform your favorite, best song right away and start strong. First impressions matter a lot in music. To get into the Yes/Probably Pile, you need to impress the judges with your voice right away, so they can consider other aspects of your musicianship. 2) Attention to Detail/Musicality - While talent is nice, judges want to know that you have more than a pretty voice. They want to know you deliver engaging performances, with lots of changes in dynamic levels, stylistic ideas etc... 3) Musical Accuracy/Diction - Unlike the High school Region/State auditions, I find most college professors are willing to forgive mistakes (missed entrances, rhythms, pitches) or subpar foreign languages because they understand that not every singer can afford weekly voice lessons or have an excellent choir teacher in high school. Colleges also know that they can train these skills. While this does not give a student a free pass to make major mistakes, a missed rhythm or pitch due to nerves is not a deal-breaker. 4) Intangibles/Related Skills/GRADES - Believe it or not, college professors DO CARE about your high school grades, even if you are a SPECTACULAR singer. Good grades demonstrate a healthy work ethic, which is essential to make a living in the highly competitive market for singers. The stereotype of the clueless, dumb singer is outdated. Most successful singers are very intelligent, motivated individuals. 5) Voice Type - Depending on what previous freshmen classes were composed of, certain voice types may be more needed then others. This does not always mean tenors are in demand, which is a common misconception due to the lack of tenors at the high school level. At my graduate school, they actually had PLENTY of good tenors, and were looking for lower voices. However, if you are a soprano, you should expect competition to be fierce for every spot. DWS I have a few ambitious students who would like to become songwriters, so this post is dedicated to them.
First, a disclaimer: I am not a songwriter. That being said, I have lots of friends who are composers, and there seems to be a general path for how to become a songwriter. 1) Get some good music theory textbooks, or take a few courses in music theory. While most of these courses are geared to classical composition, all serious songwriters of any genre need to understand the basics of how music works, how to analyze compositions etc... 2) Once you have achieved competency in music theory, start buying sheet music of your favorite songwriters/composers and analyzing how their pieces work. Whether the composer is Mozart, Gershwin, or U2, each composer has their own unique style and tendencies that you can learn from and copy. 3) Start composing! It is okay if your first works sound very similar to your favorite artists; you learn first by imitating. Over time, you should develop your own style and know when and how you can break the rules. DWS One of the chief problems facing classical music (of any sort - orchestral or vocal) is what I term the 'Scholarization' of Classical Music. While classical music has never been mass media like pop music, it was not too long ago that most people knew something about classical music and recognized a few opera stars, such as Placido Domingo, Beverly Sills, and Maria Callas, or perhaps new a famous conductor like Leonard Bernstein.
Today, if you ask random people if they know an opera star, it is most likely a dead one - Luciano Pavarotti. Even people who might show a taste for classical music, such as people who enjoy jazz, attend musical or other staged works, or follow film music, have little awareness of the classical repertoire. I personally believe that classical music has become entrapped by universities. At school, a general culture of classical music as SERIOUS music, and not easily ACCESSIBLE, is taken for granted. Serious and accessible are basically code words for "classical music is for serious, cultured people who have a certain intelligence." This is a LIE. If you look at most classical composers of the past, their music was not aimed at a certain class. Mozart did not make an opera about a half-man, half-bird to appeal to the prince of Austria. Beethoven did not write an opera about a revolutionary woman who seeks to free her husband from the state prison to make amends with his royal patrons. Opera, and classical music in general, is an artform that appeals across race, class, and language. While we shouldn't expect EVERYONE to love classical music, it is amazing how many people accept and enjoy classical music once they are exposed to it in a comfortable, easy manner. I do not claim to be a marketing genius. I know there are business people in the classical world who are brilliant and addressing these issues right now. But every classical musician needs to contribute by being great ambassadors for the genre. Similar to American citizens visiting foreign countries, we must be on our behavior lest people take a moment of arrogance, boorishness, or standoffish as representative of classical music. DWS If you have any been part of a choir, I'm sure the choral director made some reference to getting rid of your "Texan" accent.
As someone who has lived in Texas most of his life (I moved here as soon as I could!), I love a good Texan/Southern accent. That being said, a Southern drawl is very detrimental in most genres of music. A Texan accent is characterized by a fairly tight jaw, tendency to spread the mouth on 'ee' and 'a' vowels, and a vocal production that is fairly tight and low. If you have taken any voice lessons or sung, you know these habits are not conducive to good singing. The good news is that removing your accent (Texan, New York etc...) from your singing voice is relatively easy and also works toward better vocal production. A lot of work is done by simply watching your mouth and jaw in the mirror, ensuring that the correct motions are occurring for singing. These include, but are not limited to, dropping the jaw vertically, reshaping certain vowels with the tongue, and conceiving of a new vocal tone quality for yourself. DWS |
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