I got the feeling of this technique within an year and even mastered it when I was about 17 years old..... I used this same methodology for hitting my highest mixed note B5....... I went higher, but I couldn't keep the chest blended with it..... All I was left with was my head voice..... So yeah, this technique is awesome and the ease + resonance you feel is just awesome 😊👍
@@newhope5729 Don't understand what he means. The vocal folds need to physically vibrate 369.994 times per second (hertz) to produce that F# pitch. How is it *physically* any easier by "coloring" the sound? 🤔
I went to singing lessons for years until I met a lady who taught me what was called the Italian method, it took about three months until one day a not came out and my vocal chords felt like they weren't moving, it was like I was flying, I was so stupid to stop going to lessons because life got in the way now I'm desperate to get the freeing of the voice back but without the singing teacher helping me with every note I've never found anyone that can replicate her teaching techniques. All teachers Ive been to sing with their veins popping out of the neck
I'm training myself as I can because I also don't trust in modern teachers and their over-efforting techniques. I hope some day I find this thing you mention you learned in the past.
It's strange, Pavarotti is trying to teach us something here but nobody is listening. The cover he is speaking about is going from vibrating the entire vocal cord length up to E natural and then vibrating only the center of the cord after that. What a gift he left us with!
@@sanjeevbalhara9954 go to my instagram ...steven burton music. I have songs and vocal lessons there explaining this method. You can look up my UA-cam channel as well. It is Steven Burton well. I hope this helps. Have a blessed day!
This was a great question about covering in the passagio. Pav idolized DiStefano but he protected the voice better in this transitional range with covering the sound than Pippo did and thus had a longer career at the top since DiStefano wore out by the time he was in his mid 40's.
Actually, Luciano Pavarotti is on the record stating that he used Gigli as a standard on proper technique and beautiful sound whereas it was his father who highly regarded Di Stefano.
For me we call it singer’s formant. It is when you create the piercing overtone within the vibrato’s resonance via the proper positioning of the oral and esophageal musculature. The resonance does almost all the work for you, enabling you to do so much more and for so much longer. Singing with proper Bel Canto technique not only reduces vocal tension, it literally causes your use of the vocal folds to strengthen them instead of tearing them down. This is not just a matter of style. I sing Gospel, Broadway, and Disney… but using proper technique is simply the correct way to sing inasmuch as without it you are harming your voice.
@@georgeda90 wording would be different. We say don't press the bow, don't catch the vibration of the string so sound can float(?). If you press too much(it's like closinf the throat i guess) then sound drops and intonation as well. But what do i know 😂
The genius of his instrument is this . . . he provides a conversational answer to the question, then asks his accompanist to play him a flourish to F-sharp, after which he demonstrates his answer vocally. The genius follows when he reverts to discussing his point and then suddenly projects the same note . . . PERFECTLY . . . in mid sentence, before carrying on as if he were sitting in a cafe.
In addition to being among the greatest tenors of all time I praise his proficiency in speaking English. He was probably taught it in grade school. Riposa in Pace maestro.
DiStefano had The most beautiful tenor voice you can ever imagine.I heard him siginging neapolitan songs.Live.He wa Singing out of key some times. .He sang together with a big Orchestra.It was i Stockholm Sweden. Memorial concert for Jussi Björling.Robert Merrill , Birgit Nilsson , Elisabeth Söderström , James Macraken and other well known singers .The audiens was mad for DiStefano , Nilsson and Merrill and of course for Mackraken who sang from Verdis Otello.
A little bit off topic but Merrill had the kind of technique my teacher taught to his students. Do you notice how relaxed his face is and how he doesn't make any strange mouth shapes? His larynx is low because he's relaxed and not through any artifice. Compare him to Leontyne or Hvorostovsky for bad examples.
That is the “point” on the voice. Those great singers who have squillo have this razors edge sound even when they speak. If you were sitting with Pav at dinner, I suspect you would have been amazed at how sharp and “pointed” his speaking voice sounded. That comes from having the correct type of vocal cords that approximate cleanly and evenly. Correct cord adduction
@@JefersonSantos-bt1ef I was just reading comments by Joseph Shore in a post about how to practice. He wrote that what Pavarotti said is not accurate. Also, it's worthless to think about what happens in the larynx since you have no conscious control or awareness of the vocal cords.
Pavarotti' demonstration was amazing and very easy to tell even for an amateur's ear. But it's typical for his voice and Italian. P has a natural beautiful but small, bright and narrow voice and can easily hit a high pitch with an open voice. What he need to do is just get his high notes decorated(dark and soft). This feeling in his demonstration very possibly doesn't fit the singers whose natural voice is relatively dark and soft already. What's more, an Italian has a natural voice position even when they are speaking which is different with the people from other nations.
I didn't get what u were trying to explain in the phrase "This feeling in his demonstration...". Would mind to elaborate that for me. Dark and soft? If you have a link to show as a sample that would be better. Were you referring to the part where he did a demo already @1:10.
Duri Hedera unfortunately you just can’t think straight. I was talking about the difference vocal issues between various native speakers. An infant has not yet been affected by the language of a certain nation. You obviously know nothing about singing and bel canto ( of course you believe that you know everything, just like any other idiots around) . Stop making yourself embarrassed in public
Jay Tamayo I think Steve FOX is referring to the fact that Italian native speakers speak in a very forward position to begin with. That is, their tongues are already tilted forward, so the vowel sounds they make, even without training, tend to already be bright. When Pavarotti is talking about “covering,” he is talking about darkening the vowel in the passaggio (crudely put, the transition between the lower and upper registers); it helps protect the vocal chords and to produce a round rather than spread sound. (For an example of someone who doesn’t cover, check out Giuseppe Di Stefano after 1955 or so.) Since Pavarotti is an Italian native speaker with bright vowels, the addition of a cover creates a balanced sound - both bright (from the vowels) and dark (from the cover). Speakers of other languages speak with vowels that are less forward. So the danger is that if they try to cover without first getting their vowels forward, they will end up producing overly dark and woofy sounds. Also (separate point), some people cover naturally (I think that is what Steve FOX means by voices that are “dark and soft already”). So they might end up over-covering if they try to imitate what Pavarotti is doing. Steve FOX, feel free to correct me if this is not what you meant. All in all, everything that Pavarotti is saying here is accurate. But a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing.
Duri Hedera I have heard both Pavarotti and Joyce DiDonato make that point about babies crying, actually. The idea is that babies are not yet socialized, so they cry without inhibitions and, often, with full support and efficiency. But once they start becoming attuned to how other people are judging them, how they “should” act, etc., they begin to develop inhibitions and tension in the wrong places. A lot of learning how to sing has to do with removing tensions that one has learned from growing up in society. That’s why some talk about the “Naked Voice.”
Depends on how you look at it. When covering, you feel the voice changing its position to the back and front of your skull. Its resonating there unlike chest and middle voice
F# is not a head bland yet for tenors, everything is after, but a note can be blend and be coveed at the same time. Covering just means you give space to the sound so it stays round.
@@DrRhyhm Not true i was instructed vis the bel canto line of Tetrazzini F should be covered but can occasionally be opened but as a rule the passagio begins at F and definitely on F sharp
It rather means holding back the voice a little, rather than blowing straight out, particularly when one is singing high and loud. your head is like a cave with lots of resonating space, so if you were in an actual cave, you would hold back your voice a bit b/c you know it will resonate (easily) off the cave walls. (no need to risk distortion)
@@cheery-hex you writing a wrong thing!I'm a professional opera's singer- this technic is a special phisical technic which lets the chords working in a special way... It can't be explain just by words here-it needs to be shown by examples how it works physicly
It’s carrying up full chest voice (TA tension) by singing into a deep moan at a loud volume. At first it feels like your head will explode but, if you engage the larynx firmly enough, it starts to strengthen really quickly and, after resting a while, it feels stronger than before and even gets this lovely loose velvety quality. As Pavarotti says to Jerome Hines in Great Singers on Great Singing “you really must make the voice more squeezed”. It’s counter-to prevailing orthodoxy but it’s what he learned from Pola and it’s what I’ve learned from one of Pola’s pedagogical grandchildren and it just works, although it’s bloody exhausting for a while until the mechanism strengthens. Gary Catona is basically teaching this only he doesn’t explain it very well because he talks about a dark, veiled tone. It’s not dark, it’s really dark AND really bright at once.
Come al solito i cantanti lirici straordinari non sanno spiegare e dimostrare come ottengono quel suono perché richiederebbe anni. E il loro mestiere è cantare, non insegnare.
I have no idea what he means by "covering the sound" please someone explain to me, my brain doesn't function without knowing exactly what muscle groups to engage or what I'm physically supposed to do. I'm a very literal thinker and I need to improve my high range and nothing I've tried works. I'm a bass but that still shouldn't mean I can't sing F#'s well.
By cover, he means the sound is deeper. As if the pharynx is even more open. Notice the first example? He starts in chest voice and keeps the same space at the top note, and it’s not deep enough and sounds “strangled?” He allowed the larynx to relax downwards as he went up the 2nd time but didn’t move away from the impingement of the chest voice.
@@tabor503 Since the time that I've left the comment originally, I actually have a MUCH better understanding of what it means to cover. My higher range sounds immensely better than it used to. Still not perfect, obviously, but I understand the concept and try to apply it when needed. Ofcourse, I'm still only 20 so my voice has a long while before it's matured but my technique has improved a lot, especially in the last 6 months or so. Now that I understand what it means to cover and the specific ways in how to engage my body to make it work correctly, I have made great improvements to my sound
@@bassmanxan3544 I recommend the discussion by Ken Bozeman: ua-cam.com/video/izobK1cyR14/v-deo.html As you know: a rich sound (be it singing or an instrument being played) has lots of harmonics. As we know, the harmonics are relative to the fundamental. The vocal tract has resonances. For speech and singing the frequency ranges of the resonances are referred to as 'formants'. The formants are independent of the note you are singing. As you go up in pitch the formants are populated with different harmonics of the fundamental you are singing. Ken Bozeman explains that as you go to higher pitch a resonance cannot be populated in the same way anymore. Now: every singer, consciously or unconsciously, has a resonance strategy. With untrained singers the obseration is that the larynx goes to a very high position. (The untrained singer is not consciously aware of that, the untrained singer is just struggling to produce the high pitched note.) The higher position of the larynx makes the vocal tract shorter, and that allows the singer to still use a resonance strategy similar to middle range. Ken Bozeman explains: what singers describe as 'covering' is that the singer transitions to a different resonance strategy that allows for the larynx to remain in a low position. Another thing that I want to emphasize: most of what goes into singing is not accessible to introspection, because we don't have explicit awareness of how the various muscles of the larynx are deployed. By contrast: we know very accurately where our limbs are. (Example: close your eyes and touch your nose with one of your fingers. We can do that because every skeletal muscle reports back to the brain just how far that muscle is extended.) Trained singers describe that when things go right singing feels effortless. Here is my interpretation of that: what they feel is relaxation of all the muscles that they can feel *consciously* The muscles of the larynx itself also report back to the brain, but those reports don't make it to the parts of the brain that produce *conscious* awareness. A trained singer who has little knowledge of the anatomy of the larynx and the vocal tract is prone to developing misconceptions as to what is making the difference. There is room for misconception because much of how the muscles of the larynx are deployed is not accessible to introspection. Such misconceptions are not an impediment so singing very well, but the misconceptions are awkward when the singer attempts to communicate to others how to sing well. Ken Bozeman describes: in negotiating the passagio the singer is actually negotiating two transitions: transition of resonance strategy, and transition of how the vocal folds are vibrating. The vocal folds consist of ligament type tissue and muscular type tissue. The muscular part has the ability to make the vocal folds thicker or thinner, similar to how the tongue can change its shape from flat to thick. In the lower to middle range the pitch is regulated mainly by regulating the thickness of the muscular part of the focal folds. That gets you only so far; at some point the muscles can't make themselves any thinner. As the singer transitions to higher pitch the regulation of pitch shifts to increasing the tension along the length of the ligament part of the vocal folds. In my own singing I prefer to think of the flow of breath as similar to how a violinist is bowing the strings of the violin. The bow is never pressed hard onto the strings. To play louder the violinist presses a bit more, but just a very little bit more. My philosophy is: the lowest breath pressure that is sufficient is the best breath pressure. Too much breath pressure will suppress the voice. Here is a hypothesis of mine. As the singer transitions to regulating the pitch by increasing tension-along-the-length the muscular sensation of the larynx resembles the muscular sensation of handling a higher than otherwise breath pressure. It would appear that singers tend to misinterpret that as 'giving breath support'. Such misinterpretation can go as far as the singer becoming convinced that singing in upper register well is just a matter of increasing the breath pressure. Again: an individual singer can have such a misconception and still sing well, but when that singer attempts to communicate how to sing well it becomes awkward.
He actually doesn’t understand the vocal physiology well. For example, he says the chords are “at rest” when covering. This is 100% wrong, because the fact you are MAKING sound means the chords are ACTIVE
I loved the "after 20 years, of course" note.
My favorite line in the clip!
I got the feeling of this technique within an year and even mastered it when I was about 17 years old..... I used this same methodology for hitting my highest mixed note B5....... I went higher, but I couldn't keep the chest blended with it..... All I was left with was my head voice..... So yeah, this technique is awesome and the ease + resonance you feel is just awesome 😊👍
@@newhope5729 Don't understand what he means. The vocal folds need to physically vibrate 369.994 times per second (hertz) to produce that F# pitch. How is it *physically* any easier by "coloring" the sound? 🤔
@@Better_Call_Raul Sorry my mind can't comprehend that at the moment
@@newhope5729 Are you a tenor? Or a baritone?
"After that you can be totally free" what a great way of putting it.
His voice was really really powerful even whie sitting, no warm-up. It souded even louder that the new singers who performed. Amazing singer.
Pavarotti doesn't need a warm-up
how do you know he did not warmed up before the master class? Singers are tricky, they warm up when you don't see to sound always amazing.
He warms up every single day! He says that he loses his voice if he doesn't warm up in three days. I believe he uses the Caruso method to warm up.
@@ahhhmouuu what is the Caruso method?
I recall after 18 months of lessons, singing my first Bb like this. It was so easy and free - felt like I was flying.
How did you achieve it? I do it but it sounds exactly like what he said. It sounds strangled
_That's why we love large men with large voices._
He was so gifted. There is no one who compares to him. He was & will always be the best. !
.
I went to singing lessons for years until I met a lady who taught me what was called the Italian method, it took about three months until one day a not came out and my vocal chords felt like they weren't moving, it was like I was flying, I was so stupid to stop going to lessons because life got in the way now I'm desperate to get the freeing of the voice back but without the singing teacher helping me with every note I've never found anyone that can replicate her teaching techniques. All teachers Ive been to sing with their veins popping out of the neck
I'm training myself as I can because I also don't trust in modern teachers and their over-efforting techniques. I hope some day I find this thing you mention you learned in the past.
Read Antonio Juvarra's books. He's a master of true Italian belcanto
I know someone who teaches that way.
Do research on sul-fiato technique. That's the real old school italian method for singing.
What a voice.
Dont even listen to opera but this man is a god and he helped Sarajevo in war a great human being
It's strange, Pavarotti is trying to teach us something here but nobody is listening. The cover he is speaking about is going from vibrating the entire vocal cord length up to E natural and then vibrating only the center of the cord after that. What a gift he left us with!
Hi Steve, How to implement this?
@@sanjeevbalhara9954 go to my instagram ...steven burton music. I have songs and vocal lessons there explaining this method. You can look up my UA-cam channel as well. It is Steven Burton well. I hope this helps. Have a blessed day!
@@stevenburton7922 Okay ill have a look. I dont have time to watch them but i subscribed .
@@eagleforce4116 Thank you!
@Marie Whitbread Thanks for sharing! He was such a good man!
I really miss him.. such an unique voice he had...
This was a great question about covering in the passagio. Pav idolized DiStefano but he protected the voice better in this transitional range with covering the sound than Pippo did and thus had a longer career at the top since DiStefano wore out by the time he was in his mid 40's.
Actually, Luciano Pavarotti is on the record stating that he used Gigli as a standard on proper technique and beautiful sound whereas it was his father who highly regarded Di Stefano.
It is exactly the other way around
Die Stefano sounded absolutely phenomenal and is one of my favourite tenors ever, but yeah. His technique above the passagio was not great.
Bravo: so wonderfully, perfectly accurate ~ an ideal example for ALL classical singers!
A great lesson from the king, maestro Pavarotti, thanks
Spoken like a true tenor.
So kind, so sweet!
For me we call it singer’s formant. It is when you create the piercing overtone within the vibrato’s resonance via the proper positioning of the oral and esophageal musculature. The resonance does almost all the work for you, enabling you to do so much more and for so much longer. Singing with proper Bel Canto technique not only reduces vocal tension, it literally causes your use of the vocal folds to strengthen them instead of tearing them down. This is not just a matter of style. I sing Gospel, Broadway, and Disney… but using proper technique is simply the correct way to sing inasmuch as without it you are harming your voice.
This covering sound is so critical for any other Instruments too
Thank you for the uploading!!
Other instruments as?
@@georgeda90 bullshit lol
How do you cover a violin, a guitar or a trumpet?
@@georgeda90 wording would be different. We say don't press the bow, don't catch the vibration of the string so sound can float(?). If you press too much(it's like closinf the throat i guess) then sound drops and intonation as well. But what do i know 😂
@@violinpraxis So, by covering he means a resonant, free and open sound?
The genius of his instrument is this . . . he provides a conversational answer to the question, then asks his accompanist to play him a flourish to F-sharp, after which he demonstrates his answer vocally.
The genius follows when he reverts to discussing his point and then suddenly projects the same note . . . PERFECTLY . . . in mid sentence, before carrying on as if he were sitting in a cafe.
Bravo!
We got a glimpse of what Pavarotti’s belting would sound like.
Now this would have been fascinating!
In addition to being among the greatest tenors of all time I praise his proficiency in speaking English. He was probably taught it in grade school. Riposa in Pace maestro.
Listen to the Master
John 14:15
If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.
I had no idea he even spoke English, let alone speak it this well.
I knew that he spoke English but I didn’t know that he spoke it well.
All greats in their felids are dedicated deep thinkers.
DiStefano had The most beautiful tenor voice you can ever imagine.I heard him siginging neapolitan songs.Live.He wa Singing out of key some times. .He sang together with a big Orchestra.It was i Stockholm Sweden. Memorial concert for Jussi Björling.Robert Merrill , Birgit Nilsson , Elisabeth Söderström , James Macraken and other well known singers .The audiens was mad for DiStefano , Nilsson and Merrill and of course for Mackraken who sang from Verdis Otello.
A little bit off topic but Merrill had the kind of technique my teacher taught to his students. Do you notice how relaxed his face is and how he doesn't make any strange mouth shapes? His larynx is low because he's relaxed and not through any artifice. Compare him to Leontyne or Hvorostovsky for bad examples.
Out of key?😂
this is so insane
What do you mean by that?
Herrlich!
💚😊💚
When and where did this take place?
November, 1987, The Julliard School of Music, New York City
@@mhoeler thanks
@@mhoeler30 years into his career!
I find his perception, interesting. It may not be correct, but it was right for him.
Можете переводить?
I keep thinking this is where Tenacious D got thier inspiration for 'Master Exploder'.
Posterò questo video sotto tutti i video degli adoratori di mingo :D
It's weird that his speaking voice has a bit of vocal fry going on
Ash Scott Somewhat telling, don’t you think?
thinks it's his accent
he's techincally a transformer
That is the “point” on the voice. Those great singers who have squillo have this razors edge sound even when they speak. If you were sitting with Pav at dinner, I suspect you would have been amazed at how sharp and “pointed” his speaking voice sounded. That comes from having the correct type of vocal cords that approximate cleanly and evenly. Correct cord adduction
Actually vocal fry is natural in a free speaking voice.
Is his description of what happens physiologically accurate? I don't know. I'm asking
I would love to hear a speech pathologist answer this!
do you doubt pavarotti???
@@JefersonSantos-bt1ef I was just reading comments by Joseph Shore in a post about how to practice. He wrote that what Pavarotti said is not accurate. Also, it's worthless to think about what happens in the larynx since you have no conscious control or awareness of the vocal cords.
Pavarotti' demonstration was amazing and very easy to tell even for an amateur's ear. But it's typical for his voice and Italian. P has a natural beautiful but small, bright and narrow voice and can easily hit a high pitch with an open voice. What he need to do is just get his high notes decorated(dark and soft). This feeling in his demonstration very possibly doesn't fit the singers whose natural voice is relatively dark and soft already. What's more, an Italian has a natural voice position even when they are speaking which is different with the people from other nations.
I didn't get what u were trying to explain in the phrase "This feeling in his demonstration...". Would mind to elaborate that for me. Dark and soft? If you have a link to show as a sample that would be better. Were you referring to the part where he did a demo already @1:10.
Duri Hedera unfortunately you just can’t think straight. I was talking about the difference vocal issues between various native speakers. An infant has not yet been affected by the language of a certain nation. You obviously know nothing about singing and bel canto ( of course you believe that you know everything, just like any other idiots around) . Stop making yourself embarrassed in public
Jay Tamayo the point is that you probably get it far worse when you singing, after you believe that you learn sth from this viedeo
Jay Tamayo I think Steve FOX is referring to the fact that Italian native speakers speak in a very forward position to begin with. That is, their tongues are already tilted forward, so the vowel sounds they make, even without training, tend to already be bright. When Pavarotti is talking about “covering,” he is talking about darkening the vowel in the passaggio (crudely put, the transition between the lower and upper registers); it helps protect the vocal chords and to produce a round rather than spread sound. (For an example of someone who doesn’t cover, check out Giuseppe Di Stefano after 1955 or so.) Since Pavarotti is an Italian native speaker with bright vowels, the addition of a cover creates a balanced sound - both bright (from the vowels) and dark (from the cover). Speakers of other languages speak with vowels that are less forward. So the danger is that if they try to cover without first getting their vowels forward, they will end up producing overly dark and woofy sounds.
Also (separate point), some people cover naturally (I think that is what Steve FOX means by voices that are “dark and soft already”). So they might end up over-covering if they try to imitate what Pavarotti is doing. Steve FOX, feel free to correct me if this is not what you meant.
All in all, everything that Pavarotti is saying here is accurate. But a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing.
Duri Hedera I have heard both Pavarotti and Joyce DiDonato make that point about babies crying, actually. The idea is that babies are not yet socialized, so they cry without inhibitions and, often, with full support and efficiency. But once they start becoming attuned to how other people are judging them, how they “should” act, etc., they begin to develop inhibitions and tension in the wrong places. A lot of learning how to sing has to do with removing tensions that one has learned from growing up in society. That’s why some talk about the “Naked Voice.”
Covered. NOT, "head voice, or blend"-which are entirely different.
Depends on how you look at it. When covering, you feel the voice changing its position to the back and front of your skull. Its resonating there unlike chest and middle voice
F# is not a head bland yet for tenors, everything is after, but a note can be blend and be coveed at the same time. Covering just means you give space to the sound so it stays round.
@@DrRhyhm Not true i was instructed vis the bel canto line of Tetrazzini F should be covered but can occasionally be opened but as a rule the passagio begins at F and definitely on F sharp
Can someone please explain this video in simple language. What does covering the sound mean?
it is really important technic
@@stefanosever2095 Thank you. It is super clear now. :P
It rather means holding back the voice a little, rather than blowing straight out, particularly when one is singing high and loud. your head is like a cave with lots of resonating space, so if you were in an actual cave, you would hold back your voice a bit b/c you know it will resonate (easily) off the cave walls. (no need to risk distortion)
@@cheery-hex you writing a wrong thing!I'm a professional opera's singer- this technic is a special phisical technic which lets the chords working in a special way... It can't be explain just by words here-it needs to be shown by examples how it works physicly
It’s carrying up full chest voice (TA tension) by singing into a deep moan at a loud volume. At first it feels like your head will explode but, if you engage the larynx firmly enough, it starts to strengthen really quickly and, after resting a while, it feels stronger than before and even gets this lovely loose velvety quality. As Pavarotti says to Jerome Hines in Great Singers on Great Singing “you really must make the voice more squeezed”. It’s counter-to prevailing orthodoxy but it’s what he learned from Pola and it’s what I’ve learned from one of Pola’s pedagogical grandchildren and it just works, although it’s bloody exhausting for a while until the mechanism strengthens. Gary Catona is basically teaching this only he doesn’t explain it very well because he talks about a dark, veiled tone. It’s not dark, it’s really dark AND really bright at once.
Okay, but I don't understand why this applies particularly to F, F# and G.
😂 ( but not now ) is for everybody
Come al solito i cantanti lirici straordinari non sanno spiegare e dimostrare come ottengono quel suono perché richiederebbe anni. E il loro mestiere è cantare, non insegnare.
Yes, a vocal genius trying to explain -- what is almost impossible to understand, if you are already near.
Sorry: if you ar NOT already
I have no idea what he means by "covering the sound" please someone explain to me, my brain doesn't function without knowing exactly what muscle groups to engage or what I'm physically supposed to do. I'm a very literal thinker and I need to improve my high range and nothing I've tried works. I'm a bass but that still shouldn't mean I can't sing F#'s well.
By cover, he means the sound is deeper. As if the pharynx is even more open. Notice the first example? He starts in chest voice and keeps the same space at the top note, and it’s not deep enough and sounds “strangled?” He allowed the larynx to relax downwards as he went up the 2nd time but didn’t move away from the impingement of the chest voice.
Literally covering it more so it resonates. Changing the vowel sound from Ah to Uh. The shape of the mouth and loosening of the jaw not wide and open.
@@tabor503 Since the time that I've left the comment originally, I actually have a MUCH better understanding of what it means to cover. My higher range sounds immensely better than it used to. Still not perfect, obviously, but I understand the concept and try to apply it when needed. Ofcourse, I'm still only 20 so my voice has a long while before it's matured but my technique has improved a lot, especially in the last 6 months or so. Now that I understand what it means to cover and the specific ways in how to engage my body to make it work correctly, I have made great improvements to my sound
@@bassmanxan3544 I recommend the discussion by Ken Bozeman: ua-cam.com/video/izobK1cyR14/v-deo.html
As you know: a rich sound (be it singing or an instrument being played) has lots of harmonics. As we know, the harmonics are relative to the fundamental. The vocal tract has resonances. For speech and singing the frequency ranges of the resonances are referred to as 'formants'. The formants are independent of the note you are singing. As you go up in pitch the formants are populated with different harmonics of the fundamental you are singing. Ken Bozeman explains that as you go to higher pitch a resonance cannot be populated in the same way anymore. Now: every singer, consciously or unconsciously, has a resonance strategy. With untrained singers the obseration is that the larynx goes to a very high position. (The untrained singer is not consciously aware of that, the untrained singer is just struggling to produce the high pitched note.) The higher position of the larynx makes the vocal tract shorter, and that allows the singer to still use a resonance strategy similar to middle range.
Ken Bozeman explains: what singers describe as 'covering' is that the singer transitions to a different resonance strategy that allows for the larynx to remain in a low position.
Another thing that I want to emphasize: most of what goes into singing is not accessible to introspection, because we don't have explicit awareness of how the various muscles of the larynx are deployed. By contrast: we know very accurately where our limbs are. (Example: close your eyes and touch your nose with one of your fingers. We can do that because every skeletal muscle reports back to the brain just how far that muscle is extended.)
Trained singers describe that when things go right singing feels effortless.
Here is my interpretation of that: what they feel is relaxation of all the muscles that they can feel *consciously*
The muscles of the larynx itself also report back to the brain, but those reports don't make it to the parts of the brain that produce *conscious* awareness.
A trained singer who has little knowledge of the anatomy of the larynx and the vocal tract is prone to developing misconceptions as to what is making the difference. There is room for misconception because much of how the muscles of the larynx are deployed is not accessible to introspection. Such misconceptions are not an impediment so singing very well, but the misconceptions are awkward when the singer attempts to communicate to others how to sing well.
Ken Bozeman describes: in negotiating the passagio the singer is actually negotiating two transitions: transition of resonance strategy, and transition of how the vocal folds are vibrating. The vocal folds consist of ligament type tissue and muscular type tissue. The muscular part has the ability to make the vocal folds thicker or thinner, similar to how the tongue can change its shape from flat to thick. In the lower to middle range the pitch is regulated mainly by regulating the thickness of the muscular part of the focal folds. That gets you only so far; at some point the muscles can't make themselves any thinner. As the singer transitions to higher pitch the regulation of pitch shifts to increasing the tension along the length of the ligament part of the vocal folds.
In my own singing I prefer to think of the flow of breath as similar to how a violinist is bowing the strings of the violin. The bow is never pressed hard onto the strings. To play louder the violinist presses a bit more, but just a very little bit more.
My philosophy is: the lowest breath pressure that is sufficient is the best breath pressure. Too much breath pressure will suppress the voice.
Here is a hypothesis of mine. As the singer transitions to regulating the pitch by increasing tension-along-the-length the muscular sensation of the larynx resembles the muscular sensation of handling a higher than otherwise breath pressure. It would appear that singers tend to misinterpret that as 'giving breath support'. Such misinterpretation can go as far as the singer becoming convinced that singing in upper register well is just a matter of increasing the breath pressure.
Again: an individual singer can have such a misconception and still sing well, but when that singer attempts to communicate how to sing well it becomes awkward.
coverd the sound need only F.F#.G？
G# more high note isn't needed？
Looks like Jack Black!
Sounds a bit different though.
He actually doesn’t understand the vocal physiology well. For example, he says the chords are “at rest” when covering. This is 100% wrong, because the fact you are MAKING sound means the chords are ACTIVE
Maybe he means active but relaxed