I always say my last voice was just as fake if not more so. I have always modified my voice to try and fit what people expected of me, now I do it to my expectations.
Yes exactly! Any time I change myself or my behaviour there's always people who will say that I'm "fake" but actually I was faking my behaviours from BEFORE to fit in with THEM!! I want my voice to be different because hearing myself like this DOESN'T make me comfortable or happy. I want this for myself. That's not "being fake"
Pretty much on point. I always considered my voice something shameful and were always "correcting" myself midway a sentence to sound deeper and more in-line of what people would expect of me to sound. Now that I'm cracking and realizing what who I may actually be, Ive been speaking with much less "correction" and I can see how my voice has been altered throughout the years
THIS! I actually did this. I actually took lessons to do exactly this, and it was ALWAYS uncomfortable and inauthentic feeling to me. I strained my voice trying to get it lower. Being authentic is about expressing yourself in a way that feels true to who you are. It's about bringing what's inside, outside so other people can see. There is no fundamental, natural "you-ness". It's all just a messy jumble of environment, biology, culture, inner ideation, and random chance mixed together, toyed with and contextualized until you settle on something that _feels_ right to you.
I never got a chance to thank you. I'm not trans (my BFF is), but I am queer. I had a stroke years ago that ravaged my voice and made it hard to form words and breath while talking. Using your voice coaching techniques, I'm getting better at rediscovering my own voice again.
Here's a notable example of this happening to me pre-transition - I was talking to my grandfather a couple of years ago and he stopped and chuckled to himself. I asked him why and he pointed out that I had done a funny vocal tick that my dad has done for years and years. I've also seen this kind of thing happen with past relationships and roommates, you pick up little mannerisms and quirks. ...I wonder if I should hang out around my mostly-cis-girl highschool friend group more :D
Genuinely, hanging out with people is going to naturally change your voice and vocal patterns to be more like that. Won't pretend I know why, but I can tell you from so many experiences that it's the case. At this point I've had I think four different accents while speaking English in my life due to the different ethnic groups I've lived with lol.
your voice and certain quirks you have when you talk are affected a lot by the people you listen to and spend lots of time around. i used to think it was funny how my mother said please and thank you to our google home, but after a couple years, i started doing it too without realising lmfao
A trained voice is not a fake voice. A trained voice is a voice modified for a purpose. An athletic body is not fake, just trained. If I gain 1 pound in a week, my body won't be fake either, regardless of the purpose or reason. Thanks for posting this. I can't believe it was necessary to make ♥
The natural voice argument is so dumb because it can be countered by just asking if you consider a chair to still be a tree. People are so unaccustomed to people manually changing their voice that they go anti-intellectual to justify their immediate judgements.
I really appreciate you making this-- It's something I've struggled with a lot. It's like being seen as trans is one thing, but then being seen as "trying to be trans" feels kinda invalidating. I know it's silly, but it's just hard to get out of my own head. Discussions like this help though💖
A fun thing I've been doing lately is listening to a playlist of different ranges of voices I like. Characters from video games, movies, shows, and even UA-camrs. It's a fun little way to really listen and repeat back the sounds you hear.
Been on e for about a year and a half. I think feeling "fake" in my voice has been my biggest hurdle in trying to change it. This video helped, thank you
Zhea, I only wish I'd found you 20 years ago. I've never felt more confident in my ability to be myself than these past few months, and you've been a big part of that. Your channel really has been a gift from God. I'm so glad I can support you!
Wish I could have helped you 20 years ago! I was just a child then haha. So glad to be able to help you now. I'm excited for the future content we will be releasing! It should help much more! :)
I'm not trans personally, but I've been using these videos to expand my range. It's so cool that you can do this by training your voice. I hope I can train to the point of voice acting feminine roles. Your voice is lovely btw!
From a Buddhist perspective, there is nothing that is not a contrived appearance; what is typically considered "natural" is just a consolidated habit. Once we realize this, we can use that to our advantage and consciously cultivate something that is more in alignment with our values rather than going along with things out of unconscious habit. When we cultivate something in ourselves that is motivated by the pursuit of well-being and knowledge, that, ironically, is how we are express ourselves most authentically.
Thank you! I've been worried lately about how my voice sounds different when I'm talking to different people, and wanting to stop "pretending" and just be myself. Your video really puts this into perspective. After watching it, I want to focus on what situation I'm most comfortable with my voice, and enhance it from there. (Very newly hatched.) By the way, I love your voice. You have wonderfully resonant overtones.
The philosophy of voice training is super important and not covered enough. I have LOTs of internal issues with it and it's the primary reason I won't do voice training. I cannot get passed the mental blocks.
Philosophy of voice learning is my main focus. It’s the central core to what I’ve been developing and will release soon here. Finishing my book hopefully by March. Just gave a 4-hour voice workshop I’m editing to upload to Patreon. The first two hours are literally just raw philosophy of voice learning. Because the fundamental problem in voice learning is communicating the both problem with voice learning and the orientation to one needs in order to vocally develop. Most people plateau or get stuck because they don’t actually orient themselves against the skill or the medium properly. And they struggle to do that because communication is so lossy and the action of voice development is fundamentally an internal process. Internal, abstract, experiential acquired meaning has challenges to transfer to another party internally but this is what voice teaching ultimately is. Voice development relies on one having the correct internal set of tools to create auto feedback in their own voice. The only way that is possible, is if an individual is able to extract justified true belief about every vocalization they make. Then changing the voice will become as clear as coloring in a coloring book. Most individuals lack the alignment against the medium, to which truth of voice is extracted. Imagine trying to draw with a blindfold on. That is what’s happening with most students who are stuck or struggling in voice. The blindfolded drawer, could listen to hours of drawing podcasts, or listen to hours of drawing technique, but they will be unable to implement and develop that skill on their own because they are not aligned properly with the medium, which is fundamentally visual perception. An identical situation continuously happens in voice learning unless the problem is explicitly, communicated, the orientation against the medium is clearly communicated, reasoned, and justified to be true internally for the other party, and then key perceptual tools are acquired, which allow the individual to auto feedback. Much of the problem I have with my old resources is not the techniques or examples or ideas, but the lack of communication in the fundamental orientation against those materials. That’s what I will be working on making videos for in the coming months and that’s what I have been developing for the last couple of years of research, thinking, teaching, and have finished now.
Congrats on all your hard work! I can tell you really do know your stuff. You also actually *care* about people. Congrats on this post going viral on Mastodon/Fedi btw! @@TransVoiceLessons
It's really difficult when you receive unsolicited critic for your voice from loved ones, while you just try to find yourself. Can be pretty toxic. Thanks for the video
I was born in Scotland, but for the first five years I was abroad, and learned at an international school, as well as picking up some of the local language. I then moved to the Caribbean, and again, my voice and mannerisms changed. I'm now back in Scotland, and my voice and mannerisms are changing again. The fact that some of the changes are ones I'm actively working on rather than absorbing from my surroundings is neither here nor there. The singing analogy (is it an analogy when it's accurately describing an aspect of the same idea? I don't know!) is perfect.
I sing with The Atlanta Opera and just got into a bit of an argument with another singer about this a couple days ago. He was bragging about his strict adherence to the fach system and couldn't hear a single word I was saying to him because of it...
10:36 💯 this! Framing voice as an *Essential Component of Identity* is soooo much pressure. Reframing vocal training like any other learned behavior helps the failures feel far less fatal 💜
I struggled with my voice journey in the beginning because I felt shame that I was failing to achieve a feminine voice. I got around this block by auditioning for monster voices on voice acting sites.
@@hagbarthr I dabble in VA stuff, but I always lose sight of the inhuman voices! A great venue for exploring the instrument though, to be sure. I’m feeling inspired now - thank you!!
Btw, I noticed that you lowered your pitch lately compared to your earlier videos. It's... a lot more relaxed it seems. Like you took a deep breath in and out.
Ever since i made the decision to transition just a few weeks ago, I’ve been practicing lessons from your channel and it’s been easy going for me. I catch on quickly because I’ve always had a somewhat feminine voice. Now i get to embrace it!
As someone working with patients on medication this percieved dichotomy of what's "natural" and "made up" is always a point of discussion. It just doesn't make any sense since as humans our existence and social structures are inherently "unnatural". At least that's how I see it
I have the opposite belief. How is what humans create unnatural if humans are natural and our evolution to this point is in accordance with the natural laws? is it possible for humans to do anything that isn’t inherently natural? if “natural” means unaltered from its projected course this is a deterministic distinction. how can we then draw a distinction to what humans create as somehow not deterministic in origin? I believe everything humans do is "natural" as we are continued extension of nature. It seems bizarre to think consciousness is so wildly different from "nature" that actions from a conscious agent unaligned with some "intended" (see essentialist) interpretation of what nature would want is then "unnatural". In all of these frames, the mind is creating all the concepts. I don't separate myself from nature. I am nature and my consciousness interprets externality. Typically "natural" and "unnatural" are used to unload normative judgement which is ultimately consciousness trying to predict or make a judgement about what nature *would* do, despite being nature doing it. Nobody seems to have demonstrated any reason or compelling argument for where, when, or why the boundary is crossed to no longer deem human products or actions as things unnatural despite they are fully potential natural permutations of nature itself by beings emergent from nature, reacting to a causal chain of events, and fully in accordance to natural law. Mountain dew has more in common with water than dog poop has in common with gravity yet the latter are described as "natural" in the colloquial frame and the initial former is not. The property we ascribe natural or artificial has no distinct reason to it other than some argument to agency - to which that agency is fully in accordance with nature and emerged naturally and permutates nature to form all the products. Then further, we colloquially assume all of these permutations of nature we hold as distinctly "human creation (unnatural)" are inherently limited to only emerging in this universe as human creation despite being completely possible permutations of nature to reach via some other alien species for example. If a fluid composed of the same ingredients and similar concentrations to Gatorade - would that mean now Gatorade is no longer artificial since it popped up "in nature" - once again begging the question to this artificial boundary to begin with. We are nature permutating nature, expanding what nature is through our own natural abilities limited to operating against natural law. If two alien species arrive at the same tech tree, is all of that technology now inherently natural under because it is then shown to be almost a "telos" of life?
Yea I get that, it makes sense philosophically and I totally agree. If you were to draw a line why do it at trans voices though, or medicine, if you live in a house, drive a car and eat burgers.@@TransVoiceLessons
Yessss! Preach it! Excellent video. There is no "natural" voice. Your voice is what you do and how you learn to use it. My voice was fkt by all the phony rigid religious classical voice targets I was taught. But not anymore. You changed all that, freed me to use my voice as the voice that is me. Thank you sooo much. You're a life changer❤
Thank you!!! This is good to hear, esp with the struggles I have had over 4 decades :) (habit, development, autism (blunted affect), not having actual sit-down learning about how to listen to parts of speech/imitate as those socialized young did)
I usually have another point to make after I watch a video like this, but wow... I have nothing to say. You covered pretty much everything - extremely well, too. Absolutely phenomenal video as always, Z, you just never fail to explain things so incredibly well
What a wonderful video. I have definitely felt this during my transition, to the point where I have just thought "I guess i'll just deal with this voice" despite not accepting that for anything else (that can be changed).
Not trans, but I have always been told my voice is "unnatrual". I'm an actor and performer in Australia, I have a very RP English accent from my parents and speech lessons when I was a kid. In the past I've missed out on work because my comfortable speaking voice doesn't sound natural enough. My question is: what are some of the cues that trigger listeners into believing a voice is "unnatural"? I'm comfortable with my voice, my voice takes no mental effort, but people often feel I'm "putting it on". I'd be very interested if anyone has ideas on this.
I remember noticing how as a teenager, even when my voice deepened, I didn't really lower my speaking voice to take advantage of my new vocal range, and this actually resulted in some vocal strain as I was always using the high end of my register, so whenever I went higher I was over my limit. The line between my "natural" and "intentional" voice was somewhat blurred. If I had learned to speak at the age of 16, my voice would have been deeper, but I was clinging to old habits. Which one was my "natural" voice? These days, I more consciously use a higher or lower register to enhance the tone or mood of whatever story I'm telling, using my full vocal range for dramatic effect. Is that "fake"? Your voice is one of the tools you use to present yourself to the world, and through skill or training you can use it however you like.
The editing and presentation of your thesis in this video was EXCEPTIONAL. Zheanna, this format is SO good and your passion came through; i've had this "authenticity" discourse in my head for months and this was everything I needed. Thank you!!
I used to have a thick Southern accent lol. Then it was a west California accent (after someone from California moved to our school, I asked them to teach me how to speak like that), went to another state and picked up the local accent, now I'm going through feminizing voice training. Voices change so much and so do so many other things about us.
You go, girl! You are one of the people I look up too and admire. I'm so thankful for all of your hard work and your mission to help trans people and I'm so happy to hear you speak out on loving your life authentically and being your true self! I know exactly how you feel when I was living my life to fit in to society I was never more angry or stressed out. Ever since starting my transition and starting E I have had almost zero anger in me and I find it soo much easier to let go of!!! 💗💖💖💝
This was such a good topic to bring up. I especially love how many comparisons you brought up as to what else we change about ourselves that is viewed as completely normal! I think a lot of people take for granted, or underestimate, how dynamic we are as humans. But, we're capable of changing so much about ourselves! Even believing that, I still sometimes question my own motives in trying to change who I am to what I want to be-I sometimes wonder if it's "unnatural" to change myself like this when no one else is. So, it was really nice hearing someone so definitively say thinking like that is a bunch a hooey >.
Thank you for these wise words. They make me think it might be worth working on my voice some more. Work with an SLT a few years ago improved my voice a little - though I found it difficult to practise in front of people who knew me. My main problem now is that while my speaking voice sounds ok in my head, whenever I hear it reflected back to me - in a recording or a Zoom call echo - I’m mortified by how low it sounds.
My biggest struggle is hiding my Adam's apple when I talk. I'm still trying to figure that part out, and I feel like a lot of the progress I want will come with it.
I like the approach that a person doesn't just have one voice that is theirs and no other voice can happen and in life they can choose. A struggle I have with the whole "sounding fake" thing isn't so much about my natural voice but more of the voice I am trying like when I want to sound more feminine it's the worry of sounding inauthentic feminine and maybe just society or others dictating what is and isn't an authentic feminine voice and I to learn to think past that but still there is that struggle or worry that if i am trying an accent or vocal pattern whatever else not so much I don't sound like the real me, because I mean I'm always the real me but the voice I am wanting to do is real or authentic with those who grew with that voice and maybe even outsiders of it. And then just want is a good way to measure my progress in a healthy way that isn't just beating myself up for not being good enough or whatever else. On that note with others my brain doesn't assess whether they are speaking with a fake accent or inauthentic masculinity or anything else it just listens more literally to what words they are saying rather than how real it is, I don't know, I tend to be much more critical of myself and my own behavior or abilities than I am for others.
You keep me going through my voice training sessions. I get annoyed sometimes by mistakes and everything being a slow process, but listening to you and what you say really keeps me going. And seeing those boobas keeps me dreaming of getting some of my own that hopefully looks just slightly as awesome as yours.
I have found that some people are willing to accept many visual changes when it comes to someone transitioning, but seem to really have a hard time when they see you changing your voice. It is a highly personal reflection of who they view you as a person. It is something trans people struggle with in themselves. I have!
Like when folk ask what my "real" name is. Like... this one I use now? That said I often feel fake because I can't use my original Australian accent where my new voice is located, it went from "broad" to "refined" which I could work on more but it's settled pretty well now. Just snags my ear occasionally 😅
Cis people change their names all the time (mainly last name) and people don't call that fake. It's so frustrating to see the double standard. I'm cis and changed my first name (and last name) into one that actually felt like mine, unlike my previous one which was my parents giving me the same first name as one of them. (Don't give kids a Jr name, it's often bad)
@@Call-me-Al changing the last name has nothing to do with faking it, because you just took one name if you are married :D Just randomly changing the first name is just disrespectful against your parents, ok yeah i would get it if the name is really embarassing but other then that you should not do this... And i don't get this "cis" thing, you are "cis" so you are just a men or woman.
@@kuessebrama my parents were trash, they are not part of my life. I didn't get married and take some spouse's name to ditch mine, I changed all of my name through mundane legal procedures while single. I was never called my original first name in most contexts anyway, I was a "Junior", and the name was never really mine but my parents trying to make me into an artificial clone (which is a fate not all Jrs suffer, fortunately). My now legal first name actually feels like truly mine despite that it's a common name. People who want to sever their ties to their family change names, people in the witness protection program have to change their name (usually last name), people who want to further their careers based on name statistics, immigrants who want to "stand out" less usually change their last name and sometimes first name to a more local form, there are many reasons why cisgender people change their name without getting married. Fun fact: in some cultures the mother never changes her last name, because she isn't by blood related to the family, and her children will have the last name of the father. The whole changing last name to the husband's in the west is just us historically showing that she's his property now. Hyphenated names for both or a new last name is common but not the norm as of yet. A few countries have you just stack on all the last names in the family tree like it's a pokemon tournament and the winner is the one who caught the most names. Naming conventions are only a product of what culture you were brought up in.
11:55 OMG, I knew I wasn't the only one. We reverse voice trained, and you succeeded at getting your voice back ➕ I wonder how common this vocal fry is for us.
When I first started working with my voice therapist, we had this conversation. And she pretty much said exactly what you just expressed. It was very helpful for me to start off with that foundation. Do I think my new voice sounds strange at times? Yes, but it's only because it's something new. I feel much more grounded when I am able to achieve the voice that reflects who I am. It's not easy, it does take practice and time. And just as a side note, I was raised in Chicago. I used to have that classic Chicago accent. It is largely gone now having lived in California for a few decades. My voice was authentic with the accent as it is without. The concept of a "natural" voice is complete nonsense. Thank you for this video. ❤
What I am really struggling with personally is getting to the point where my voice feels like mine. Whenever I do girl voice it sounds like it is missing something that is very me about my current voice. I want to change it to be higher pitched and less heavy. Hell, I found out that I dont actually know how to raise pitch on its own, I have always instead done the thing with raising my thorax or whatever, which makes it relatively easy for me do learn to do it (actually doing it is different, I have been pretty monotone my entire life so going out of that range is hard). But any sound I make that sounds girly sounds...wrong. It sounds like someone elses voice. It might be an issue of where the resting point/default point is, even before I did voice training my default/resting voice was already a voice where I raised my thorax, giving me a lighter sound than if I speak while keeping my voice completely neutral, at the spot where my voice box lies when I am breathing naturally, not where I move it to when I speak. But when I raise it further, to a higher point it sounds off. I know that it is a matter of time, but taking that dive is scary. What if I dive into the pool, learn to swim, and come out with a voice that just, isnt me anymore? That doesnt sounds like how I sound, but someone else? And what if that thing that I am scared of is actually a good thing? Its hard. Its scary, change is scary. As someone who is on a waiting list in the UK (I got very lucky, the clinic that was gonna take 20+ months for me to access is closing down, changing my waiting time from 20+ months to like 7 or 8, still to much but beyond the point) I wonder, will I feel the same fear taking hormones? Its the same with everything to do with transition that is to do with the body, like with posture. For me, pulling the shoulders back and in tenses the back, but even now it makes my body look a lot less masculine cause I do not have wide shoulders relative to my hips (although not to say I look small, no matter what I will look large, but I dont have a particular issue with that. except that clothes are going to get even harder to find in a good size once I transition, my ribcage aint gonna shrink enough for it to fit into the usual clothes for women lmao). I want to change, thats the point. But it doesnt mean it isnt scary. Wondering if the changes are good, something that will make me feel mroe like me, or something that will drag me further away from someone I can recognise. I struggle as most trans people do with not seeing myself in, well, myself. But for my voice, it feels like mine in some ways. I dont like certain parts of it, I hate the feeling of speaking with a deeper voice. But other than that, its mine. Its not perfect, I sound breathy, I sound british, I have a lot of very strange intonations, but its mine. I dont wish to change those, but I struggle with keeping them while changing the thing I wish. Its the same with everything else. how to I change the not me, and keep the me? As in the process of changing the not me, it is very hard to keep the me as it is. And as stated earlier, is that change of the things I think are me, even a bad thing? Its a mess. Hope you dont mind the wall of text, what was intended as a short comment spiraled into me dumping a struggle with my mental state I didnt even realise was there before this comment. Whether intentionally or unintentionall, this video really helped. I honestly was only half listening to the latter half so it may have come to this conclusion without me noticing. Thanks regardless, this video really helped me.
you have a uniquely bewitching ability to make videos about voice training that are also about _A LOT MORE_ than just voice training. did not realize how much i needed to hear someone explicitly disentangle identity from skillbuilding like this. Determination restored 😤
Yeah i mean it is. This should not be offending but it is like it is, but to be fair it would be strange if a transwoman for example would sound like a men. So it is fake but i understand the desire behind it even if i am not trans.
I've only practiced a few times but I stop because somehow I end up putting on a weird accent whilst raising my voice! I'll keep trying but it's not easy.
1:59 They what now? Who are these fockers? No but really, thank you for talking about this specific topic. Since it's the majority thought process that changing your voice is "faking" your voice, I've had that idea as a source of anxiety about how I might be perceived for a long time. I got this projection when I was 9 years old and my voice started significantly dropping. "Why don't you just talk like a normal kid?" "Why are you trying to sound like that?" I dunno I just... this is what my voice did, okay? Probably because I spent too much time around my dad and he sounded like Jabba the Hutt. I've often countered this kind of speak with something to the degree of, "Everything we do is an act anyway." I still believe that to be true to some degree. Then it's a matter of perception. Either my new voice will be as "fake" as my old voice, or it will be as "real" as my old voice.
Yeah I sometimes would get anxiety using my voice around family, I would revert. It doesn’t work out long term for my overall happiness. I just wanted to be more accommodating to older family:(
You have a very beautiful voice. It feels natural to me because it feels natural to you, so of course it's genuine. I find it has a pleasant and expressive tone-and you can take credit for that, because you had the power to sculpt it, chose your targets well and followed through to mastery. Also, I appreciate your take on this. The clear descriptions and analogies make it feel transparent and easy to comprehend, while you remain very realistic yet optimistic about the process :)
I'll always remember the time my brother talked in his "normal voice" around family, but the minute he got on the phone with a boss or coworker, his voice dropped several notes in order to sound, imo, deeper, more stereotypically "masculine," and therefore, "authoritative." Voices change during speeches, in job interviews, on dates, etc., and people often do this without noticing or thinking about it. Nobody has a one-note voice. We are all more three-dimensional than that. Great video, keep up the good work
There are men and women out there that have issues with how they sound that I pass your lessons on to. This isn't just a Trans issue. I know women with very masculine voices that sound like men. If the topic comes up I link them your videos. You have people that have vocal chord damage that need vocal therapy. Are their voices fake? Should they be ridiculed? You also have vocal coaching for singers. It's not some weird concept. So I really don't get it, From what I've seen of you through all these years is you are constantly you. And a very beautiful person who makes extremely helpful videos.
@@TransVoiceLessons To be honest I spent a chunk of my life trying to sound like a guy but was terrible at it. So I just gave up trying and decided to just be myself. So I get ya :)
When I was a child, I had elocution lessons, ie learnedspeak clear bbc English... it was because I went to a private dayschool. They changed my voice, I got beat up because of my accent... I covered that up in my next school adopting rockney cockney. Despite regarding my then esturine accent, whenever I got a little drunk everyone remarked about the "posh" accent. So recognizing that, I eventually decided to speak in the way I felt most comfortable and rellaxed which was the way I was taught to speak as a child... it was simple to change my vocal range because I ama natural mimic... it is why I loved and loveyour channel it has helped me refine my voice to reflect who I am... and THATreally helps!!
Thank you for this video you are inspiring. I have only begun me feminine voice journey and at present am stuck in what you called a plateau. Your clips give me hope that I can get a break through similar to the one you undertook. As a side note, which I hope is not inappropriate, I love what you are wearing, you look very attractive and natural.
I was just writing this comment that as a as a Scot I often code-switch as I now live in England. Took me by surprise when you said "if you're Scottish...".
To all the morons talking about "fake" voices: By definition your own voice cannot sound fake. If I use my vocal folds, the space in my mouth, my tongue placement, the resonance in my chest, the push from my diaphragm to make any sort of voice - no matter what it is - it's my voice. It cannot be fake. I made that voice using various parts of my body. Listen to Metal vocalists doing these crazy Metal vocals and then speaking in an interview after the concert. Listen to opera singers singing in an opera and then speak normally afterwards. Neither the voice they use on stage nor their speaking voice are fake. They make these voices on their own. If I give different characters in my DnD campaign different voices, different accents etc. none of that is "fake", it's all made by me, using my body to make those sounds. The mere notion, that a human being's voice could be "fake" at any point is an embarrassing showcase of how little those people know about vocal anatomy or rather humans in general. How could one even come to that conclusion?
I'm loving the new video format of this latest uploads. It really does help me understand the concepts better. And this is such an important video. I even think this might be your most essential video ever! Thanks Z!
Sadly from the looks of the subtitle sections and from just watching for 2 minutes, this video doesn't seem to be about my issue with my voice. My "feminine" voice sounds so fake to me (plus more androgynous than actually feminine, which is why I put it in quotations there) and I don't know what to do. It's like I hit this plateau a few months ago that I haven't been able to overcome. Like I've reached my voice's natural limits yet I still don't have a voice I'm happy with. I keep experimenting and going back through all the exercises and tips I find and nothing has helped. Yet what baffles me is that people I have asked say that the voice sounds like a woman's voice and they would have never guessed it has been trained and I'm just like... how!?!?! So it sucks. It's like I'm in this limbo state with a voice I don't like and don't wanna use because it doesn't actually sound genuinely feminine to me, yet other people say it does. And no amount of training and using it makes it sound better. Still just sounds like my male voice pitched up a bit tbh... So I could probably get by if I used it, but I don't want to tbh. Like I have this male voice I don't like but at least it's a natural sounding voice to me, whereas this feminine voice I trained, idk I feel so silly trying to use it because it sounds so fake to me. The entire point of voice training for me was to eventually arrive at a voice I was happy with but nah, I still just wanna go mute tbh... (Also yes, I have did the resonance exercises over and over again, I must be changing my resonance in some capacity, but it's always what I struggled most with and I still think my larynx might have barely any range. Maybe it's enough to have a barely bright enough resonance which is why people I have shared my voice with says it sounds good, whereas I still think it sounds like a pitched up guy's voice. Because it's still on the low end of brightness or something. Who knows)
I narrate with voices n stuff for my kid ... that's when I work my own voice as a woman... but I just tweak my voice until it's vibrations don't bother me as a person... but it's not fake or even forced I relax and speak and somehow my accent my whole speech pattern is just different
I love your videos, they are refreshing and make you think a bit, but I think it's good that there are finally people who say positive things to someone, hey, do something, action really well done, thank you🥰
I just want to thank Z for all her work. I actually skipped a big chunk of work on my voice, because i was singing my favourite female singer tracks, and one day i just broke my limit, started to sound a lot more feminine, and that was so sudden that my sister thought that i have a girl singing in my room. And now Z helped me alot with tuning my voice
I love this channel, I'm not trans myself but find it incredibly interesting. I had two questions though. 1. Do hormones physically change your voice, so if you didn't feminize your voice would it still sound different? 2. Dose practicing physically change your voice? Like does it physically change the muscles not just the way you use them?
A perfect example of this: When I was very young (pretransition obv.), I had a fairly girlish voice, and when I would get excited or upset about something, it would tend to go up by an octave or more. This was embarrassing to my father, and he began to ridicule me for it any time my voice began to sound "too feminine". Bear in mind, I'm like 8 years old at this point. But he put time and effort into conditioning me with the idea that the worst possible thing that I, as a boy (allegedly) could have happen to me, is to be called feminine/compared to a girl; that it was the height of embarassment to do anything "like a girl". Once I'd absorbed that idea, he proceeded to ridicule me any time my voice raised above a certain pitch, started calling me by the feminine version of my name, even in front of my peers and little league teammates. I guess he thought he could embarass me to the point where I'd become 'more masculine'. Aaaaaand as horrific as that experience was, it worked, because I eventually started over-correcting, dropping my voice down by an octave any time I was around men. Essentially I learned how to 'code-switch', since it seemed the only way to protect myself from humiliation and ridicule was to have a low, vaguely aggressive, unmistakably male-sounding voice. Took thirty years for my egg to crack because of that conditioning, and I'm STILL struggling to break that habit of code-switching/lowering my voice any time I am around men, to this day. Your voice is something you LEARNED. It didn't happen in a vacuum. It didn't occur 'naturally'. It is a set of behaviors you learned from people around you, and due to that, those behaviors can also be unlearned. Your voice belongs to nobody but YOU, and you deserve to have the voice that YOU want, that makes YOU happy; not a voice that someone else wants you to have, or that makes the people around you most comfortable. ❤️
My voice dropping at like 13-15 was one of the reasons I gave up on hormonal transition, because all of the stuff I could find online (in 2004 0r 2005 lol) suggested there was nothing that could be done about voice (outside of a dramatic and often risky surgery). Oddly enough even after it dropped my pattern of speech lead to me getting misgendered over the phone, family assuming I was my mother (landline phones were big), and so on; until my youth group at church devoted a whole *hour long session* to teaching me to "talk like a man." Now my voice affirms my gender, it's taken work, and I still have some improvements I want to make, but it get the job done lol-
Doing voice lessons, both as a singer and as someone trying to change their speaking voice, has really opened my eyes as to just how socially constructed our voices really are. Even the masculine and feminine aspects. It's really been interesting.
If there's one thing I learned in a lifetime of singing It's that there's no such thing as "real voice". What is a voice? It's our body pushing air through a muscled tube to make different sounds that we call words. Like all muscles, the more you work it the stronger it gets and more skilled you become at using it. If you stick to it long enough, it becomes your natural voice. It becomes more natural to speak that way and actually becomes more difficult to go back to the voice you used to have.
I always say my last voice was just as fake if not more so. I have always modified my voice to try and fit what people expected of me, now I do it to my expectations.
Exactly
Yes exactly! Any time I change myself or my behaviour there's always people who will say that I'm "fake" but actually I was faking my behaviours from BEFORE to fit in with THEM!! I want my voice to be different because hearing myself like this DOESN'T make me comfortable or happy. I want this for myself. That's not "being fake"
Its called linguistic convergence.
Pretty much on point. I always considered my voice something shameful and were always "correcting" myself midway a sentence to sound deeper and more in-line of what people would expect of me to sound. Now that I'm cracking and realizing what who I may actually be, Ive been speaking with much less "correction" and I can see how my voice has been altered throughout the years
THIS! I actually did this. I actually took lessons to do exactly this, and it was ALWAYS uncomfortable and inauthentic feeling to me. I strained my voice trying to get it lower.
Being authentic is about expressing yourself in a way that feels true to who you are. It's about bringing what's inside, outside so other people can see. There is no fundamental, natural "you-ness". It's all just a messy jumble of environment, biology, culture, inner ideation, and random chance mixed together, toyed with and contextualized until you settle on something that _feels_ right to you.
The first analogy that came to my mind is training. Are you in a fake body because you lift weights and gain muscle mass?
This is so absurd.
I never got a chance to thank you. I'm not trans (my BFF is), but I am queer. I had a stroke years ago that ravaged my voice and made it hard to form words and breath while talking. Using your voice coaching techniques, I'm getting better at rediscovering my own voice again.
I hope your progress is steady, tangible and a source of motivation to carry you forward!
My lord. I’m sorry you’re going through this. I can only hope and prey you stay on track and get to where you were before.
Here's a notable example of this happening to me pre-transition - I was talking to my grandfather a couple of years ago and he stopped and chuckled to himself. I asked him why and he pointed out that I had done a funny vocal tick that my dad has done for years and years. I've also seen this kind of thing happen with past relationships and roommates, you pick up little mannerisms and quirks.
...I wonder if I should hang out around my mostly-cis-girl highschool friend group more :D
Genuinely, hanging out with people is going to naturally change your voice and vocal patterns to be more like that. Won't pretend I know why, but I can tell you from so many experiences that it's the case. At this point I've had I think four different accents while speaking English in my life due to the different ethnic groups I've lived with lol.
your voice and certain quirks you have when you talk are affected a lot by the people you listen to and spend lots of time around. i used to think it was funny how my mother said please and thank you to our google home, but after a couple years, i started doing it too without realising lmfao
It's like saying trained muscles are fake
God I love Z.
WHAT AN ABSOLUTE QUEEN.
This is just what I needed to hear today, thank you.
A trained voice is not a fake voice. A trained voice is a voice modified for a purpose. An athletic body is not fake, just trained. If I gain 1 pound in a week, my body won't be fake either, regardless of the purpose or reason. Thanks for posting this. I can't believe it was necessary to make ♥
its like trying to prevent someone from changing their handwriting because its not "their natural handwriting"
The natural voice argument is so dumb because it can be countered by just asking if you consider a chair to still be a tree. People are so unaccustomed to people manually changing their voice that they go anti-intellectual to justify their immediate judgements.
I really appreciate you making this-- It's something I've struggled with a lot. It's like being seen as trans is one thing, but then being seen as "trying to be trans" feels kinda invalidating. I know it's silly, but it's just hard to get out of my own head. Discussions like this help though💖
People sure like throwing around the word "fake" when they're trying to insult people. It's so transparent and petty.
A fun thing I've been doing lately is listening to a playlist of different ranges of voices I like. Characters from video games, movies, shows, and even UA-camrs. It's a fun little way to really listen and repeat back the sounds you hear.
Been on e for about a year and a half. I think feeling "fake" in my voice has been my biggest hurdle in trying to change it. This video helped, thank you
So glad to be able to help
Zhea, I only wish I'd found you 20 years ago. I've never felt more confident in my ability to be myself than these past few months, and you've been a big part of that.
Your channel really has been a gift from God. I'm so glad I can support you!
Wish I could have helped you 20 years ago! I was just a child then haha. So glad to be able to help you now. I'm excited for the future content we will be releasing! It should help much more! :)
posture is such a good analogy
I'm not trans personally, but I've been using these videos to expand my range. It's so cool that you can do this by training your voice. I hope I can train to the point of voice acting feminine roles. Your voice is lovely btw!
From a Buddhist perspective, there is nothing that is not a contrived appearance; what is typically considered "natural" is just a consolidated habit. Once we realize this, we can use that to our advantage and consciously cultivate something that is more in alignment with our values rather than going along with things out of unconscious habit. When we cultivate something in ourselves that is motivated by the pursuit of well-being and knowledge, that, ironically, is how we are express ourselves most authentically.
Thank you! I've been worried lately about how my voice sounds different when I'm talking to different people, and wanting to stop "pretending" and just be myself. Your video really puts this into perspective. After watching it, I want to focus on what situation I'm most comfortable with my voice, and enhance it from there. (Very newly hatched.)
By the way, I love your voice. You have wonderfully resonant overtones.
The philosophy of voice training is super important and not covered enough. I have LOTs of internal issues with it and it's the primary reason I won't do voice training. I cannot get passed the mental blocks.
Philosophy of voice learning is my main focus. It’s the central core to what I’ve been developing and will release soon here. Finishing my book hopefully by March. Just gave a 4-hour voice workshop I’m editing to upload to Patreon. The first two hours are literally just raw philosophy of voice learning. Because the fundamental problem in voice learning is communicating the both problem with voice learning and the orientation to one needs in order to vocally develop. Most people plateau or get stuck because they don’t actually orient themselves against the skill or the medium properly. And they struggle to do that because communication is so lossy and the action of voice development is fundamentally an internal process. Internal, abstract, experiential acquired meaning has challenges to transfer to another party internally but this is what voice teaching ultimately is. Voice development relies on one having the correct internal set of tools to create auto feedback in their own voice. The only way that is possible, is if an individual is able to extract justified true belief about every vocalization they make. Then changing the voice will become as clear as coloring in a coloring book. Most individuals lack the alignment against the medium, to which truth of voice is extracted. Imagine trying to draw with a blindfold on. That is what’s happening with most students who are stuck or struggling in voice. The blindfolded drawer, could listen to hours of drawing podcasts, or listen to hours of drawing technique, but they will be unable to implement and develop that skill on their own because they are not aligned properly with the medium, which is fundamentally visual perception. An identical situation continuously happens in voice learning unless the problem is explicitly, communicated, the orientation against the medium is clearly communicated, reasoned, and justified to be true internally for the other party, and then key perceptual tools are acquired, which allow the individual to auto feedback. Much of the problem I have with my old resources is not the techniques or examples or ideas, but the lack of communication in the fundamental orientation against those materials. That’s what I will be working on making videos for in the coming months and that’s what I have been developing for the last couple of years of research, thinking, teaching, and have finished now.
Congrats on all your hard work! I can tell you really do know your stuff. You also actually *care* about people. Congrats on this post going viral on Mastodon/Fedi btw! @@TransVoiceLessons
Editing game has improved SO MUCH! Loving it, really helps keep things interesting
Agreed! :3 so happy with the new stuff. Glad you enjoy it!!
It's really difficult when you receive unsolicited critic for your voice from loved ones, while you just try to find yourself.
Can be pretty toxic.
Thanks for the video
I was born in Scotland, but for the first five years I was abroad, and learned at an international school, as well as picking up some of the local language. I then moved to the Caribbean, and again, my voice and mannerisms changed.
I'm now back in Scotland, and my voice and mannerisms are changing again. The fact that some of the changes are ones I'm actively working on rather than absorbing from my surroundings is neither here nor there.
The singing analogy (is it an analogy when it's accurately describing an aspect of the same idea? I don't know!) is perfect.
I sing with The Atlanta Opera and just got into a bit of an argument with another singer about this a couple days ago. He was bragging about his strict adherence to the fach system and couldn't hear a single word I was saying to him because of it...
10:36 💯 this! Framing voice as an *Essential Component of Identity* is soooo much pressure. Reframing vocal training like any other learned behavior helps the failures feel far less fatal 💜
I struggled with my voice journey in the beginning because I felt shame that I was failing to achieve a feminine voice. I got around this block by auditioning for monster voices on voice acting sites.
@@hagbarthr I dabble in VA stuff, but I always lose sight of the inhuman voices! A great venue for exploring the instrument though, to be sure. I’m feeling inspired now - thank you!!
Btw, I noticed that you lowered your pitch lately compared to your earlier videos. It's... a lot more relaxed it seems. Like you took a deep breath in and out.
Still struggling with my voice. Kinda envy you. But I'll get there too. Thank you so much for your channel, you helped me more than you can imagine
Ever since i made the decision to transition just a few weeks ago, I’ve been practicing lessons from your channel and it’s been easy going for me. I catch on quickly because I’ve always had a somewhat feminine voice. Now i get to embrace it!
As someone working with patients on medication this percieved dichotomy of what's "natural" and "made up" is always a point of discussion. It just doesn't make any sense since as humans our existence and social structures are inherently "unnatural". At least that's how I see it
I have the opposite belief. How is what humans create unnatural if humans are natural and our evolution to this point is in accordance with the natural laws? is it possible for humans to do anything that isn’t inherently natural? if “natural” means unaltered from its projected course this is a deterministic distinction. how can we then draw a distinction to what humans create as somehow not deterministic in origin?
I believe everything humans do is "natural" as we are continued extension of nature. It seems bizarre to think consciousness is so wildly different from "nature" that actions from a conscious agent unaligned with some "intended" (see essentialist) interpretation of what nature would want is then "unnatural". In all of these frames, the mind is creating all the concepts. I don't separate myself from nature. I am nature and my consciousness interprets externality. Typically "natural" and "unnatural" are used to unload normative judgement which is ultimately consciousness trying to predict or make a judgement about what nature *would* do, despite being nature doing it.
Nobody seems to have demonstrated any reason or compelling argument for where, when, or why the boundary is crossed to no longer deem human products or actions as things unnatural despite they are fully potential natural permutations of nature itself by beings emergent from nature, reacting to a causal chain of events, and fully in accordance to natural law.
Mountain dew has more in common with water than dog poop has in common with gravity yet the latter are described as "natural" in the colloquial frame and the initial former is not. The property we ascribe natural or artificial has no distinct reason to it other than some argument to agency - to which that agency is fully in accordance with nature and emerged naturally and permutates nature to form all the products.
Then further, we colloquially assume all of these permutations of nature we hold as distinctly "human creation (unnatural)" are inherently limited to only emerging in this universe as human creation despite being completely possible permutations of nature to reach via some other alien species for example.
If a fluid composed of the same ingredients and similar concentrations to Gatorade - would that mean now Gatorade is no longer artificial since it popped up "in nature" - once again begging the question to this artificial boundary to begin with. We are nature permutating nature, expanding what nature is through our own natural abilities limited to operating against natural law. If two alien species arrive at the same tech tree, is all of that technology now inherently natural under because it is then shown to be almost a "telos" of life?
Yea I get that, it makes sense philosophically and I totally agree. If you were to draw a line why do it at trans voices though, or medicine, if you live in a house, drive a car and eat burgers.@@TransVoiceLessons
Yessss! Preach it! Excellent video. There is no "natural" voice. Your voice is what you do and how you learn to use it. My voice was fkt by all the phony rigid religious classical voice targets I was taught. But not anymore. You changed all that, freed me to use my voice as the voice that is me. Thank you sooo much. You're a life changer❤
Thank you!!! This is good to hear, esp with the struggles I have had over 4 decades :)
(habit, development, autism (blunted affect), not having actual sit-down learning about how to listen to parts of speech/imitate as those socialized young did)
I usually have another point to make after I watch a video like this, but wow... I have nothing to say. You covered pretty much everything - extremely well, too.
Absolutely phenomenal video as always, Z, you just never fail to explain things so incredibly well
as someone who's a bit gullible and grew up with too many oppinioned people around (and are still there), this is really valuable to me. thank you
What a wonderful video. I have definitely felt this during my transition, to the point where I have just thought "I guess i'll just deal with this voice" despite not accepting that for anything else (that can be changed).
Not trans, but I have always been told my voice is "unnatrual". I'm an actor and performer in Australia, I have a very RP English accent from my parents and speech lessons when I was a kid. In the past I've missed out on work because my comfortable speaking voice doesn't sound natural enough.
My question is: what are some of the cues that trigger listeners into believing a voice is "unnatural"? I'm comfortable with my voice, my voice takes no mental effort, but people often feel I'm "putting it on". I'd be very interested if anyone has ideas on this.
your channel is such a godsend, thank you so much
i just love how freaking smart you are.
gosh and as a massage and movement therapist and i love the postural analogy and how similar it is to the posture of our vocal ability.
I remember noticing how as a teenager, even when my voice deepened, I didn't really lower my speaking voice to take advantage of my new vocal range, and this actually resulted in some vocal strain as I was always using the high end of my register, so whenever I went higher I was over my limit. The line between my "natural" and "intentional" voice was somewhat blurred. If I had learned to speak at the age of 16, my voice would have been deeper, but I was clinging to old habits. Which one was my "natural" voice?
These days, I more consciously use a higher or lower register to enhance the tone or mood of whatever story I'm telling, using my full vocal range for dramatic effect. Is that "fake"?
Your voice is one of the tools you use to present yourself to the world, and through skill or training you can use it however you like.
The editing and presentation of your thesis in this video was EXCEPTIONAL. Zheanna, this format is SO good and your passion came through; i've had this "authenticity" discourse in my head for months and this was everything I needed. Thank you!!
I used to have a thick Southern accent lol. Then it was a west California accent (after someone from California moved to our school, I asked them to teach me how to speak like that), went to another state and picked up the local accent, now I'm going through feminizing voice training. Voices change so much and so do so many other things about us.
You go, girl! You are one of the people I look up too and admire. I'm so thankful for all of your hard work and your mission to help trans people and I'm so happy to hear you speak out on loving your life authentically and being your true self! I know exactly how you feel when I was living my life to fit in to society I was never more angry or stressed out. Ever since starting my transition and starting E I have had almost zero anger in me and I find it soo much easier to let go of!!! 💗💖💖💝
This was such a good topic to bring up. I especially love how many comparisons you brought up as to what else we change about ourselves that is viewed as completely normal! I think a lot of people take for granted, or underestimate, how dynamic we are as humans. But, we're capable of changing so much about ourselves!
Even believing that, I still sometimes question my own motives in trying to change who I am to what I want to be-I sometimes wonder if it's "unnatural" to change myself like this when no one else is. So, it was really nice hearing someone so definitively say thinking like that is a bunch a hooey >.
"Changing your voice to your desires is unnatural!" *proceeds to drive gas car instead of walk barefoot*
make it make sense!
Thank you for these wise words. They make me think it might be worth working on my voice some more. Work with an SLT a few years ago improved my voice a little - though I found it difficult to practise in front of people who knew me.
My main problem now is that while my speaking voice sounds ok in my head, whenever I hear it reflected back to me - in a recording or a Zoom call echo - I’m mortified by how low it sounds.
My biggest struggle is hiding my Adam's apple when I talk. I'm still trying to figure that part out, and I feel like a lot of the progress I want will come with it.
It is not possible :D You even see it if you are not talking, i don't know how you want to hide it.
Late but you could get a tracheal shave if you need to.
I like the approach that a person doesn't just have one voice that is theirs and no other voice can happen and in life they can choose.
A struggle I have with the whole "sounding fake" thing isn't so much about my natural voice but more of the voice I am trying like when I want to sound more feminine it's the worry of sounding inauthentic feminine and maybe just society or others dictating what is and isn't an authentic feminine voice and I to learn to think past that but still there is that struggle or worry that if i am trying an accent or vocal pattern whatever else not so much I don't sound like the real me, because I mean I'm always the real me but the voice I am wanting to do is real or authentic with those who grew with that voice and maybe even outsiders of it. And then just want is a good way to measure my progress in a healthy way that isn't just beating myself up for not being good enough or whatever else. On that note with others my brain doesn't assess whether they are speaking with a fake accent or inauthentic masculinity or anything else it just listens more literally to what words they are saying rather than how real it is, I don't know, I tend to be much more critical of myself and my own behavior or abilities than I am for others.
You keep me going through my voice training sessions. I get annoyed sometimes by mistakes and everything being a slow process, but listening to you and what you say really keeps me going.
And seeing those boobas keeps me dreaming of getting some of my own that hopefully looks just slightly as awesome as yours.
Precious ! So clear , informative and complete. A pleasure to listen, even for the old cis i am who is just trying to stay open minded . Congrats !
Thank you!
I have found that some people are willing to accept many visual changes when it comes to someone transitioning, but seem to really have a hard time when they see you changing your voice. It is a highly personal reflection of who they view you as a person. It is something trans people struggle with in themselves. I have!
Like when folk ask what my "real" name is. Like... this one I use now?
That said I often feel fake because I can't use my original Australian accent where my new voice is located, it went from "broad" to "refined" which I could work on more but it's settled pretty well now. Just snags my ear occasionally 😅
Cis people change their names all the time (mainly last name) and people don't call that fake.
It's so frustrating to see the double standard.
I'm cis and changed my first name (and last name) into one that actually felt like mine, unlike my previous one which was my parents giving me the same first name as one of them. (Don't give kids a Jr name, it's often bad)
@@Call-me-Al changing the last name has nothing to do with faking it, because you just took one name if you are married :D Just randomly changing the first name is just disrespectful against your parents, ok yeah i would get it if the name is really embarassing but other then that you should not do this... And i don't get this "cis" thing, you are "cis" so you are just a men or woman.
@@kuessebrama my parents were trash, they are not part of my life. I didn't get married and take some spouse's name to ditch mine, I changed all of my name through mundane legal procedures while single. I was never called my original first name in most contexts anyway, I was a "Junior", and the name was never really mine but my parents trying to make me into an artificial clone (which is a fate not all Jrs suffer, fortunately). My now legal first name actually feels like truly mine despite that it's a common name.
People who want to sever their ties to their family change names, people in the witness protection program have to change their name (usually last name), people who want to further their careers based on name statistics, immigrants who want to "stand out" less usually change their last name and sometimes first name to a more local form, there are many reasons why cisgender people change their name without getting married.
Fun fact: in some cultures the mother never changes her last name, because she isn't by blood related to the family, and her children will have the last name of the father. The whole changing last name to the husband's in the west is just us historically showing that she's his property now. Hyphenated names for both or a new last name is common but not the norm as of yet. A few countries have you just stack on all the last names in the family tree like it's a pokemon tournament and the winner is the one who caught the most names. Naming conventions are only a product of what culture you were brought up in.
I have been struggling with this A LOT lately, so, thank you so much for posting this. 🧡
11:55 OMG, I knew I wasn't the only one. We reverse voice trained, and you succeeded at getting your voice back ➕
I wonder how common this vocal fry is for us.
When I first started working with my voice therapist, we had this conversation. And she pretty much said exactly what you just expressed. It was very helpful for me to start off with that foundation. Do I think my new voice sounds strange at times? Yes, but it's only because it's something new. I feel much more grounded when I am able to achieve the voice that reflects who I am. It's not easy, it does take practice and time. And just as a side note, I was raised in Chicago. I used to have that classic Chicago accent. It is largely gone now having lived in California for a few decades. My voice was authentic with the accent as it is without. The concept of a "natural" voice is complete nonsense. Thank you for this video. ❤
What I am really struggling with personally is getting to the point where my voice feels like mine. Whenever I do girl voice it sounds like it is missing something that is very me about my current voice. I want to change it to be higher pitched and less heavy. Hell, I found out that I dont actually know how to raise pitch on its own, I have always instead done the thing with raising my thorax or whatever, which makes it relatively easy for me do learn to do it (actually doing it is different, I have been pretty monotone my entire life so going out of that range is hard). But any sound I make that sounds girly sounds...wrong. It sounds like someone elses voice. It might be an issue of where the resting point/default point is, even before I did voice training my default/resting voice was already a voice where I raised my thorax, giving me a lighter sound than if I speak while keeping my voice completely neutral, at the spot where my voice box lies when I am breathing naturally, not where I move it to when I speak. But when I raise it further, to a higher point it sounds off.
I know that it is a matter of time, but taking that dive is scary. What if I dive into the pool, learn to swim, and come out with a voice that just, isnt me anymore? That doesnt sounds like how I sound, but someone else?
And what if that thing that I am scared of is actually a good thing? Its hard. Its scary, change is scary. As someone who is on a waiting list in the UK (I got very lucky, the clinic that was gonna take 20+ months for me to access is closing down, changing my waiting time from 20+ months to like 7 or 8, still to much but beyond the point) I wonder, will I feel the same fear taking hormones?
Its the same with everything to do with transition that is to do with the body, like with posture. For me, pulling the shoulders back and in tenses the back, but even now it makes my body look a lot less masculine cause I do not have wide shoulders relative to my hips (although not to say I look small, no matter what I will look large, but I dont have a particular issue with that. except that clothes are going to get even harder to find in a good size once I transition, my ribcage aint gonna shrink enough for it to fit into the usual clothes for women lmao).
I want to change, thats the point. But it doesnt mean it isnt scary. Wondering if the changes are good, something that will make me feel mroe like me, or something that will drag me further away from someone I can recognise.
I struggle as most trans people do with not seeing myself in, well, myself. But for my voice, it feels like mine in some ways. I dont like certain parts of it, I hate the feeling of speaking with a deeper voice. But other than that, its mine. Its not perfect, I sound breathy, I sound british, I have a lot of very strange intonations, but its mine. I dont wish to change those, but I struggle with keeping them while changing the thing I wish.
Its the same with everything else. how to I change the not me, and keep the me? As in the process of changing the not me, it is very hard to keep the me as it is. And as stated earlier, is that change of the things I think are me, even a bad thing?
Its a mess. Hope you dont mind the wall of text, what was intended as a short comment spiraled into me dumping a struggle with my mental state I didnt even realise was there before this comment. Whether intentionally or unintentionall, this video really helped. I honestly was only half listening to the latter half so it may have come to this conclusion without me noticing. Thanks regardless, this video really helped me.
The first voice we learn is no more "real" or "natural" than our first language, or our first musical instrument, or our first driving lesson.
you have a uniquely bewitching ability to make videos about voice training that are also about _A LOT MORE_ than just voice training.
did not realize how much i needed to hear someone explicitly disentangle identity from skillbuilding like this. Determination restored 😤
Thank you Z, my voice being "fake" is something my transphobic family has badgered me about. This video made me feel better :)
Yeah i mean it is. This should not be offending but it is like it is, but to be fair it would be strange if a transwoman for example would sound like a men. So it is fake but i understand the desire behind it even if i am not trans.
thanks for the CW on 6:22, TransVoiceLessons!
Thanks for saying all of this... It really helps me, scared as I am to use my new voice that "feels fake", thank u :3
I'm loving the new editing style!
I've only practiced a few times but I stop because somehow I end up putting on a weird accent whilst raising my voice!
I'll keep trying but it's not easy.
1:59 They what now? Who are these fockers?
No but really, thank you for talking about this specific topic. Since it's the majority thought process that changing your voice is "faking" your voice, I've had that idea as a source of anxiety about how I might be perceived for a long time. I got this projection when I was 9 years old and my voice started significantly dropping. "Why don't you just talk like a normal kid?" "Why are you trying to sound like that?" I dunno I just... this is what my voice did, okay? Probably because I spent too much time around my dad and he sounded like Jabba the Hutt. I've often countered this kind of speak with something to the degree of, "Everything we do is an act anyway." I still believe that to be true to some degree. Then it's a matter of perception. Either my new voice will be as "fake" as my old voice, or it will be as "real" as my old voice.
Yeah I sometimes would get anxiety using my voice around family, I would revert. It doesn’t work out long term for my overall happiness. I just wanted to be more accommodating to older family:(
You have a very beautiful voice. It feels natural to me because it feels natural to you, so of course it's genuine. I find it has a pleasant and expressive tone-and you can take credit for that, because you had the power to sculpt it, chose your targets well and followed through to mastery.
Also, I appreciate your take on this. The clear descriptions and analogies make it feel transparent and easy to comprehend, while you remain very realistic yet optimistic about the process :)
This is probably the most important video I've ever seen about voice!
I'll always remember the time my brother talked in his "normal voice" around family, but the minute he got on the phone with a boss or coworker, his voice dropped several notes in order to sound, imo, deeper, more stereotypically "masculine," and therefore, "authoritative." Voices change during speeches, in job interviews, on dates, etc., and people often do this without noticing or thinking about it. Nobody has a one-note voice. We are all more three-dimensional than that. Great video, keep up the good work
Agreed!!! 👏🏿👏🏿👏🏿
I always knew and noticed how my voice deepens as a type of defense mechanism
There are men and women out there that have issues with how they sound
that I pass your lessons on to. This isn't just a Trans issue. I know women with
very masculine voices that sound like men. If the topic comes up I link them
your videos. You have people that have vocal chord damage that need vocal
therapy. Are their voices fake? Should they be ridiculed? You also have vocal
coaching for singers. It's not some weird concept. So I really don't get it,
From what I've seen of you through all these years is you are constantly you.
And a very beautiful person who makes extremely helpful videos.
Beautiful message! I agree! Voice learning is for everyone!
@@TransVoiceLessons To be honest I spent a chunk of my life trying to sound like a guy but was terrible at it. So I just gave up trying and decided to just be myself. So I get ya :)
When I was a child, I had elocution lessons, ie learnedspeak clear bbc English... it was because I went to a private dayschool. They changed my voice, I got beat up because of my accent... I covered that up in my next school adopting rockney cockney. Despite regarding my then esturine accent, whenever I got a little drunk everyone remarked about the "posh" accent. So recognizing that, I eventually decided to speak in the way I felt most comfortable and rellaxed which was the way I was taught to speak as a child... it was simple to change my vocal range because I ama natural mimic... it is why I loved and loveyour channel it has helped me refine my voice to reflect who I am... and THATreally helps!!
Watching you always leaves me so clearheaded, focused and tuned in to what really matters, thank you
Thank you for this video you are inspiring. I have only begun me feminine voice journey and at present am stuck in what you called a plateau. Your clips give me hope that I can get a break through similar to the one you undertook. As a side note, which I hope is not inappropriate, I love what you are wearing, you look very attractive and natural.
I love how you sound now... it's so natural and beautiful
thank you so much
I was just writing this comment that as a as a Scot I often code-switch as I now live in England. Took me by surprise when you said "if you're Scottish...".
go off queen
~naturalisation~ making people believe that a taught behaviour is innate
To all the morons talking about "fake" voices:
By definition your own voice cannot sound fake. If I use my vocal folds, the space in my mouth, my tongue placement, the resonance in my chest, the push from my diaphragm to make any sort of voice - no matter what it is - it's my voice. It cannot be fake. I made that voice using various parts of my body.
Listen to Metal vocalists doing these crazy Metal vocals and then speaking in an interview after the concert. Listen to opera singers singing in an opera and then speak normally afterwards. Neither the voice they use on stage nor their speaking voice are fake. They make these voices on their own. If I give different characters in my DnD campaign different voices, different accents etc. none of that is "fake", it's all made by me, using my body to make those sounds.
The mere notion, that a human being's voice could be "fake" at any point is an embarrassing showcase of how little those people know about vocal anatomy or rather humans in general. How could one even come to that conclusion?
damn girl! you so smart
I'm loving the new video format of this latest uploads. It really does help me understand the concepts better. And this is such an important video. I even think this might be your most essential video ever! Thanks Z!
Sadly from the looks of the subtitle sections and from just watching for 2 minutes, this video doesn't seem to be about my issue with my voice.
My "feminine" voice sounds so fake to me (plus more androgynous than actually feminine, which is why I put it in quotations there) and I don't know what to do. It's like I hit this plateau a few months ago that I haven't been able to overcome. Like I've reached my voice's natural limits yet I still don't have a voice I'm happy with. I keep experimenting and going back through all the exercises and tips I find and nothing has helped.
Yet what baffles me is that people I have asked say that the voice sounds like a woman's voice and they would have never guessed it has been trained and I'm just like... how!?!?! So it sucks. It's like I'm in this limbo state with a voice I don't like and don't wanna use because it doesn't actually sound genuinely feminine to me, yet other people say it does. And no amount of training and using it makes it sound better. Still just sounds like my male voice pitched up a bit tbh...
So I could probably get by if I used it, but I don't want to tbh. Like I have this male voice I don't like but at least it's a natural sounding voice to me, whereas this feminine voice I trained, idk I feel so silly trying to use it because it sounds so fake to me.
The entire point of voice training for me was to eventually arrive at a voice I was happy with but nah, I still just wanna go mute tbh...
(Also yes, I have did the resonance exercises over and over again, I must be changing my resonance in some capacity, but it's always what I struggled most with and I still think my larynx might have barely any range. Maybe it's enough to have a barely bright enough resonance which is why people I have shared my voice with says it sounds good, whereas I still think it sounds like a pitched up guy's voice. Because it's still on the low end of brightness or something. Who knows)
wow i really needed to hear this. so beautifully said!!!!
Hey girl, cool channel, it was great meeting you earlier! (Hayley Uber driver)
I'm scottish. I was born in Scotland. But my first language I learned was German. Then English. But I have a mid-western accent. 😂
awesome editing!!!
I narrate with voices n stuff for my kid
... that's when I work my own voice as a woman... but I just tweak my voice until it's vibrations don't bother me as a person... but it's not fake or even forced I relax and speak and somehow my accent my whole speech pattern is just different
I love your videos, they are refreshing and make you think a bit, but I think it's good that there are finally people who say positive things to someone, hey, do something, action really well done, thank you🥰
what she said at 11:36 struck home 🥲🥲🥲🥲. im trans and also used to deepen my voice because of societal expectations ❤️🩹
I just want to thank Z for all her work. I actually skipped a big chunk of work on my voice, because i was singing my favourite female singer tracks, and one day i just broke my limit, started to sound a lot more feminine, and that was so sudden that my sister thought that i have a girl singing in my room. And now Z helped me alot with tuning my voice
"Ah Shit!(Here We Go Again)" >.>
you're great btw :3
I love this channel, I'm not trans myself but find it incredibly interesting. I had two questions though.
1. Do hormones physically change your voice, so if you didn't feminize your voice would it still sound different?
2. Dose practicing physically change your voice? Like does it physically change the muscles not just the way you use them?
WAIT i just realized i rediscovered you through your lumatone/microtonal stuff and didn't make the connection until now ^^;
Thanks for the therapy session Z :')
A perfect example of this: When I was very young (pretransition obv.), I had a fairly girlish voice, and when I would get excited or upset about something, it would tend to go up by an octave or more.
This was embarrassing to my father, and he began to ridicule me for it any time my voice began to sound "too feminine". Bear in mind, I'm like 8 years old at this point. But he put time and effort into conditioning me with the idea that the worst possible thing that I, as a boy (allegedly) could have happen to me, is to be called feminine/compared to a girl; that it was the height of embarassment to do anything "like a girl".
Once I'd absorbed that idea, he proceeded to ridicule me any time my voice raised above a certain pitch, started calling me by the feminine version of my name, even in front of my peers and little league teammates. I guess he thought he could embarass me to the point where I'd become 'more masculine'.
Aaaaaand as horrific as that experience was, it worked, because I eventually started over-correcting, dropping my voice down by an octave any time I was around men. Essentially I learned how to 'code-switch', since it seemed the only way to protect myself from humiliation and ridicule was to have a low, vaguely aggressive, unmistakably male-sounding voice.
Took thirty years for my egg to crack because of that conditioning, and I'm STILL struggling to break that habit of code-switching/lowering my voice any time I am around men, to this day.
Your voice is something you LEARNED. It didn't happen in a vacuum. It didn't occur 'naturally'. It is a set of behaviors you learned from people around you, and due to that, those behaviors can also be unlearned. Your voice belongs to nobody but YOU, and you deserve to have the voice that YOU want, that makes YOU happy; not a voice that someone else wants you to have, or that makes the people around you most comfortable.
❤️
My voice dropping at like 13-15 was one of the reasons I gave up on hormonal transition, because all of the stuff I could find online (in 2004 0r 2005 lol) suggested there was nothing that could be done about voice (outside of a dramatic and often risky surgery). Oddly enough even after it dropped my pattern of speech lead to me getting misgendered over the phone, family assuming I was my mother (landline phones were big), and so on; until my youth group at church devoted a whole *hour long session* to teaching me to "talk like a man."
Now my voice affirms my gender, it's taken work, and I still have some improvements I want to make, but it get the job done lol-
Doing voice lessons, both as a singer and as someone trying to change their speaking voice, has really opened my eyes as to just how socially constructed our voices really are. Even the masculine and feminine aspects. It's really been interesting.
If there's one thing I learned in a lifetime of singing It's that there's no such thing as "real voice". What is a voice? It's our body pushing air through a muscled tube to make different sounds that we call words. Like all muscles, the more you work it the stronger it gets and more skilled you become at using it. If you stick to it long enough, it becomes your natural voice. It becomes more natural to speak that way and actually becomes more difficult to go back to the voice you used to have.
Spitting 🔥
I feel like I sound fake.. like an anime girl or something. I feel awkward. 😭
I love this. Thank you for explaining the reasoning so clearly.
I like my voice though and don't want to change it, but I don't really have a choice if I want to ever pass 😞
I keep on getting into my voice but then defaulting to my OG voice. it's so annoying. my muscle memory just wont stick