I talked to Cindy about the "heavy" and "low" feeling I've been having in my voice; anything remotely high was just too hard to sing, and my vocal agility was down.
We started out with [prrri] on 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, with a diagonal "smile" that doesn't make the snarl. The stretch should feel particularly strong around the back molars. Make sure to keep the height even as you go down in pitch. Have "pre sneeze" on "show me" on 8531. The sneeze should feel like a downward "shot," rather than up. This provides the approach from above.
When going down the scale, it should always feel like the descent down the scale is not like a slide, but an upward arch. "shy" on 87654321. Use a hand cue to stay over the sound, rather than craning the neck. The sound has to follow the contour of the roof of the mouth, and then it evens out. We're practicing this in the middle range, rather than in the high, because if you establish good technique below, higher is much easier.
"pan" on 54321, slowly, no nasality in the vowel. The biggest mistake is on the note just below the highest note on a scale; it needs to be in an arch. As you go up, allow the sound to be lighter. It almost sounds like you add more "ah" (as in pan) to the vowel on the normal [a]. Think of the baseball with the red dot--in order to roll down, the red dot has to roll up. "gira la voce"
"top jaw," coming down into the pitch.
[fi fe fi] with that sort of "Emily Floyd in Strongest Suit" sort of facial expression (a.k.a. "diagonal cheek tug"). The sound is really high and forward. Use bright vowels, "cheeky" things, sneezy things. It's all about lift, not about downward space.
"Play ball" on 8-7654321, starting with a bright vowel then a rounder vowel.
Use "jiggles" or quick oscillation of the voice in wobble, and allow the voice to dip up and down to get unstuck from the speech/low voice mechanism. The pitch doesn't really matter; what matters is that you can release out of the mechanism. "oh?" This inflection should be the same sort of sensation you have on upward releases.
[o] 13-24-35-42-31. Then switch to "ow." Even upward movement feels like falling down.
Go back to using "bite down on the apple" to remind yourself of the internal lift. When the soft palette is lifting, the sensation comes more in the molars--"hammer the molars into the skull and keep them there!"
Look around if you feel your A-O joint getting stiff. It's the same thing as crazy face except for your neck. If you have a bad habit, do something else to replace that habit. "Scratch your back instead of picking your nose. Once you stop picking your nose, you can stop scratching your back."
"Voi che sapete": To avoid getting "stuck," try opening your mouth/sticking your tongue out frequently to refresh. Try umlauting [i] on upward movements. Cheeks and lips are stretchy/loose. If things get shallow, release more in the jaw, maintaining the height in the cheeks/molars. Work on double consonants. Make sure the [r] still have pitch.
On high [i] vowels, modify to [e]. (Above a D5 ish is where you start to modify.) Remember to modify back to the original vowel when you go back down. Use the apple here.
[u] is a high vowel. I have a tendency to think of it as a low vowel, but it's very high because the back of the tongue is high. I'm pulling down on the molars too much. This is where you hammer the molars up. I'm used to using pressure; instead, "click" up.
Keep height despite changes in vowels! Especially with schwa moving to other vowels. When you round your lips, you need to stretch your lips/cheeks around that to maintain height/lift.
TAKE-AWAYS:
- diagonal cheek tug
- avoid getting stuck by moving around the A-O joint, crazy face, sticking out the tongue, etc.
- Hammer those molars up! Instead of using pressure for upward pitch change, "click" up.
- gira la voce
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