- I suspect many of you are trolling YouTube
looking for that one video that will
provide you with the secret to singing utopia.
You wanna extend your singing range, right?
You wanna sing higher, louder, longer.
All good goals if your water level is beginner singer.
But if you want to move beyond vocal performances
in your shower, then you need
to stop trying to extend your singing range.
(applause)
(upbeat music)
Good day, my name is Dr. Dan,
welcome to voice essentials where everybody sings.
Now I know that many of you have been
watching TV talent shows where every singer
seems to bust out extreme notes
at the absolute top of their range.
It sounds impressive, but did you know
that loud high notes are among the easiest
sounds for a singer to produce.
Truth be told, a loud ear-piercing wail
was probably the first sound your body ever created
when the medical staff smacked your newborn
bottom to encourage you to breathe.
High notes are rather primal.
Now, don't get me wrong, it can be challenging
to sing notes at the very top of your range
with balance and sustainability,
but I'm here to tell you that singing higher
should not be your focus as a developing singer.
The best singers of the world do not
only concentrate on extremes of their range.
Why, well we only ever access those notes 1% of the time,
the other 99% is spent singing
in the main body of the voice, which,
for most singers is nothing more than an octave and a half.
So today we are going to look at those
all-important notes in the middle of your range.
I'm gonna teach you how to find them
and then I'm gonna give you some activities
to further develop their overall tone and quality.
(cheering)
Okay, to start let's find the main body of your voice,
those notes where your voice feels most comfortable.
Now as we start, let me highlight
that I'm going to be using my own voice as an example
which is almost certainly going to be different to your own.
So, I'll do my best to highlight the overall concept
while using my naturally high tenor voice as the example.
I'm going to orientate from a note
smack-bang in the middle of my voice.
(piano)
(singing)
G3, firstly I'm going to look for my most comfortable
lowest note by singing a five note scale,
in descending semi-tone steps.
Here we go.
(piano)
(singing)
Working a little harder.
(singing)
The C is a little bit harder again.
(singing)
I can probably go a little bit lower
but I think I've found my lowest comfortable note
which is probably around about a D3.
Now let's find the highest comfortable note in my range,
remembering that we're searching for the point
at which my voice will start to work
a little harder to produce the sound.
I'm going to start a little lower this time
on F3 just to give my voice somewhere to go.
Let's give this a shot.
(piano)
(singing)
There's the F5, sorry the F4,
which is just starting to work a little bit harder.
(piano)
(singing)
Had to work for that one.
(singing)
So my lowest comfortable note was D3
and my highest comfortable note was about F4
giving me a natural body of nearly an octave and a half.
Again, when you go searching for your
vocal range sweet spot, you'll almost certainly
need to start on different notes to me.
The most important thing to identify is the
way your voice feels more so than how it sounds.
The moment you feel your voice working
that little bit harder, identify the note
that stands as your lower or your upper boundary.
(applause)
Now what we've just found is your fach,
the sweet spot in your overall range.
If you'd like to learn more about fach,
and it's closely related sibling tessitura,
I'll leave links in the description section below
for you to check out after today's video.
Now as I mentioned, for most of us mere mortals,
the fach of your voice is likely to be
no more than an octave to an octave and a half.
So what can be achieved with such a small range.
Well, singers such as Frank Sinatra,
Norah Jones, Bob Dylan, rarely stray from
their sweet spot of their vocal range,
and yet each of them is a respected singer
in their particular genre.
It's all about how you use the body
of your voice to its full potential
Specifically it's all about vocal tone.
Now I like to describe vocal tone
as the color and texture of one's voice.
The underdeveloped singer will often lack
in vocal tone and their voice
will often produce lackluster hues of color.
The color of your voice, the vocal tone,
is developed by shapes that your
sound travels through along the vocal tract.
A short narrow vocal tract will typically
produce bright piercing colors,
while a longer wider vocal tract
will generally produce warmer, deeper hues.
Now try this with me, using a G3
hum the note with a forward placement.
(piano)
(humming)
Now due to the narrow shape of the vocal tract,
the note has a rather bright tone.
And the same note will sound completely different
when I hum it through puffy cheeks.
Have a listen.
(piano)
(humming)
The puffy cheek activity widens and elongates
the length of the vocal tract
which means the sound develops
into a warmer coloring.
You might like to try both shapes
on each separate note of your fach,
paying attention to how the voice feels and sounds.
I've got two more activities for you to try,
but before I give them to you,
take a quick moment to hit the thumbs up button
to let the YouTube gods know that you're
enjoying today's video.
(applause)
Using the hum and puffy cheeks,
we're going to do a pitch glide of a major third,
starting at the bottom of our fach
and working up to the top end of our fach.
(piano)
(humming)
And so on.
You should expect the hum and puffy cheeks
to feel rather different respectively
as you traverse your fach.
It's also important to manage your breath pressure levels
as you negotiate lower to higher,
being sure to keep everything nice and balanced,
avoiding any tendency for constriction.
Lastly, again using the hum and puffy cheeks
we are going to sing across the fach
using the same five note scale that we first used
to find the lowest and highest points.
(humming)
And so on.
You may have noticed that with both of these last activities
I'm always starting at the bottom of my fach
and then working up to the top.
I'm doing this purposefully because ultimately
I'm going to want to use my fully developed fach
to form a solid foundation for notes that
sit above the upper boundary of my fach,
and for that matter below.
Remember, the object is not to restrict ourselves
to the confines of our octave or octave and a half,
but moreover to build the fach's tonal capacity
and mechanical balance to serve the entire vocal range.
Trust me when I say that extreme notes become
a whole lot easier when you fully mature
the body of your voice first.
If you've enjoyed these activities then
I think you'll enjoy many of the tracks
on my singing exercise CD
Dr. Dan's Voice Essentials.
It's easy enough to download so be sure
to check it out via the links
in the description section below.
Leave me any comments below outlining
how you found the working with the exercises today.
I'm always keen to read your feedback.
And if this is your first time watching
one of my videos, welcome.
I release new videos every week designed
to develop your voice and improve your sound.
Please take a quick moment to visit my channel
and subscribe, I'd love for you to join our
ever-growing community of singers
who just like you want to raise their voice and song.
I'll see you in the next voice essentials video.
I'm Dr. Dan, sing well.