hi everybody my name is Justin Stoney
and I'm the founder of New York vocal
coaching here in New York City welcome
to episode 51 of voice lessons to the
world the show where we want to help you
guys as singers by answering your
questions from all over and I'll give
you a chance to ask questions later but
our question for this week comes from
Nicole W in Sydney Australia and Nicole
writes dear Justin I'd love for you to
do an episode on diphthongs
I have diphthongs when I sing and it's
really causing my voice to be twanging
well Nicole we would love to do an
episode on diphthongs as well and so
that's what we're gonna do here today
but I know what you guys are thinking
wait a minute Justin diphthongs I
thought this was a family show I don't
know where this is headed
diphthongs but I promise you it's not
what you think okay so what is a
diphthong diphthong this comes from the
Greek word song means vowel all right
and dip means two so that's two vowels
diphthong two vowel sounds within one
vowel so an example of this would be say
an a vowel a write a a that's two vowels
in one vowel or I ah II I
that's a diphthong now we also do have a
mono thong that would be like an e vowel
e right one vowel sound mono thumb or ah
ah that's just one vowel and of course
we move to diphthongs i we get two for
one there's also even something called a
trip song although this is a little bit
more uncommon if you have like a cockney
accent you might have a governor lol
governor right so you hear three vowel
sounds within one vowel but today we're
going to be talking about diphthongs
because diphthongs are so commonly
talked about by singing teachers and by
singers let's try to find out together
why diphthongs could be a problem okay
when you're trying to hold a law
phrase or a long note I should say and
you are singing on a diphthong you're
actually changing the resonance quite
severely when you move from vowel to
vowel as we change Valls
the resonance in our head changes quite
a lot and that's going to make sometimes
a quite a big interference in the note
that we're trying to do if we go too
quickly to the second vowel in the
diphthong I'm going to show you what I
mean by this
but first notice how much difference
there is in either my tongue or my lips
when I move from vowel to vowel I I or
oh wow
my tongue or my lips move drastically as
I'm changing vow from trying to hold a
long note or have a long legato phrase
the change in vowel could really
interfere with my note or with my legato
line and that's why voice teachers so
often harp so much on diphthongs so that
line and so that sustain doesn't get
interrupted by the second song okay now
let me show you what I mean by this in a
song called on the street where you live
from the musical my fair lady
now here's without letting the
diphthongs interfere people stop instead
they don't bother
well there's nowhere else on earth that
I would rather be let the time go by I
won't care if I okay I didn't let it
interfere but now if I do let the time
go by
I won't care the shift from A to E was a
problem let the time go by I won't
and that really shifts my note as I'm
trying to hold at the time go by I won't
care if I and that is not interfered
with by the second vowel so that's
really what we're trying to do is not
let the second thong interfere with the
first we're trying to stay on the first
vowel in a diphthong pair as long as
humanly possible and then cut it off
with the second but now you probably say
Justin aren't there times in songs where
we do want to go to the diphthong and
absolutely we don't want to say that
this is bad but we always want to make
things a choice when we say now there
are styles that you really need to have
diphthongs for example if you're going
to have a country accent you're gonna be
doing some country or some bluegrass a
lot of the sounds are going to have a
diphthong like the word day right day
that has a second vowel sound on purpose
day right so if I have a man of constant
sorrow by the Soggy Bottom boys
you
I am a man of constant sorrow I've seen
troll
all my days I need to go days or else
I'm gonna days and that's not gonna
sound right my days I need to have a
diphthong in that instance now another
example would be extreme examples in
songs where it's purposeful to go to the
diphthong an example would be out
tonight from rent we've got this phrase
here I want to go
right now if I did uh-huh
tonight that wouldn't be the song it's
purposefully Oh tonight and so sometimes
in pop songs or musical theater a lot of
styles have songs that specifically go
to that second thumb on purpose so we
want to be aware that that is a common
and know that that's a choice in some
instances so we want to be able to go
back and forth now I'm going to give you
a little exercise here where we practice
together on four of the most major
diphthongs and we're going to do each
one in a row this is not a hard exercise
we're not even going to go high I just
want to give you guys a chance to try
the most common diphthong vowels and
hold the first thought and then cut it
off with the second so we're going to do
just on one note Mae Mae Mae my-my-my mo
mo mo and mal mal mal
okay these are the four big ones all
right and we're going show you what
we're gonna do we're gonna hold and then
we're gonna cut off like this Mae Mae
Mae and then my my my and then no mo mo
and finally Mau Mau Mau right so you get
practice with holding the front part of
the vowel so here we go together with
Mae Mae Mae
Meimei good now try my
good for youth moe
great Wow
nice stuff
Meimei good my my my my
good for you moe moe moe moe
good Mau Mau Mau Mau it was great
now moving on me
good stuff my
good moe
good Mao
good stuff now Mae Mae Mae Mae nice my
good for you moe
good Mao
good work now again Mick
a good stuff my
good moe
good for you ma ma ma ma excellent now
here's the last one
Mei good for you my my my my
I good mo
and very last one now excellent
excellent stuff so Nicole and all you
can see now a little bit more
information on diphthongs and how you
can control them so that they don't
interfere with your legato line so that
you can hold that front part of the
thong and cut it off at the very very
end with the second thumb or if it's
part of your style or it's an
intentional part of the song you can go
ahead and honor that second thong as a
part of your music so I hope that that's
been helpful for you guys today as
singers if you have questions that you'd
like to see us answer on the show you
can send an email to questions at voice
lessons to the WorldCom and we just
encourage you don't lose that joy don't
lose that passion don't let people tell
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Oh