I rarely, if ever talk about vocal technique, not because I don’t think about it (often!) However, I have learned that like many things, it is very personal and while I do believe the end results of optimum singing are the same, the process each singer goes through can be quite different. I bring this up because I recently finished singing the role of Don Parmenione in Rossini’s “L’occasione fa il ladro.” After one performance, I was told that someone in the audience was very complimentary of my technique. At the same performance, one of the orchestra members complimented me on my singing and musicality. While I love that I received a wonderful review, I was most happy that it was recognized by others that I had worked hard on my technical security in order to make the work sound “easy.”
When I started studying voice as a freshman in college, I had NO idea about technique. I simply sang and when it was too high or too low I figured the piece was not for me. Luckily by my junior year, I found a teacher who got me onto the right path and that luck continued throughout grad school and now into my professional life with teachers who really talk about HOW the voice works and what it should FEEL like. (Note that I said “feel” and not “sound.”)
A talk on technique could take up pages and pages, but in order to give some insight into what I do; I will break it down into the SSS system. When I am warming up my voice, I am always aiming for Space, Spin and Squillo. These three elements working together help me feel like I am singing at my best.
Space. As an undergrad, I learned a lot about singing on vowels. Vowels are what we singers spend so much time on during the act of singing. But what I also learned is that depending on what part of the range one is in, the vowel’s space will alter and in my case modify. So most of my warm up time is finding where a particular vowel resonates best within my range. For me, the space is created by the amount of lift of the soft palate and the placement of the tongue. This is an amazing coordination act and yet, for me, is the foundation for all my sound. My current teacher believes it is necessary to find your optimum space on each vowel (and there are lots of them, especially in French!) in each part of your voice. I’ll admit, it can be VERY tedious, and yet so helpful when learning a role.
Spin. This is what I call continued airflow. Many people use a myriad of words and images to describe this: support, energy, imagine a ball floating on a fountain, etc… But for me, I think of the voice vibrating at an “intense, yet relaxed rate.” One of my first warm-ups before I sing anything is to sing “La, Le, Li, Lo, Lu” on one pitch. This helps me coordinate the amount of spin in the voice with the vowel space. I know my breath or spin is working when it feels easy. Some days it clicks faster than others, but I always try to be patient as we know voices have a personality of their own. As I go higher, I often think of a “sigh” into the vowel as it makes for an easier coordination of onset and spin. Again, this did not come easily, but it helps to ensure that I am using breath and space versus muscle to sing in the upper part of my voice.
Squillo. This is another word that many people talk about in which there are multiple terms: placement, ring, steel etc…For me, this was one of the last elements to come into my voice, not because it wasn’t naturally there, but because I spent several years listening to myself and I liked what I perceived as a warm, rich, velvetly sound. Unfortunately, no one else could hear it and all that “color” was getting lost. It was my current teacher who talked to me about really bringing “focus” to the middle voice as it sounded a bit dull (open, but without clarity.) For a while squillo sounded “ugly” and we talked at length about how to balance the ping and the warmth. (In undergrad, I became a huge fan of chiaroscuro, the balance of light and dark elements in the voice that many opera singers work to achieve.) This was when the three elements that I had worked on separately came together.
Space is the darkness, or warmth and squillo the light. But I also realized that “lightness” had another meaning and that was the spin or shimmer in the voice, that creates a lightness or ease of production or coordination of these elements. It all sounds so simple, but any singer will tell you that to balance these elements is like walking on a tightrope. Then on top of all of that, we add text and drama and it’s no wonder opera singers are INSANE.
But there is an incredible joy of breaking all of these elements down and putting them together. And it is even more exciting when someone (ANYONE) recognizes the hard work of making it seem easy.
Peace,
Eric
