or so the ads on the CTA claim. I'm really bemused by those advertisements, clearly what they intend to impart is that "Syphilis is a viable disease that is showing up once more, get tested." but I can't help but read it in the tone that one might read "The McRib is back!"
I had a voice lesson for the first time since June on Monday, it was really nice to do again. I had even taken a pretty hefty hiatus from practicing, due to trying to find jobs and struggling to deal with change in my life. This pause in my practicing has not gone unnoticed, man does my breath support suck! It's not so bad, I just feel some lines that I would have not needed to even think about before. Not to worry however I'll just have to start practicing again.
One of the things that I have been chipping away at working at but was brought up very clearly in my lesson on Monday, is to not worry about singing beautifully. Since I entered college my private voice teachers have said things like sing louder, or fuller, but this new teacher I think put it in the best way: She asked me if I had ever heard a violin played up close. The answer is emphatically yes, her point is that up close the violin doesn't sound so nice. We like the violin for its sweet sound, but up close it's not so beautiful. You hear the attack of the bow, you hear the grittier sounds that this supposedly elegant instrument makes, the instrument is played for the room. The room takes the sound and smooths it out.
The same with the voice, it doesn't need to sound beautiful in my head, and in my mouth, but out in the room. This is why I'm (justifiably) uncomfortable with close miking, it picks up all the edginess that the room is intended to smooth out.
That's the way it feels to sing this way to me: it feels like I'm singing on the edge. Which is cool because as Duff'll tell life is to be lived on the edge, otherwise you are not living at all. However what do I really mean by saying that I'm singing on the edge (my voice teacher asked how it felt to sing that way, I told her about the edge...teachers frequently ask how singing certain ways feel, only sometimes is there something to tell them). Singing on the edge is a slightly unnerving thing, because you're singing on the edge of control. I feel like if I sing any bigger (not necessarily louder) than I will lose control. My voice will crack or something.
This is however a feeling that I need to embrace, I need to feel like I'm losing control of my voice. I think that one of the main things I need to work out in my voice is that I always need to be in control, when I let go of this I tend to have excellent results.
However this is just me and the way I sing, too "beautiful" and too in control.
Next: Da Corneto
