If we had to put classical voice and pop voice in their extremes regarded differencies in vocal positions, I would say that it is in the way of treating the two positions in which we currently work (in pop for some dark and not high voices or when we want to give more structure to timbre even if losing some extension, we have just one position). In classical we use muscles of appoggio and sustain to obtain two vertical segments of those positions (the blending of registers) while in pop (and often jazz) we use the same muscles to give the illusion of two horizontal planes. Of course this is just the extreme pure, a number nearly infinite of ways of mixing of the two concepts is not only is possible but sign of a good technique and the choice of personal voice over a only academic one.

One of the central questions that my work poses in its results is that some excellent musicians and singers previously hidden into a not responding correctly singing body (also for many long years), can now correct this substantial deformation and achieve a correct and effective vocal gesture. Is it then all solved? Is it then that they have just to sing and use new gesture and get what they did not previously? Would truly like it was just like that; I would really like and love it for them but no, there is then a hidden trick to be solved and not easy to accept. We have to deal about the fact that with an ineffective gesture the feedbacks were affected at all levels, also at internal levels. So you give someone a winner gesture and if you do not work at the same time on internal winner patterns not experienced previously you will have a loser attitude and mentality into a now winner gesture. If instead you train at the same time vocal pattern and internal pattern you can give the opportunity to change and obtain at the same time winner attitude and winner gesture. For a technical and a personal point can be perceived as rough to accept that to a loser gesture (just an objectively not effective vocal gesture) correspond a loser way of deciding and of being toward voice, but you can as coach give reason and dignity and make it indipendent from the arrival point of someone but just as a not lucky point workable and changeable. All the singers I worked with who had vocal issues in some sort were also internally affected by that, the good and fantastic news is that yes they totally surmounted that nearly all and became winner, and this is the reason why I do not follow those who tell me to choose only yet winners.

We hear sometimes talking about the need of deep and of a connection to what is the no time and where everything is the same to everybody. I also work to obtain this connection with my artists, in some of my posts you can find the question even if said in other terms. Does this mean that we have no place and we give no place to futile and superficial as some seem to deduce as if or one or the other? There lies an important point: we need both and the misunderstanding lies only in how obtaining both correctly. Put in your training deep and consistency and that precise and nearly hurting serious concentration to find inside and as the structural root of your sound and breath this one who is the same for everybody, then go on stage and be futile, react to superficial, to the sun, fall in love with musicians and sound engineer and how he is playing with your sound, push the groove of those breezes nice that those feelings are, feel the root of the public but play with their outfits and make up. If trained on consistency no surface can take away the connection, but it will be possible fun and joy and poetry and dancing.

Technical voice can support and give a sound to dreams and visions and a part of world and universe while the natural voice supports and give voice to the interpreter, his life, his habits, reactions in life and intuitions. Technical has a training to access to a freedom and reactivity that use the interpreter, through and beyond him and mixing him and the existing outside him.

(For technical I do not intend the declared technical voice, meaning by that an affectation in sound and artifice perceived in singing, this is a techical limit to be solved.)

It is a choice and not a sound, it is a way of being interpreters and artists.

Sometimes, on purpose, I make my students wait.
Can be just a couple of minutes, can be more, can be me opening the door with still my earphones, can be a not care about them for the time of finishing what I was doing.
They sometimes think I am losing time of their lesson, but I am teaching a lesson perhaps more important than some vocalisations. I teach them the focus and the attitude, that attitude I talked about in a recent post.
Their time for singing, their time in lessons, their time in rehearsals and on stage must be in the sense of this and not judging and analysing and arguing and stating. It is not a requirement of humbleness or patience or submission, not at all, just the capacity to remain focused and ready to sing no matter the disturbances. I go on ’till they arrive focused and no reaction but their focus.
They learn not taking care of how a technical problem on stage will make them wait even hours or rush. And remaining ready in any moment to do their job, they learn to make a public wait if necessary, to provoke or wait the public wave or the musicians on stage or into the music, to obtain what is correct and has a greater sense than a good voice in tune.

Work on what you are, not on what you pretend to be. Perhaps the most tricky and delicate part of my job is obtaining that by my artists.

That difference not always perceived or made relevant but as subtle as corresponding to two total different universes hidden bewteen a request and an offer. Music is always in an offer, even when ruled and born by professionals requests. It is a level of choice and comprehension very important to an artist in every kind of point of his career to be effective.

Since your diaphragm (as many other things) is built on actions, act on your choices and purposes and not on your fears.

Fundamentals. Manuel Garcia exercise for blending registers and actually in contemporary times useful to practice that expire that closing the pharynx and obtaining the perfect copertura than leads to opening of the throat. That opening the throat so misunderstood and forgot in the sensation, yet fundamental for effect singing and to transform a flow of air into a not flowing air but just a force and no more air sensation. Copertura transforms our instrument from a ineffective flute to a violin, being breathing muscles the arch. Enjoy your Wednesday wherever you are, lots of good voice and music.