Voice Teachers

This post is partly for Zachary, because his comment brought many questions and comments to mind, but it was something I was going to write anyway.

Over the years, I worked with four voice teachers. I mentioned two of my earliest ones in this post. Then there was my current teacher, whom I met in 1976 and worked with through 1980, and then in 2003 I met "The Mentor" whom I studied with for two years, before going back to my current teacher whom I will call "M".

I was never able to sing comfortably above a high A, not matter what I did or what teacher I studied with.  That was just an intractable problem.  The last year I sang as a young person (in 1980) I had more or less gotten a handle on the B flat, and once or twice could sorta kinda squeak up to a C sharp but that was a rare occasion and certainly the highest note I ever felt I "owned" was the A.

I don't know if ranges are a physiologically fixed thing.  I know that study can increase a person's range, but only by so much.  What my teacher tells me is that I might have been able to stretch it up by a note or two if I had been continuously studying in my prime (if I had continued on at 30, when I finally was beginning to feel that I was singing well, and then gave it up) but not necessarily by much.  What he has said is that study can make the sound better and the facility greater in the range that I have.

I also don't know to what extent smoking damaged my voice.  I think one reason I sounded so much better at 54 than I did at 30 (although without, at first, the stamina) was that it had been almost 30 years since I had smoked.  I know that I have no residual respiratory weaknesses (I get colds, etc. much less frequently than anyone I know) but vocal cords are delicate.  So it's one thing to have so much damage that it's obvious in one's speaking voice, and another to have minute damage that would only manifest itself when trying to sing at the outer limits of one's range.

But getting back to the subject of teachers.  Here is what I think has happened with this teacher.  I think I made a lot of progress up to a point and then hit a plateau.  I became aware of the plateau around last Fall, which was when I was preparing for the concert.  My middle voice had gotten richer and fuller, and I started finding it harder to sing at the top, even an A, which for me was always "my crowning glory".  My teacher explained that this was because the top of my voice needed to "catch up" with the rest of my voice.  He said when I sang well, those notes were actually better than they had been, but that it now took more support to sing up there.  Recently, I have noticed a breakthrough and I seem to be having less trouble.

So the issue with this teacher is, I think, not that he's telling me anything wrong (for example I always sing better at a lesson than at home, and if I do what he tells me I sing better than when I forget to do it), it's that there may be additional things that are right that he is not telling me.  (I would leave in a heartbeat if he ever had me doing anything that felt uncomfortable, which is an experience that I have had, if you read my above-referenced post about "Mr. B.")

But at this point I am loathe to make a change.  Particularly after yesterday's lesson, at which I sang especially well and felt more freedom than I had felt in a long time.

I know I am very resistant to change.  My first impulse if I am having a problem is to work with what I have rather than looking elsewhere.  Particularly in the case of this teacher with whom I have such a bond (a healthy one, not an unhealthy one like I had with The Mentor).  I now consider him a friend, as well as a colleague (I could tell from remarks he made at yesterday's lesson that he takes this Verdi Requiem project seriously because he made a few tentative concert commitments and checked his calendar first to make sure they didn't conflict with the Requiem date.)

Of course if an opportunity to get a second opinion fell into my lap I would take it.  I think I was put off by the tenor soloist's wife approaching me because I found it intrusive.  But, for example, a few years ago a renowned teacher and coach posted something on a message board stating that she was giving "pay what you can" consultations,so I went to one and got some feedback.  She thought most of my problems with high notes (the ones I actually have - I sang "Acerba Volutta" for her) had to do with not maintaining a good energy balance and creating a lot of tension around the "setup" for the top notes.  But she told me I had the basics of a good technique.

In any event, maybe I will give it a few months and see.  I want to go ahead with the Requiem at the very least, before making a change, and that is not difficult to sing.  In fact I find "Lux Aeterna" easier than many mezzos do because I use the same skills I use to sing soprano in the choir.

I did speak to my teacher about vocal problems yesterday, saying that I had been approached by the wife of a colleague about a teacher, and that I knew I still had problems and did he know why, as I had been studying a long time.  He said a lot of it had to do with not focusing when I was singing.  That I had to focus on particularly trying to keep the right pharyngeal space.  That not doing that caused my upper passagio to sound muddy and made it harder to go higher. He must be right about that because when I did what he told me the top notes were easier and freer. He also said that bigger voices require more support (and more time to put together) and that I had gone for over two decades without singing at all. That I only took a lesson every two weeks (that is all I can afford).  He also said that singing with the choir and trying to "blend" may undo some of what I am learning at lessons.  I think that used to be true, but that I have now learned how to use a supported pianissimo not a falsetto.  I don't want to give up the choir, though, because it means so much to me, not just musically but also spiritually.  I get solo opportunities (I don't care if they are unpaid), and my musicianship has improved astronomically as a result of singing difficult music in a small group.  If I hadn't been singing with the choir all these years I wouldn't be learning the mezzo solo parts of the Requiem as quickly as I'm learning them because musically it is a difficult ensemble piece.  Also this choir director is very nice and supportive.  As are the other people in the choir.  I have made a nice group of friends my own age there and I desperately need that kind of connection.  I spend most of my time working at home, and the rest of it with someone elderly and disagreeable, no matter how much I love her.  In addition to singing in the choir we go to concerts together and on outings, along with other people our age at the church.

So that's it, I guess.

I will just play it by ear at choir practice tonight.  If the tenor comes up to me and gives me the number of his voice teacher, hey.  I'll take it, and then just see.

The Post I Don't Want to Make

I was debating for several days whether to write about this, but I decided now that I will.  Just when I was feeling at an all time low (not about my singing, which I really feel has improved lately, but about how my life has conspired, for the past five years really, to make it more and more difficult for me to follow my "bliss" in any way at all, regarding singing or otherwise), I had the kind of upsetting experience I never thought I'd have.

When I was on line Sunday after the church service (we sang a rousing anthem in 8 parts and I sang the bottom soprano part - full voice, because there was another part above me and the ending was marked "forte") the wife of our star tenor soloist (who also sometimes leads the choir rehearsals when our director is away) came up to me and said "I know a voice teacher who would love to get her hands on you".  So this was like, huh??  She's not a singer, so why is she telling me about a voice teacher.  Then it got worse as she went on.  First she raved about my spectacular instrument, then she talked about how this teacher had helped her husband when his voice was "in tatters".  (I know her husband had the beginnings of a major career which was derailed because he had respiratory problems, so he went on to another profession but kept singing.)  So does my voice sound like it's "in tatters"?  I would hardly think so.  I mean, I think there are issues I need to fix and I don't always know why some of them are resistant, but changing teachers is not the first solution that springs to mind.  I have an unusually big voice (everyone has said that) so as soon as I stop "crooning" (my teacher's word) I have to deal with the issue of how to support it and "manage" it.  This takes time and the decks are stacked against me because I didn't do the right things when my voice was growing, I started really studying seriously (by which I mean not sabotaging myself) at the age of 54, or in any event, I started studying again at the age of 54, which would be hard enough.

So there are two issues here.  Yes, I've often thought it would be interesting to get a second opinion, which actually I did once, with a respected teacher and coach, who told me basically that I had a good technique, I just had to map out how I was going to "present" an aria so I husbanded my strength and not panic and do so much "preparation" for a high note.  I had often also thought that maybe some of the problems I've had with top notes are the result of my teacher teaching me to approach them the way he does (on the other hand, the reason I began studying with him in the 70s  was that I was impressed by his wife's singing and she was a spinto soprano with pianissimi worthy of Leontyne Price) so I had thought it might be good to get a second (particularly a female) perspective on how to lighten my voice at the top.  (And if my teacher died or moved away, there is a woman I would contact, because I have always liked the way her students sound.)

But to have someone throw down the gauntlet that way in a peculiar context?

I remember Zachary who has commented on this blog, saying that when a person says something like that they want to make trouble.  But why would this woman want to make trouble?  (Actually I spoke to my partner about this incident, and she was surprisingly sympathetic and said that maybe this woman was trying to be helpful.  She also said maybe the husband put her put to it but I would doubt that - as he sometimes leads the choir I think he would feel free to speak to me if he wanted to but the way to do that is to say "you seem to be having trouble with that phrase, have you thought of trying [fillintheblank]?" not to flog a particular teacher.)

In any event, I'm not sure how I feel about this.  I am not really insulted but I feel put on the spot. And of course I am doubting myself.  Why do I keep having this big voice that sounds undisciplined?  (On the other hand, some people have told me I have a good technique.)

I have a lesson today and thought I would ask my teacher if he has heard of the teacher that was mentioned, but I tried looking her up online and couldn't find any information, which is odd.  I can find information about my current teacher, even though he has no academic credentials, if I google him I get hits mentioning concerts and operas he has sung in.  (I also got plenty of hits about this tenor and his wife who is a college professor in another field.)

So I think I will just go to my lesson.  I may mention this conversation just by way of asking him what he thinks of it.

Then tomorrow, unfortunately, this tenor is leading the choir rehearsal.  I say "unfortunately" because I feel now I will have to deal with this issue because even though he didn't participate in the conversation I was having with his wife he certainly overheard it.  Actually, I have always liked when he leads the rehearsals because he knows about voices and always makes good suggestions to the group.

I think the thing I find hard to deal with about certain kinds of criticism (constructive or otherwise) isn't just that criticism can sting (or it can be helpful) it's that I see it as pushing me in a position of having to do something: take a suggestion (whether I want to or not), argue why I don't want to take a suggestion, or something.


Mostly I just feel embarrassed.

Mr. B.

Once again, I should be working, but one of the exercises in The Artist's Way involved making lists of people who discouraged you, and people who encouraged you, so....

God knows I have wasted enough "ink" on the former, so why not write about the latter?

I know I blame other people (and social trends) for my failure to nurture my own singing talent until the age of 54, when it was well past the 11th hour, but much of the blame lies with me.  (But knowing that, where do I go from here?)

I say that I started singing the first time when I was 26, but that is not true.  That was the first time I studied and sang after I had quit smoking.  I don't really count the earlier forays into classical singing but maybe I should.

There were the casual lessons I took at 15, with a former Metropolitan opera soprano, where I learned nothing, and in fact my singing got worse and worse the more I smoked and went on unhealthy crash diets.

Then I stopped altogether to wallow in drugs and rock and roll (any sex I wallowed in was incidental and not really relevant one way or another in terms of my singing) and started again at 22 when I was singing with a Gilbert and Sullivan company in the chorus and as a cover for the lead contralto.

After years of abuse, my voice had dropped about a fifth from where it had been at 15, but it must have had something because one of the men in the cast (who had come to G&S via a minor opera career) told me I sounded "like the old fashioned Italian mezzos, particularly Ebe Stignani." He told me that my performance as Katisha was "astounding".  I didn't have a teacher at the time, but found one via one of the tenors in the company.

I will call this man "Mr. B."  I have always said that he went a good way to "ruining" my voice but maybe some of the problem lay with me and my smoking (and intermittent drinking).  Mr. B. taught a specific technique (I don't know what it's called) that emphasized singing in a raw chest voice.  The theory was that if you could isolate your chest voice you could also isolate your head voice and have better high notes, but with me that never happened, although it had with the tenor in question, who previously to studying with Mr. B. had only been able to sing high notes falsetto.  And lest you think it was a man's game only, Mr. B.'s daughter was singing Mimi at 18 and now, at 50 is a famous Wagnerian soprano.  One of the things that technique is based on is enormous physical strength.  In addition to singing, Mr. B, had me doing sit-ups, walking two miles a day, and drinking milk with every meal.  Actually, in the beginning I did sound a lot like Ebe Stignani and even managed to sing through "O Don Fatale" but that was short lived.  Was the fault with Mr. B., my smoking, or my singing 7 shows a week with the G&S outfit? In any event, my upper register pretty much disappeared and I lived in mortal terror of "Mikado week" when at any moment I might be called upon to sub as Katisha and have to sing a high A flat at the end of Act 1.  Otherwise, I had a rich full voice up to the F or F sharp at the top of the staff and that was it.

But suppose I had stuck with Mr. B. and just been a student?  Suppose I had been nunlike and given up smoking and drinking and partying?  Even given up the G&S company?  They weren't paying me anything unless I sang a children's matinee. (I earned my living during the day by grooming dogs and had a flexible schedule.)  Mr. B. gave a discount to students who came every day ($10 a lesson in 1972) and I remember I did do that in the beginning (hence my surprising performance of "O Don Fatale"?)

When I say I made all the wrong choices, I don't just mean with smoking, drinking, starving myself (actually I had stopped doing that for a while at the G&S company - I had to share costumes with a woman the size of Deborah Voigt pre-surgery and pinning them down to a size 12 was hard enough) but also the gruelling schedule I was performing at that company.  It was "fun".  That was why I did it.  I knew a few people who were going to a conservatory and they were deconstructing art songs in different languages while I was having "fun".  Of course the people who put in the work of that kind when they're 21 have the lives I would give my eye teeth for at 40, but how could I have known that then?

So the question is: what am I going to do with this information that I am getting from The Artist's Way?


What I long for is to find something special, that only I can do, or that I can do better than most of the people in my immediate environment, that will interest someone. No matter how well I can sing "Acerba Volutta" there will be not ten, but probably 50 people who can sing it as well, or better, who are younger and better educated, and who have "connections", even insignificant ones.

I don't think it's likely that I will move out of my rent regulated apartment in the armpit of Lincoln Center any time soon, but boy, there are days when I wish I were singing the National Anthem at a Little League game in "East Eggshell, Iowa" and signing autographs afterwards.

We Interrupt the Detour for Some Regular Programming

Since I now have had the chutzpah to make this blog's link part of my "signature" on The Forum (which, BTW, no longer intimidates me so much since I'm being taken semi-seriously at auditions and group coachings) I thought I'd do another regular singing post.

Something I'm really excited about, is that my wonderful voice teacher (I'm not comfortable posting his name here without his permission) said he would do a concert of duets with me in the Spring.

We met 34 years ago when we were both singing with the "Opera Underground" (a facetious name for the no-pay opera groups that were around in the 1970s that predominately but not exclusively featured avocational singers of all ages who were not conservatory graduates, many of whom had gorgeous voices, some of whom had flawed voices, and most of whom did not sight read or stray too far from the standard opera rep). He was transitioning from baritone to tenor and I was a hooty contralto who had been singing with a Gilbert & Sullivan company and smoking like a chimney. I had recently quit smoking and needed some help learning how to use my head voice (when I smoked I not only had no high notes to speak of - I could barely scream out Katisha's high G at the end of Act I of The Mikado- I also could neither hum nor scream, only squawk). When I found out that this young singer (we were the same age) was a teacher, and would only charge me $10 a lesson to learn what his teacher was teaching him (mostly techniques for lightening the voice) I jumped at the chance and have never regretted it.

When I first began singing again at 54 I studied with The Mentor Who Shall Not Be Discussed but after we had irreconcilable differences I returned to my original teacher, who was still around. At that time he was singing tenor, but switched to baritone again. Now, at 60, he is back to singing tenor and we both think a concert of duets would be a great thing to do.

As I said in a response to a comment on The Forum about whether or not there are any skinny opera singers with big voices, I mentioned that when I returned to singing I was about 10 pounds heavier, had stopped starvation dieting, and was much better able to support my voice, which has turned out to be much bigger than I had thought it was way back when. In fact my teacher has me learning Amneris (an aria-less role that is none the less the Holy Grail for dramatic mezzos) and it is one of the most comfortable roles I have ever sung in my entire life!!!.

I had already been working on the Judgement Scene which is a mezzo/bass duet, for a concert I will be doing with my bass friend (another older avocational singer) and now have made a start on the duet immediately previous. It has two High B Flats in it, which don't scare me at all since they're part of an upwardly progressing scale, which makes singing them really just like vocalizing. And she has to sing big, but she gets lots of breaks.

I have always thought of this role as out of bounds since I don't know if I have the C flat for the Triumphal Scene (how mean could a composer get? making a mezzo sing out of her range in a context where she could just as easily be singing an octave lower since all the chorus sopranos are singing up there) but there's nothing to stop me from keeping those two last scenes in my concert rep.

So maybe I'm a moving from "Baby Dramatic" to the real deal?