Question 4

Dear Petra,
My teacher explains the anatomy to me very precisely and also demands that I always imagine the sequences very exactly when I sing. I don't always manage to do it that way. What am I doing wrong? How can I sing better?
Thank you!
Katharina

Dear Katharina,

to answer these questions, I need to elaborate a bit.
Basically, I welcome the incorporation of knowledge about anatomy and physiology into the teaching of singing. The search for knowledge about what happens before and during singing goes back a long way and found, for example, a first pioneer in Manuel Garcia in the 19th century with the use of the laryngoscope. To this day, scientists continue to research tirelessly to unravel the last secrets of singing. We can explain processes involved in singing, know which muscle "does" what, and how to change the vocal sound by altering resonant spaces involved in singing. We know about the overtone structure, about singing formants, we have computer programs at hand that make the produced sound visible and that can help us to see directly how the voice sound can be changed when changing the instrument. The list of research results, their practical application and evaluation could be continued for a long time.

I would not like to miss these findings. They can help the teacher to expand his tool palette and enable him to respond individually to the needs of each student in the classroom.

The toddler learns to use his body individually through trial and error and develops his own body language over the years. This will change and stabilize until the end of life - without us thinking about every movement of a finger. It is similar with singing.

In my opinion, it requires the entire human being. There are highly complex processes going on that have to be coordinated and which, in the end, take place virtually by themselves. People often say that you need instinct for singing. If that's how you define the ability to let go and allow, then maybe that's part of the truth. 

For me, the knowledge of how I as a singer individually make the best use of my resonance spaces, establish the implementation and application of this knowledge in practical action, and "practice" through proper repetition until these movements are manifested in the body in such a way that they take place "as if by themselves", so to speak.

All this does not yet make a singer out of me. If I can execute the purely technical tone production that makes for a beautiful and expressive sound, then expressiveness, presentation, musicality, appearance, health, energy, and much more are added.

My old violin didactic teacher gave me an anatomical textbook at the beginning of my studies and said that it was not important to him that I could "pray down" all the muscles. But I had to know which muscles were where and how they interacted. I would have to be able to transfer this to the student and recognize where violinistic problems originated in less than optimal coordination or a blockage.

During my own vocal studies, the really excellent vocal didactic lessons, or rather, the intellectual examination of the "how to sing" when singing, blocked me, and it took me some time to follow my main subject teacher's advice, after all, to leave out the knowledge of the physiology of singing when singing.

In my own teaching, I have tried for many years to avoid this somewhat top-heavy approach and to let the singer seeking advice solve his problem physically and not intellectually, without focusing on the problem. Over the years, singers who were teaching or who wanted to become singing teachers also came. In these lessons I did a lot more explaining. This approach did not always lead to a positive result. The singers who could already sing benefited; those who were not yet ready, this often brought more into their heads and it was harder to bring them back into the body.

My conclusion from these experiences is that nothing can be generalized. It always depends on the particular teacher-student constellation. As a teacher, I respond to the student's stage of development. Basically, I would recommend to first be able to produce something found and repeatable in a singable way before I would deal with the exact analysis of the processes. Nevertheless, a basic knowledge of anatomy can be helpful for any singer.

From this point of view, the study of vocal pedagogy should presuppose healthy singing of one's own.

Back to your question: perhaps it could help you, since you already have a great deal of vocal physiological knowledge, to try to look at this knowledge, as it were, from the meta-level and, when actively singing, to try to simply trust your body and soul again and "allow" practice.
You can achieve a shift in focus through movements that, for now, have nothing to do with technical singing and processing the content of the piece.
You could recite the text in your mind while walking. You can speak the text and when you have internalized this muscularly, add a movement. I used to combine washing windows, ironing laundry or tidying bookshelves with this. When I had a lot to study, my apartment was always especially tidy.

Perhaps you could also discuss this question directly with your teacher. He knows you for years, will be able to present his approach and so you could try to find an answer together.

We singers sing and we do it independently. The teacher-coach should be a companion and advisor who shows us passable ways. However, we have to walk these paths ourselves and often only we can find the right path.

Sincerely
Yours

Petra Lang