{"id":3375,"date":"2014-08-08T09:36:25","date_gmt":"2014-08-08T13:36:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rockwellblake.com\/blog\/?p=3375"},"modified":"2014-11-27T09:18:27","modified_gmt":"2014-11-27T13:18:27","slug":"lesson-1-002","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/2014\/08\/08\/lesson-1-002\/","title":{"rendered":"Lesson 1.002"},"content":{"rendered":"

So what should we do next?\u00a0 Tomorrow I start doing a master class<\/a> here in the North Country, but that is what I am going to do next.\u00a0 The question is really what should be the next step in teaching someone how to sing.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Garcia gives us a lot of advice about the difficulties voices will present to teachers.\u00a0 It\u2019s up to the teacher to sift through his information in order to follow the correct Garcia suggestion relevant for each individual.\u00a0 We have to discern and understand each problem as it is presented, and I can attest to the fact that every exercise of increased complication will likely uncover a new vocal fault or difficulty.\u00a0 So, now that we have the student singing the best \u201cA\u201d vowel that the student\u2019s voice is able to produce, we can begin to complicate things a bit.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Lesson<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Because it was so long ago that Renata<\/a> made me do all that \u201cold school\u201d exercise work, I don\u2019t remember having any trouble doing two consecutive pitches.\u00a0 This may be why I am always surprised at how many students of singing have trouble with this mini hurdle.\u00a0 My advice concerning Garcia\u2019s exercises includes challenging the student to bring what he\/she has learned in each previous exercise to the next exercise.\u00a0 In this lesson the challenge is very simple.\u00a0 Make those alternating pitches sound as stable<\/a> as the previous lesson\u2019s single pitch.\u00a0 How hard is that?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Given the evidence, it seems to be very difficult indeed.\u00a0 Let\u2019s talk about just a few of the little problems that can,,,,, let\u2019s be clear, do crop up.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The bump: when moving the voice from one pitch to the other, the student, especially with woodwind instrument experience, will sometimes have the habit to do a little accent with every pitch change.\u00a0 You know how those hollow bits of wood or metal we call woodwinds have holes and keys with pads.\u00a0 Well when you\u00a0 are learning to play one of those things with your fast moving fingers, each hole or key that gets closed at high velocity gives off a sound.\u00a0 Something like that seems to be a necessary accessory for some students when they change pitches.\u00a0 This needs to be taken care of immediately.\u00a0 I have run into this habit that I call \u201cWalking on the notes\u201d in students who have been studying voice for a long time.\u00a0 They seem unable to sing \u201cLegato<\/a>\u201d at all.\u00a0 Catching this defect early and making sure the bump does not appear when the pitch is changed will go a long way in teaching legato vocalization.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Going straight: just before changing the pitch and for a short period after changing the pitch the vibrato<\/a> will often disappear.\u00a0 It is a wonder that so many singers today stop their vibrato and don\u2019t even know they are doing it.\u00a0 I know that the Baroque crowd seems to believe in making straight sounds as often as possible.\u00a0 I do not. \u00a0In any event, there is no need to announce the arrival of a pitch change with a straightening of the tone\u2026 you know.. stopping the vibrato.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Push-ups: The moment before the pitch change, instead of going straight, some students will begin a small but noticeable crescendo which will continue into the higher pitch, and the return to the lower pitch will have the opposite effect added.\u00a0 This one is less common than the above, but is just as serious and annoying to hear if unchecked early on.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Slurpee\u2019s: Slipping and sliding from note to note is something that often shows up with young ones, but be careful about the cure for this fault.\u00a0 I have noticed in some \u201ctrained\u201d individuals a habit of stopping the sound between notes.\u00a0 I don\u2019t expect anyone to admit to teaching this particular stupidity, but the students who have shown me this maneuver had to have learned it somewhere.\u00a0 In order to cut everyone a break, I am willing to believe it to be a confusion inserted into the mind of the singer by virtue of\u2026 sorry\u2026. by mischief lodged in the language used to seek to correct this slimy style of ignorant singing.\u00a0 \u201cPrecision\u201d can\u2019t be \u201cPerfect\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n

These are just a few things from my list of faults to watch out for.\u00a0 Garcia\u2019s list is shorter than mine, but printing costs were rather high in his day.\u00a0 Come to think of it, the costs of printing are no laughing matter even today.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I had a note just the other day from a reader who wanted to know if I was forgetting about all you who care to read tenor thoughts.\u00a0 You are all well remembered, and maybe I should clue you in.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The world of singing is in a bad way, and that is the reason for this blog and various other activities in which I engage.\u00a0 If anyone has never heard: \u201cArt reflects life and life reflects Art<\/a>\u201d please ponder this pomposity.\u00a0 Next, I want to tell you that life itself is in a bad way, and I am hard pressed to ignore it.\u00a0 In as much as I am able to engage the trends in society that I recognize as negative movements, I must act with that gift of ability to resist the push that moves singing toward bad and life toward feudal servitude.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Resisting the slavery our social contract seems to be approaching is why I have been a little slow\u2026. please allow my understatement\u2026. to get out a new blog.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Where my mind and body has been investing the greater portion of time and effort has been tax resistance, political action, gardening and home repairs.\u00a0 We have a wonderful garden, a house that our North Country weather keeps pummeling and a local<\/a>, State<\/a> and Federal<\/a> government that sees us little people as an inexhaustible source of revenue.\u00a0 This I resist with the help of others in a website<\/a> I manage. \u00a0We have a candidate for United States Congress <\/a>that my wife, Debbie, and I are supporting and also a candidate for New York State Assembly for whom I put up a website<\/a>.\u00a0 There are a few family oriented events that we manage to shoe horn into our daily doings as well.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Life is good when full.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So what should we do next?\u00a0 Tomorrow I start doing a master class here in the North Country, but that is what I am going to do next.\u00a0 The question is really what should be the next step in teaching someone how to sing. Garcia gives us a lot of advice about the difficulties voices […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3379,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3375","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/Lesson-1.002.jpg?fit=876%2C300&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2kj1l-Sr","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3375","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3375"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3375\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3385,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3375\/revisions\/3385"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3379"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}