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Now, today's lesson is going to be more centered on vocal health,
and in particular we will be talking about the first out of the two most
common vocal damaging flaws namely glottal shock.
If I were to make a list of the most common factors that contribute to vocal
cord injury,
high in the list would be, glottal shock,
and glottal stop.
Both of these improper techniques are often addressed by voice teacher's
as well as throat doctors,
and both have ruined more voice careers
than probably any other physical factor next to gas or reflux disease and vocal
fatigue.
Glottal shock is a clicking
in the voice that can be heard at the onset of words that do not begin with
some sort of consonant.
An example of this would be when we sing or say words such as
"apple" or "every" or "only,"
these words of course begin with a vowel
rather than a consonant,
and as you hopely could hear, there was sort of a clicking noise at the
beginning of those words;
This is glottal shock.
You see, what happens is this,
if i were to place my vocal chords together before I sing,
when I actually do go to sing the vocal chords are then forced open and then,
unfortunately,
slam shut slapping themselves together,
causing the click heard on the words onset.
This is known by the way as the words a tact,
and this particular tact
it's not only unhealthy to our vocal instrument,
but it's very unmusical as well.
So, how do we avoid glottal shock? Well...
there are three techniques.
The first one employs a basic breathing principle in voice,
and could be viewed as the main fix.
The second is, through the usage of a pair of vocal ornaments,
and the third is based on the way we connect one word to the next.
The first approach is based around a very important basic principle:
We must start the act of singing with air first,
then voice.
Let me repeat this
very very important singing principle.
We must start the act of singing with air
first,
then voice. You see, the voice will flow
out of our mouths much better
if we start off with a little bit of air first.
In singing, this can be achieved simply by placing a very short "h"
at the beginning of the words that do not have initial consonants.
Think of what an "h" actually is;
It is friction caused by exhaling air.
So, if i'm going to sing the word, "I'm" without the "h"
it may sound like this:
"I'm."
And with the "h" it could sound like this:
"(h)I'm."