Membership Expired Matt Pocock
Membership ExpiredForum Replies Created
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Yeah I agree with Laura – I read the packet of ingredients on an e-cig once and it’s amazing how dangerous some of the parts are! Also, how’s your hydration?
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Yeah, defo get someone to go have a look at your voice. Do you belt a lot in lessons?
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I may have to get back to you in October-time as I don’t know what assignments I’ll have around that time, but well up for this 🙂
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It’s all to do with creating vowels which have harsh clusters of harmonics that come together to create a second note on top of the normal note. So the unusual vowel that she’s making there (high, tense tongue and closed lips) create this strange, piercing sound, which she then fluctuates and controls with her lips. It’s really frigging tough to control – but if you imitate her you might be able to hear a slight ring of harmonics on there? I’ve been trying it all morning and only managed to get a tiny, tiny bit – this gal got game.
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Tough one – but he needs to practice that ‘being judged’ moment. Maybe at the end of each session you can make a video of him, so that he can practice singing in front of a camera? The feelings you get in front of a camera are a sort of diminished version of on-stage fear – so it would be a kind of stage fright vaccine. Worked well with a couple of my goons.
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Once again, Kat’s on it – that twang will work wonders for getting her vocal folds to be more active: although it’ll take ages for it to feel comfortable for her. I had a student who used to talk only in head voice – very light and lilting but not at all forceful or impactful – but eventually the chest voice came out!
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yep! thats the one🙂
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have you tried using a “pharyngeal”/”nasty” voice? This can be sung in a /nae/ /nae/ sound over the melody, and then by singing the actual lyrics in a nasty voice/accent. The other thing I’d recommend is to only choose songs that stay below the bridge. The only thing worse than trying to get chest voice, is trying to get it AND mix it at the same time. Choose songs that stay below A4, and even ones that are predominantly below E4, to really get that solidness there before trying to mix it with anything.
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Sitting On The Dock Of The Bay ain’t too bad for beginners…
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Feeling Good, especially the Buble version?
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Birmingham sounds ok!
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That sounds like a great idea🙂 We just need to find a place to plonk ourselves that everyone can get to. Maybe, if Matthew Rusk were up for it, we could have it in Leicester? As he’s the one who brought us all together, and it’s fairly central for people to get to from Leeds/Nottingham/Derby etc. What do we think?
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There is a 42% chance that I may do just that.
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Very happy with my new moniker🙂 Spectrum view is awesome for tracking things like twang and giving the student visual feedback without having to listen to their voice – great for beginners! I also use the Estill Voiceprint software which basically does the same thing (but has a few extra features and is designed for singers). https://www.estillvoice.com/products/
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Lydia, I use an online booking system – the one I use is pretty cumbersome and crap but it still prevents time wasters. Students pay online over BACS transfer before the lesson and it cuts my admin in half.
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He owes you money! Send the heavies. Maybe offer him half-price cancellation fee on compassionate grounds?
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I would be straight to the point with him and ask him outright about his behaviour. It’s not fair on you at all.
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Eek, bad luck Beckie in having such a difficult situation land on your plate! It’s always tough when you think that someone might be on the spectrum, but time and again the advice I’ve been given is ‘set them boundaries, so they know what to stick to’. Even if he’s nowhere near the spectrum, my advice would be the same – give him a deadline to improve his behaviour by, and if he doesn’t stick to it (or relapses over three lessons) give him a month off teaching. Good luck – that is a doozie.6
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The phrase I use is: “Really sorry, but it’s industry standard” when getting students to pay a cancellation fee. It’s a good’un – always works.
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As for work-life balance – I teach from 10-7, but I get up at 7AM to do my admin and writing etc. I try and keep a gadget-free bedroom and TRY to put my work down in the evenings (but it’s tough sometimes!). I also keep a free day on Mondays to do admin – means I can catch up with friends and gently do all my accounts etc. Hope that helps 🙂
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Hey guys, totally missed this thread but this is really interesting and important stuff. The 70 students thing might be a bit misleading – a lot of those were 30-minute college students that I was teaching, which means you can fit far more in your week. At peak I was probably teaching 35 hours a week, 7 hours a day with two long, leisurely hour-long breaks to break it up. It’s so important to stay rested and happy because if I’m unhappy, I’m just not worth the money. So the midday naps and binge-watching Breaking Bad’s are crucial 🙂
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I teach 10-7 Tuesday-Friday, 10-3 on Saturday. Mostly adults, retirees and students, very few afterschoolers. About 60-70 students at peak times in the year but less over summer 60:40 female to male, I’d say Hope that helps!
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Would be great if I could run some chapters by you guys – does that sound good? 🙂
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OH! This is crazy awesome – thanks Kat Wells 🙂
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That sounds about right on the trachea front, though I’ve never heard that term. Could you link that video? Will catch it in the morning – you’re keeping me up with this nerd talk, damn it!
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Hey Eliza – saw this one before and I do actually buy it! One tone is definitely made by her true vocal folds, one tone by the whistle in her lips – and the other one could possibly be the action of the AES, but to control it like that is incredible. One possible explanation is that she’s sucking the air in instead of blowing out? But I honestly don’t know. It’s a bloody impressive all-round performance though.
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One of my students once said “Do I have to keep bloody prodding myself?” – Couldn’t have put it better myself!
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Epic – now write us a reading list, Kat! With your crazy knowledge you’re currently our queen nerd, but I want to be hot on your tails by this time next week.
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Also, fascinating to read about the transference of effort from the TA to the CT – I’d never considered that as a possibility for registration shift. Where did you read/learn that?
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Kat Wells – you are definitely my kind of nerd 🙂 I think if we could get together a group reading list of books that we found helpful for different methodologies that would be a great way of getting the knowledge of the group up. I’ll start a note now 🙂
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True that, Eliza – though I’ve had a shift in my thinking over the last couple of weeks: surely we earn our money better by training people to be singing teachers, not singers? So many classical teachers teach in that monkey-see, monkey-do type way – “No, sing like this!” – without any care for the cause-and-effect logic of anatomy. We have an opportunity to give people the ability to not only sing well, but also to give them the skills to start charging £25/hour for their understanding of the voice! So for me, I love teaching the hardcore anatomy even to beginners – especially if you can inspire them with the wonder of it all 🙂
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Kat, thanks for that awesome post 🙂 I’ll make sure to have a look at that website this weekend! What does IVA have to say about registration changes – i.e. moving from chest to head? Neither Estill or CVI (Complete Vocal Institute, Cathrine Sadolin) has any time for register changes, saying it’s all part of the same set-up. I still teach chest and head voice, mostly for want of a better explanation. Does IVA have one?
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Wow Kat, sounds like your body of knowledge is going to be really great for this group 🙂 A couple of questions – first, what’s IVA?
Second, how do you find the Alexander technique in teaching? I’ve heard it’s great for posture – but I don’t focus too much on posture beyond the basic corrective stuff so I’d love to hear how it is when you get in-depth!
Also, the ‘science-versus-feeling’ debate could probably go on all day – but I find Estill is stonkingly good for allowing you to be specific when it comes to diagnosing difficulties in the voice (although it’s a bit light on abdominal support!)
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I went on an Estill course a few months ago, and it completely turned my head around about teaching – once you know what all the bits are and what they do, it becomes so much easier to listen out for things and make alterations, would highly recommend going on one of their courses!
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Oh cool Laura, I’ve not met an SLS person before – how is it to teach? I’ve got a couple of books from SLS people and I’ve never been very impressed by it – but well up for being convinced 🙂
