Song of the Sock

“Give me the gift of a grip-top sock,

A clip-drape, ship-shape, tip-top sock.

Not your spiv-slick, slap-stick, slip-shod stock

But a plastic, elastic, grip-top sock.

None of your fantastic, slack swop-slop

From a slap-dash, flash cash haberdash shop:

Not a knock-knack, knit-lock,

Knock-kneed knickerblocker sock

With a mock-shot, blot-mottled

Trick-tick-tocker clock:

Not a rucked-up, puckered-up flop-top sock.

Not a super-sheer seersucker

Pukka sack smock sock.

Not a spot-speckled, frog-speckled

Cheap sheikh’s sock

Off a hotch-pot, moss blotch

Blotched Scotch block;

Nothing slip-slop, drip-drop,

Flip-flop or clip-clop.

Tip me to a tip-top, hip-hop, tip-top;

Tip me to a tip-top”

I have spent time practicing reading this song/tongue twister in order to once again work on my pronunciation, articulation and diction. 

This piece of writing helps me to focus on what I am saying and that I ensure to take care over our diction and articulation. Reading this, almost epic, tongue twister allows me to also practice our breath-control which is very important in performing. “With the voice, you depend on the breath to start the sound”  I also paractice this whilst change the tempo and volume, going from a whisper to a projected shout. “When you let out the volume, you must never lose the clarity of speech because the specific reason for the size will not be present.^”

I have also been looking up some videos about the use of tongue twister to warm-up and train your voice in order to get a better understanding of how they help you to develop your vocal technique.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBDKTRva_YA

I watched this carefully as she really seemed to know what she was talking about, but she also taught me some more tongue twisters to put in my repertoire, allowing me to continue working on my articulation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GoRyRbyKKOU

In this video the guy goes through the tongue twisters bit by bit, showing how clear the words should but it is much more helpful than the last as he also switches his pace, tone, breath control and difficulty, allowing, not only for different abilities but it is a video that allows you to e challenged, try out your voice and continuing developing your technique whilst learning new tongue twisters. I found this video brilliant and since discovery have been watching it repeatedly at different times in order to continue pushing my voice and learn the various skills needed to be a vocal performer.

I will continue to work on tongue twisters and explore further into how they help you to develop your voice as the weeks go on, whilst exploring into other warm-up and why they are so vital to a performer.

Physical Warm-Ups

The following are comments and criticisms of previous lessons, sessions and practices using physical warm-ups, alongside descriptions of why physical warm-ups are important to a vocal performer. It will come across as rather disjointed but that is because they are all about different, previous experiences.

- The exercise in which we lay on the floor and worked to relax ourselves into a regulated 4/4 breathing pattern was, in my opinion, a very important exercise. This is because it aids your concentration and helps you to relax and focus as a preparation for the warm-up and performance to come. It is also important to relax to rid yourself of any tension “tension can limit breathing capacity”

 - Another exercise that I found particularly useful was the one in which we shook our hands and legs. We shook each hand and leg whilst counting down from 10 and this exercise really helped to loosen and relax our muscle. Its aim was to limber us up and remove any tension to avoid stiffness throughout the warm-up and performance. This is important to do as if we remain with tension built up in our muscles or stiffness throughout our bodies the  less control we maintain over our voice and the muscles that help to make your voice, be it in your neck, abdominals or back etc… The more relaxed and limber we are, the better our voice will be ad the better quality that our voice will create, it will also help to prevent any damage to your voice.

- I found this session very helpful and found it very useful to learn a large range of different warm-up exercises. I also went through these exercises on my own in order to gain a better understanding of how they work to help our voice. The exercise where I placed my hands on my diaphragm whilst saying “PPP-PP-PPP-POO” was very helpful in gaining a better understanding on how my diaphragm works, and built a connection between my diaphragm and voice.

- Warming up the body really helped me to concentrate and relax before exercising your voice. It also really helped to regulate my breathing. This was helpful as it would be very difficult to perform if we were out of breath. 

1.      We started off the lesson by getting into a circle. We then had to tense our muscles and stretch up toward to the ceiling as far as we could before we began to gradually relax our muscles starting with our fingers. Once we got to our shoulders (deltoid muscles) we let out all the air and dropped all of the tension with a “phwamph!” – we did this by going floppy from the waist up, letting our upper body just hang over the bottom half of our bodies. We then stayed in this position, with our arms relaxed, hanging over our heads, and gently swung from side to side. Next, we remained in the position of our upper body hanging over our lower body and began to walk around the room, still in this position. We then started to add the sounds that monkeys create and travelled around the room ‘communicating with one another’.

By doing this it helped to, not only stretch and warm up our muscles but it also helped to warm up our voices. Our diaphragm is the muscle that aids in expelling air from our lungs when we fall forward, because of this, the diaphragm is a muscle that is especially warmed up. When we reached up toward the ceiling our rib cage opened up slightly more and gave space for our lungs to fill with air, whereas when we were hunched over, our lungs had less space to fill. “Singing is of course an excellent way to stretch the voice. It strengthens the breathing and makes you find and use the resonances in the chest and head.”

1.      Our next exercises were large arm circles and swings. These are another physical exercise that work-out that exercises our deltoid muscles and helps to open up our chests, once again increasing the space for our lungs to spread into, allowing us to fill them with more air.

1.      Next we did some neck tilts and neck circles. We also did some lateral tilts, these physical stretches simply help to warm up the body which is an important part of warming up your voice. 

Tongue Twisters? Why?

TWO LIPS

“The flexibility of the lips is very important if speech is to be clear and projected. Vowels as well as consonants suffer from lack of lip mobility.” Sounds: p  b  m  w  wh

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers

A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked

If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers

Where’s the Peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?

A white witch watched a woe-begone walrus winding white wool

A poor pauper paused on purpose to pawn a porpoise

Big blue blisters bleeding badly

Which witch is which?

TONGUE-TIP AND UPPER-TEETH RIDGE

“The majority of English consonants are produced by approximation of the tongue-tip and upper-teeth ridge” Sounds: t  d  l  n  r  s  z

Six Sicilian seamen sailed the seven seas southward

Do drop in at the dew drop inn

Christopher Twistle was trying to whistle and Christopher twisted his tongue

Red lorry, yellow lorry, red lorry, yellow lorry

Twenty twisted tangled threads, twining taut the tree tops

BACK OF  TONGUE AND SOFT PALATE

“These help those people who find it difficult to pronounce the ‘ing’ on the ends of words such as ‘singing’ and ‘ringing’. It will also help those who suffer from nasality caused by a lazy soft palate” Sounds: k  g  ng

A skunk sat on a stump

The skunk thunk the stump stunk

The stump thunk the skunk stunk

How much caramel

Can a canny cannibal

Cram into a camel,

If a canny cannibal

Can cram caramel

Into a camel?

                                                                              

Quin’s twin sisters sing tongue-twisters

Three grey green greedy geese,

Feeding on a weedy piece,

The piece was weedy,

And the geese were greedy,

Three grey green greedy geese.

TONGUE-TIP AND UPPER TEETH

“Many people have difficulty with the ‘th’ sound in ‘think’ and ‘thought’. ‘Cockneys’ tend to pronounce these words as ‘fink’ and ‘fought’. These will help in correcting this” Sounds: th 

Freddy thrush flies through thick fog

I’d far rather lather father,

Thank father lather me,

Because when father lathers,

He lathers rather free

The Leith police dismisseth us

Whether the weather be fine

Or whether the weather be not

Whether the weather be cold

Or whether the weather be hot

We’ll weather the weather,

Whether we like it or not.

This thatched roof is thick

TONGUE-TIP AND UPPER TEETH

“Many people have difficulty with the ‘th’ sound in ‘think’ and ‘thought’. ‘Cockneys’ tend to pronounce these words as ‘fink’ and ‘fought’. These will help in correcting this” Sounds: th 

Freddy thrush flies through thick fog

I’d far rather lather father,

Thank father lather me,

Because when father lathers,

He lathers rather free

The Leith police dismisseth us

Whether the weather be fine

Or whether the weather be not

Whether the weather be cold

Or whether the weather be hot

We’ll weather the weather,

Whether we like it or not.

This thatched roof is thick

LOWER LIP AND UPPER TEETH

“If you trip over your ‘f’ and ‘v’ consonants then practice these amusing ‘twisters’,” Sounds: f  v

Five frantic frogs fled from fifty fierce fishes.

One smart fellow he felt smart

Two smart fellows they felt smart

Three smart fellows they all felt smart

A fat-thighed freak fries thick fish

I’m a fig plucker,

I’m a fig plucker’s son

I pluck figs till the fig pluckers come.

Vera valued the valley violets

Vigorous Vesta voiced voluble verse vociferously

TONGUE BLADE AND FRONT OF HARD PALATE

“These contain some of the sounds which trip many tongues. ‘sh’ and ‘s’ placed closely together are well-known hazards.” Sounds: ch  ge  sh  zh

A chilly sited click steel slitter sitting slitting a satellite’s charted site.

Chin-chin chinaman. Chop! Chop! Chop!

If a shipshape ship shop stocks six shipshape shop-soiled ships

How many shipshape shop-soiled ships would six shipshape ship shops stock

Once I hear a mother utter,

‘Daughter. Go and shut the shutter.’

‘Shutter’s shut,’ the daughter uttered.

‘For I can’t shut it any shutter’

The Duke paid the money due to the Jew before

The dew was off the grass on Tuesday

And the Jew having duly acknowledged it

said adieu to the Duke for ever.

OPEN RESONATOR

“’h’ is possibly the greatest single trouble-maker in speaking…I heard a nervous person drop the following verbal clanger: ‘Hi ope that you will support the harts in this harea.’ You can avoid a similar incident if you practise these examples” Sounds: h

He ate hot apples and halibut hastily

A haddock, a haddock, a black-spotted haddock,

A black spot on the black back of a black-spotted haddock.

If a hair net could net hair,

How much hair could that hair net net,

If a hair net could net hair?

Last year I could not hear with either ear

If a Hottentot taught a Hottentot to to talk ere the tot could totter,

Ought the Hottentot tot to be taught to say ‘ought’ or ‘naught’

Or what ought to be taught her?

-Exaggeration of vowels

-Thai Chi

-Lateral stretching

-Breathing in then breathing out with ‘colour’ e.g. “eeee” “aaah” “oooh”

-Humming

“ The voice is the means by which, in everyday life, you communicate with other people, and though, of course, how you present yourself-you posture, movement, dress and involuntary gesture-gives an impression of your personality, it is through the speaking voice that you convey your thoughts and feelings.”

This quote from Cicely Berry shows us that it is vital that we look after our voice and emphasizes the importance of maintaining healthy vocal chords. Some exercises that were widely popular amongst my peers were the tongue twisters. Tongue twisters have been used all over the world, by many different performers for years. This is because it so influential on articulation, diction, clarity and sibilance, amongst others.

Me doing some tongue twisters:

http://picosong.com/wMep

The tongue twisters I practiced were very, very helpful. They really helped with articulation, diction, clarity and sibilance as well as exercising various muscles in the body to help with our muscular control. They are exercises that can be used in a variety of situations and will help us throughout the course as well as any other performing routes we decide to take. The different tongue twisters focused on different parts of our voice; some focused on the pronunciation, lips and tongue whilst others focused on the guttural part of our voice. I found that the main problem I have with my articulation and pronunciation is controlling where my tongue is in the mouth, so placing it correctly. Because of this I plan to work a lot on particular tongue twisters that focus on helping with that specific problem. I know that this is not just an eay fix so I will continue to work on this to persistently improve my diction.

I am focusing on particular one such as:

Whether the weather be fine

Or whether the weather be not

Whether the weather be cold

Or whether the weather be hot

We’ll weather the weather,

Whether we like it or not.

Three grey green greedy geese,

Feeding on a weedy piece,

The piece was weedy,

And the geese were greedy,

Three grey green greedy geese.

Christopher Twistle was trying to whistle and Christopher twisted his tongue

More of me practicing the above specific tongue twisters: http://picosong.com/wMCC

EXERCISES FOR THE TONGUE:

·         Twist the Twine Tightly Round the Tree Trunks

·         Did Dora Dare to Deceive David Deliberately?

·         Kate Cooney Carefully Closed the Kitchen Cupboards

·         Gregory Garside Gained Good Gradings in Greek Grammar

·         Naughty Nora Has No Nice Neighbours

·         Little Larry Lester Lolled Lazily on the Li-Lo

·         Rosemary Wright Was Richly Dressed in Red Corduroy

“Exercising the back of the tongue is vital, not only for clarity of diction, but for the release of the sound as a whole.”

I am going to continue practicing these articulation exercise throughout the entirety of the course as well as during my time as a performer. Looking at my vocal skills from this angle really helps me to highlight what I need to work on in order to make the most out of my tool so that I can improve and develop.

Personal Warm-Up Practice

 My personal preparation for singing was to extend my vocal range with the use of various exercises:

·         Breathing and breath control to relax and remove all tension

·         Big Mouth

·         Big Mouth with silent scream

·         Cat’s Bum

·         Cat’s Bum with silent scream

·         Sirening – (mmm, oooh, woahh, ahhh)

·         “A, E, I, O, U”

·         “A, E, I, O, U”– raising octave

·         “Ah, Ay, Eee, Oh, Ooh”

·          “Ah, Ay, Eee, Oh, Ooh”– raising octave

·         Tongue twisters

·         “mmmm” – resonator not scales

·         “ooooh” – resonator

·         “woahh” – resonator

·         “ahhh” – resonator

·         “Sh, sh, sh, sh”

·         “Tss, tss, tss, tss”

·         “Pft, pft”

·         “Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha” – exaggerated laughing, with my hands on my diaphragm so I could feel the movement and contractions of it.

·         “Huh, huh, huh, huh” – with my hands on my diaphragm so I could feel the movement and contractions of it.

·          “A-men”

·         I then worked on some Tongue Twisters.

·         Next I began some staccatos first with the sound of ‘la’. I had to ensure that I relaxed my jaw and I began lowering and ascending in octaves as I went along. I then repeated this exercise but this time with the sound of ‘nan a nan a nan a nan a na’ then ‘nah nah nah’. To exercise and strengthen my jaw and upper palate I then made the sound ‘nya nya nya nya nya’. I then stretched out various other facial muscles by making the sound ‘maw maw maw’ ensuring that my lips were pursed creating a ‘fish’ face.

·         I then exercised our soft palate: ‘yah-e-ah yah-e-ah yah-e-ah yah-e-ah yah-e-ah yah-e-ah yah-e-ah yaaaahh’ with this exercise I raised octaves as I went along and as well as for me to exercise my soft palate it helped with my vibrato.

·       ‘yah yah yah yah yaaah, yah yah yah yah yaaah, yah yah yah yah yaaah, yaaah’, ‘la la la la laaah, la la la la laaah, la la la la laaah, laaah’ and ‘mm mm mm mm mmmm, mm mm mm mm mmmm, mm mm mm mm mmmm, mmmm’ – I lowered in octaves

I I still struggle with my pitching  but with practice I have managed to improve my range and have been, on 1 or 2 occasions been actually able to reach a C#, my problem is with my transition between my chest voice and my head voice. Knowing that this is my current problem I plan to continue doing various vocal exercises such as sirening and arpeggios to smooth over my vocal transitions. 

The Lungs

The Lungs

The lungs are the most essential organ when it comes to respiration. The lung’s primary function is to transport oxygen from the general atmosphere, into the blood stream and then throughout the different areas of the body. It is also the role of the lungs to then remove any carbon dioxide from the blood stream and then release it back into the atmosphere. The lungs are a pair of sponge-like organs and are found in the thoracic cavity, almost filling it. They have many folds which increase the surface area for gas exchange and your left lung is slightly smaller than your right lung. This is so that there is space in the thoracic cavity for your heart.

The left lung is divided into two ‘lobes’ whilst the right lung is divided into three ‘lobes’.

Within your lungs there are two wind-pipes that divide off of the larger wind-pipe known as the trachea. These smaller wind-pipes are called the right stem and left stem bronchus; this of course means that the right stem bronchus leads into the right lung whilst the left stem bronchus leads into the left lung. From this point, the bronchus divide off into many smaller tubes called bronchi, which in turn divide off into even smaller tubes called bronchioles. There are a total of 22 divisions which leads to the forming of more than 100, 000 of these smaller tubes as well as more than 300 million tiny air sacs known as the alveoli. The alveoli are generally no more than 0.3mm in diameter.

The alveoli give the lungs an expansive surface area for gas exchange. The surface area of the lungs is so huge that if you were to lay all airways and air sacs of a person’s lungs, flat onto the ground, the surface area would cover an entire tennis court – more than 100 square yards.

The alveoli are the most important part of our lungs as it is through them that all of the gasses diffuse in and out of your lungs into or out of your blood stream. This is possible as the alveoli are totally covered and ‘bathed’ in millions of minute blood capillaries. The alveoli allow for an efficient of exchange of oxygen into the blood stream and carbon dioxide out of the blood stream and back into the lungs ready to be exhaled back into the atmosphere.
Obviously the lungs are the pushing power that allows for respiration. The air we breathe in travels down our trachea (windpipe), into the lungs through the two bronchus and the oxygen from this is then dispersed into the blood stream with thanks to the alveoli. With each breath we take, the lungs draw in oxygen and remove carbon dioxide.

The alveoli have a very thin membrane which allows for the exchange of gases but if this membrane thickens or is damaged even slightly, the vital gas exchange becomes much less efficient. The more of a person’s alveoli that become damaged like this the higher the chance of said person suffering from breathlessness.

This would be a huge problem to a performer as a lack in the proficiency of the gas exchange can lead to breathlessness which would have a detrimental effect upon projection. The person may also begin to suffer with fatigue which can easily lead to problems such as fainting, which is not only dangerous for the sufferer but to the people around them when performing as fainting can easily cause accidents and injury. A person’s articulation may also become affected as fatigue can lead to a loss of focus and an increase in sloppiness. It is very important for me to have an understanding of how our lungs affect our voice in order for me to learn the importance and look after them in the aim to increase our breath control and vocal technique.
 
There are a numerous amount of diseases that can affect the health of our lungs and hinder our performance, for this reason it is very important for us to try our hardest to keep our lungs as healthy as possible. Some of the diseases that affect lung health include:
* Lung Cancer
* Asbestosis
* COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease)
* Pneumonia
* Pleural cavity diseases
* Pulmonary vascular diseases
* Pulmonary Oedema
* Pulmonary tuberculosis
* Asthma
* Bronchitis

As well as the lungs being the main organ necessary for respiration, they actually also act as one of the body’s defences against infection and harmful bacteria. Despite the fact that the nose is the primary line of defence against harmful materials that are inhaled, the lungs count as the secondary line of defence, any harmful inhaled particles, such as smoke and pollution, and infectious agents, such as many viruses and bacteria, pass through our nose or mouth and proceed to lodge in the lungs.

The lungs produce a sticky substance called mucous and it is this fluid that can trap these inhaled materials and therefore aid the lungs’ white blood cells in the process of destroying these harmful agents and bacteria. It is suggested to cough as a good way to clear mucus from the lungs but these agents can be brough up the airways ready to be either swallowed of coughed out by cilia. The larger airways of our respiration system are covered with tiny cells that are almost hair-like called cilia.

These cells beat and it is their beating with a fast rhythm that allows the mucus and cells to be propelled up the airways to be coughed out or swallowed. It is often found that, in smokers, the cilia have been either killed or become inactive which allows thick mucus to accumulate resulting in an inefficient lung defence.

It is very important for performers to have as large a lung capacity as possible in order to enhance their vocal capacity through way of breath. There are factors that can serious affect and diminish your lung capacity. For example, if you smoke or suffer from lung disease your lung capacity is decreased. For performers, a decreased lung capacity can result in an incline of difficulty of holding a note for a long time (singing) or struggle with pronunciation and articulation due to a struggle to create the necessary glottal onset of vowels. I, personally am a smoker and therefore need to realise the damage smoking causes to my vocal health. Through way of research and disturbing pictures as above I hope to try and quit as i know that it is vital for a performer to have a healthy, working body in order to be the best that we can be.

The Intercostal Muscles

The Intercostal Muscles:

There are spaces present in-between the ribs and these are known as the intercostal spaces. Due to the fact that there are 12 ribs, there are 11 intercostal spaces and these spaces contain different nerves, blood vessels and muscles. The muscles that tend to be found in these gaps are the intercostal muscles.

The intercostal muscles are various collections of muscles that help to form and move the chest wall and can be found running between the ribs. There are three principal layers:

* The external intercostal muscles – these are on the outer layer. These originate on ribs 1-11 and their insertions are on ribs 2-12. These muscles aid in forced and quiet inhalation and are responsible for the expansion of the transverse dimension of the thoracic cavity as well as the elevation of the ribs. They are innervated by the intercostal nerves and provided by the intercostal veins and arteries, with their fibres running in opposite directions.

* The internal intercostal muscles – these are on the inner layer. These originate on ribs 1-11 and their insertions are on ribs 2-12. These muscles ain in forced expiration and are responsible for decreasing the transverse dimensions of the thoracic cavity as well as the depression of the ribs. They are innervated by the intercostal nerves and provided by the intercostal veins and arteries, with their fibres running in opposite directions.

* The innermost intercostal muscle – this muscle is found in the deepest layers of the internal intercostal muscles but is separated from them by the ‘neurovascular bundle’.


The left side of the picture shows the inner layer of the intercostal muscles whilst the right side shows the outer layer.

The main involvement of the intercostal muscles in with the mechanical aspect of breathing as they help in expanding and shrinking the capacity of the chest when breathing.
External: These muscles create an increased lung volume by pulling the ribs up and therefore draw air into the lungs. Internal: These muscles create a decreased lung volume by bringing the ribs closer to one another expelling the air out of the lungs.

These muscles aiding with the respiration process it what makes them so important to a performer. It is the usage of these muscles that enhance proper breathing and makes it possible for a reduction of strain on the vocal cords. They also help for greater breath control. Both of these are needed in both singing and acting, for example performing a monologue or when singing a song. My understanding of these muscles is important as to ensure that I look after my body and understand how to control them in order to improve my vocal technique.

Vocal Register and pitch

Vocal Register and Pitch

In order to fully understand the mechanisms of pitch control we must take a look at the composition of tissue in the vocal chords.

However, deeper vocal fold tissues - collagen, elastin and muscle - exhibit some resistance to stretching, but can become quite stiff.

A vocal register is a specific series of tones in the human voice that are produced as a result of one particular vibratory pattern of the vocal folds.

A person’s vocal pitch is determined by the resonant frequency of the vocal folds and differentiates with gender and age.

	Average Frequency
Adult Male	125 Hz
Adult Female	210 Hz
Children	Over 300 Hz

The greater the frequency of vibrations in the vocal folds, the higher the vocal pitch will be and vice versa. A person’s vocal frequency is determined by the thickness and length of the vocal cords as well as the tension retained in the vocal cords. Due to this, women’s voices tend to be pitched higher than men’s as they have shorter vocal cords.

The movement of the vocal folds is controlled by what is known as the vagus nerve, which is a very important part of our nervous system, and are white in colour due to scant blood circulation.

Because our vocal fold manipulate the way our voices sound, there are three types of onsets:

·         Simultaneous – both air and sound working together – this is the most common onset for a singer as it allows a better flow of sound.

·         Glottal – sound working against the air. This onset and the movement of the larynx is the vocal cords close immediately

·         Aspirate – air working against the sound resulting in a ‘breathy’ sound – this onset and the movement of the larynx are pushing out breath before sound

As performers such as singers or actors, we must make a conscious decision on which onset we wish to uses.

As performers, it is vital that we keep the vocal cords healthy and learn how to enhance their affect; they are one of the most important aspects of voice production. The folds create and generate sounds that have rich harmonics due to collisions of the vocal folds themselves. Certain singers learn to use these harmonics to their advantage and can isolate particulars of the harmonics which is often called overtone singing which is often perceived as singing in more than one pitch and tone at the same.