Vocal technique?

In my opinion, in the voice teaching, in its traditional method, the means have been confused with the end. In most of the times, under my own experience in conservatories and with private teachers, the use of the media, the searching to achieve some kind of goal or result, has become an end itself. I mean, the application of a singing technique, which is nothing more than a conceptual theory that tries to find what happens when we speak or sing, has become an end itself. For many teachers, the application of a specific technique is the more important thing and they leave behind the point that singing can only be the execution of the natural expression of a text with music, of a message with content and musical form, in short, to be an instrument at the service of Nature.

Today I can not help to remain astonished when I remember the practices in my student days, and which is done today, where you were not required to know the meaning of the text of the aria or song to be performed, but rather the execution of notes was required under a certain technique, a certain "way of doing". This way of doing, that is to say the means, thus becomes an end in itself. It was thought, as still thinks now, that with the concrete execution of a physical concept you can arrive at the natural expression of the gift of the voice, which could be successful in the production of an artistic expression.




The searching of a concrete result can approach what the voice could do by itself without the intervention of the controlling mind, but it can not be as faithful as it would be if it were left to intervene with its own wisdom, a wisdom that the own nature grants us. This search for a result could have fruits in a short period of time, but in the long run it has been shown that it has caused problems in the singers, since the emission is not natural, the controlled emission does not obey to what nature itself grants, but is the result of an artificial emission of the song, a voice without a full expression. This lack of full expression also has another consequence and is that the sound does not reach the soul of the listener with fullness, there is no naturalness in the production of the voice, there are artifices in order to achieve certain technical objectives. Objectives, on the other hand, that, if they are not achieved, create in the singer frustrations and fears, distrust in himself and in many occasions abandonment.

All the tensions, the efforts to achieve an end - to reach an high note, finishing a whole work without "dying" in the attempt, or sometimes a single whole aria - have a common cause, an origin, that explains the unwanted results, the lack of naturalness. Many times when we hear the naturalness of a voice we recognize it immediately, we say "he/she has an easy singing", "he/she has a very natural voice". That person is the very expression of Nature that is acting through it without any hindrance. It accepts itself as a musical expression of what nature wants to express through it. You do not have to wonder what is happening in your body, what muscular mechanisms are activated. You do not need it at all, just let what you perceive as natural flow and also enjoy it! The application of technical mechanisms to the production of sound often produces a physical and mental effort that is far from what would be a pleasant song.


The person who has found the natural flow of his own expression and of the expression of nature, the moment he asks himself how those movements are made in his body and moves away from the natural, will begin to look for a control of his body , a use of itself separated from Nature. The voice would stop emitting naturally. What to do then? To give a table of solutions or steps to "do this and the problems will be over" would be to fall back into another search for means and would contradict myself. The human temptation to find the reason for things in "three comfortable steps" means that, among other things, we separate the part of the whole.

I would like you to start asking yourself questions, you will begin to doubt what you have been told as true or even what you yourself have established as true and that nevertheless does not work. If you just think "well, it does not work for me now, but it will work for me", you must start to think that you should change your mind. I believe in singing as the expression that nature uses through us to express itself. I do not propose steps but I give you some advice or indications about why you should change your beliefs. I hope to be your first step along this web.