the orange spiel page 1 august 2019 · the orange spiel page 4 august 2019 (continued from page 3)...

The Orange Spiel August 2019

Volume 39 Issue 8 August 2019 We meet at 7:00 most Thursdays at Shepherd of the Woods Lutheran, 7860 Southside Blvd, Jacksonville, FL Guests always welcome Call 355-SING No Experience Necessary

WHAT'S INSIDE Title Page Congratulations Palmetto Vocal Project 1 Editorial 2 Barbershop Harmony 3 8 Golden Rules For High Intensity 3-4 Because You...With A Little Bit Of Me 5 Reading Music 6 33 Most Effective Singing Tips 6 All About Vocal Fry 7-10 # Tom Hoolen: On Being Curious 11 Breathing, Support, And Estill Model 12-13 Chapter Quartets 13 Free Your Voice 14 Free Singing Tips 14 Quartet Corner 15 Chapter Member Stats 15 Board Minute Summary 16 Magic Choral Trick #383 16 Upcoming Schedules 17 Birthdays / Guests / New Members 17 Directing Team / Other Leaders 18 Chapter Officers / Music Team 19

CONGRATULATIONS

PALMETTO VOCAL PROJECT

C ongratulations to our brother chorus up in Mt Pleasant SC, Palmetto Vocal Project. Many of us are dual members with them and sang with them at the recent International Convention in

Salt Lake City. While many thought that the performance was better than the scores indicated (especially the ballad), the fact remains that they moved up several places from their previous International competitions and scored their highest marks to date. They are definitely on the move, in the right direction.


The Orange Spiel is published monthly and is the official publication of the Jacksonville Big O Chapter of the Sunshine District of the Barbershop Harmony Society, the home of the Big Orange Chorus. The chapter and chorus meet most Thursday evenings at 7:00 pm at the Shepherd of the Woods, 7860 South-side Blvd. For more information visit our website, http://www.bigorangechorus.com. Articles, pictures and address corrections may be sent to the editor.

EDITORIAL We are trying to grow our membership. One of the best ways of doing that is to get out there with more performances so that more people will see and hear what we do and want to do it, too. We understand that there can be work conflicts or family issues that might cause a man to miss once in a great while. But the expectation remains that when the chapter is doing something, the chapter will be there. Of course, this assumes that our performances will always be great and getting better. That means re-hearsals and practicing at home will continue to be of paramount importance. The expectation remains that we will be prepared and ready to learn what Jay has to impart to us, each and every week. Each and every man, improving, just a little, each and every day, will result in huge advances for the chorus.

2019 Board of Directors President: Terry Ezell Immediate Past Pres: Brian Kerr Executive VP: Jason Dearing VP Music & Performance: John Alexander VP Membership: Phil Warmanen VP Marketing & PR: Robert Reeves Secretary: Mike Sobolewski Treasurer: Gregg Flowers Finance Chairman: Rick Morin Music Director: Jay Giallombardo

Big O Bucks Coordinator: Mike Sobolewski Bookkeeper: Rick Morin

Committees Show Chairman: Jason Dearing Webmaster: Frank Nosalek Chorus Manager: Jason Dearing Uniform Manager: Dave Walker

2019 Music Team Music Director: Jay Giallombardo Associate Director: George Gipp Music VP: John Alexander Section Leaders: Terry Ezell Tenor Steve Mullens Lead Daniel Pesante Lead Brian Kerr Bari Timothy Keatley Bari John Alexander Bass Alex Burney Bass Presentation Team: George Gipp Mike Sobolewski Bob Stump

John Alexander, Editor 2429 Southern Links Dr Fleming Island FL 32003 [email protected] 904-278-3987

For more detailed, timely information see my weekly publication:

Orange Zest

If you’re not giving the world your

best, each and every time, what

world are you saving it for?


BARBERSHOP HARMONY by Ana Maria

from facebook.com

I don’t know if they were a barbershop quartet on not, but:

“First known Barbershop quartet. African-American male quartets are known to have existed as early as 1873. And in Jacksonville, Florida, there was an African-American quartet of singing barbers in the 1880’s. These are the very first non-professional quartets of whose existence we are certain. Other earlier ones surely existed. It is likely that the reper-toires of these groups consisted of spirituals, planta-tions songs, and popular songs.” (editor’s note: Robert Reeves found further men-tions of the Jacksonville connection among other information on barbershop singing history in a 37 page excerpt at https://composerjude.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Play-That-barbershop-Chord.pdf)

8 GOLDEN RULES FOR

HIGH INTENSITY VOCALS by David Combes

from voicecouncil.com

H igh intensity singing can be the holy grail of commercial music – yet this kind of singing is best developed face-to-face with a knowl-edgeable coach.

When you work with an experienced singing teacher, you will learn the rules that make this kind of singing both safe and powerful. I review them here in this video: https://youtu.be/4vdedKD20Bg

Warm Up Develop a good vocal warm-up regime with your singing teacher or vocal coach before you ever ap-proach this area of singing. After all, you would never sprint a race the moment you woke up in the morning. This warm up might involved tongue trill-sirens (see 0.55 in the video). As you warm up, you should be asking yourself if your voice is up to high intensity work that day.

Get Engaged with Your Body Constriction and tension often happens when we fail to think of engaging with entire body, but focus solely on our throat. Where are you actively engaged in supporting your voice? This doesn’t mean locking your knees, tighten-ing your hips and sticking your chest out. Instead, find points of balance and check to see if your body is ready for the work it is about to do.

Don’t Force Your Larynx to be Low When you are doing high-intensity rock vocals, you need to allow your larynx to rise – this doesn’t mean pulling it up (that can lead to constriction), but leaving it free to rise. Think about shouting across a busy road to get someone’s attention, “Hey!” –often this involves,

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naturally, a raised larynx. I give some examples of this at 2.55 in the video.

Breath Most people think that a higher and louder note means a higher breath volume and pressure on the exhale – but that is not the case with really intense, high vocals. When people are singing highly and brightly, the vo-cal folds are only apart for 30% of a cycle – they are actually closed 70% of the time. This means that less air is needed than you might think. In fact, If you push a lot of air through, you will actually force the vocal cords into a position that is wrong for high intensity singing. See my examples in the video to see this process at work at 4.18.

Ensure Your Effort is Appropriate Remember that the vocal cords are closed for more than half of each cycle when you are singing high notes at a high intensity – you have to work but do not need to think of your throat as a high effort area. Because you do not need a lot of breath for high in-tensity singing, the abdominal region also doesn’t need your highest effort; high effort in the abs will press too much air over the cords. You may want to anchor in your upper back with more effort. I find that certain physical postures help me to engage in this area – see the video for some examples of how to approach this at 6.20.

Focus on “Right” instead of “Loud” If you approach high intensity singing as a quest for volume, this can lead to difficulties – forgetting the rules above. If you reverse the process and aim for “right” (with volume as a by-product of this aim), you are more likely to keep on track with good technique. This is a little bit of a psychological trick that makes some sense – keeping you focused on great tech-

nique and getting the emotional delivery right.

Learn to Use Twang Twang is a technique that uses relatively little ef-fort to produce a bright, sound that is edgy and cuts through. When you are coming to the end of your warm up, before launching into your high intensity phrase, do some exercises that are really high in twang. I demonstrate some octave leaps in the video at 8.45.

Practice Removing Consonants One way to work yourself into a vocally demand-ing phrase (after using the first 7 rules) is to re-move all of the consonants and pick a favorite vowel, and use that to get into a phrase – on only a vowel sound. This allows you to practice your twang, phrasing and breathing. Then, add the consonants and words back in. See 8.35 for an example of this ap-proach. Take care when working on high intensity vocals; I would never work in this area of my voice without first running through things with a good singing teacher or vocal coach before launching in.

8 GOLDEN RULES FOR HIGH INTENSITY

(continued)


describe them with over-the-top, non-snooty lan-guage. He'd say "this wine straight up tastes like Fruity Pebbles," or "hit a deer on the road, let it fall down, throw a bunch of cherries on it, take your knife... cut the deer, bite it - that's the flavor profile here." At the end of every video, Gary V would say, "because YOU... with a little bit of ME... we're changing the wine world!" As bizarre as it might sound, I believed the man. I, who had neverever-ever been a wine guy, was FASCINATED with wine because it was made ACCESSIBLE, NOT STUFFY, and NOT SCARY. What is our job as vocal music educators? SAME. Make choral music ACCESSI-BLE, NOT STUFFY, and NOT SCARY - in other words, ACHIEVABLE AND FUN. When our choirs TAKE OUR INSTRUCTION and DO SOMETHING WITH IT, they are responsible for that improvement. It's SO CRUCIAL that we let them know they THEY are the ones who make things happen. There is power in ownership. WE have a role in providing guidance, but THEY have to do the work. THEY are the heroes of the story. That's why I now end my rehearsals with, "because YOU... with a little bit of ME... we're changing this choir!" Question of the day: What non-musician has inspired your music? @garyvee

BECAUSE YOU...

WITH A LITTLE BIT OF ME…

WE'RE CHANGING

THIS CHOIR! by Brody McDonald

from choirbites.com

M any blogs or books try to be "game-changers" or "life-transforming." They claim to have the "top 10 secrets to a great rehearsal." I do no such thing.

Sometimes just a little something (a "bite") is suffi-cient. This isn't transformative, but it is useful. I'm going the long way around on this one, so stay with me. At one point, my wife and I got into drinking wine. Not just in a casual way... I mean a "let's swirl it, sniff it, taste it, and analyze it" way. I like to go deep into my knowledge of any given hobby, so I started poking around on the internet researching wine. That's when I found Gary Vaynerchuk. Today, Gary V is a highly-sought-after guru in the world of social media and marketing for business. Gary V made his bones, however, growing his family wine store. A pioneer in content marketing, Gary V got people like me from around the country to buy wine online at his store through a daily vlog called "Wine Li-brary TV." Each day, Gary V would taste wines and


READING MUSIC by Jay Giallombardo

T o keep your commitment to con-tinuous improvement, one area to add to your list is “becoming a bet-ter reader” of music.

Adage: Musicians train their: eyes “to hear”; ears “to see” Training both senses of hearing and sight gives you a “richer” understanding of music. “I have always learned music just by listening”. Good for you! But, is this a virtue? It appears to be only 50% of your perception. Work on your weak side! If you are strong with the “ears”, work on the eyes. If you are already a pretty good reader, do more “ear-training”. When you hear music, what do you “see”? When every singer in the chorus gets a little bit bet-ter, the chorus gets a lot better! Here are two great videos on fundamentals: Reading music in 15 minutes or less. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyqthu9T2xc Landmark System https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSOU-J9KHbg

33 MOST EFFECTIVE

SINGING TIPS from how2improvesinging.com

#26 by Ellen Shea

Breathing Is The First Step I work on breathing techniques with all of my students, whether beginning, interme-diate or advanced. If I were to pick one thing that I tell a student in one of the first lessons – Put your hands on the sides of your ribs, with your thumbs to the back. Take a deep breath, starting in your belly, and feel your ribs expand. When you sing, no matter how long, short, high or low the phrase is, you want to keep those ribs expanded. The belly will go in and out, but the ribs stay ex-panded. This way, you don’t have to keep rebuilding the breath every time you take in air. I always give a ton of information in the first couple of lessons, so I’ve got tips on vocal production, reso-nance and relaxation – but coordinating breathing is the most important first step.”


ALL ABOUT VOCAL FRY by Joanna Cazden

from joannacazden.com

Vocal fry: Maybe you hate it. Maybe you don’t no-tice it. Or maybe it just makes you think of the Kar-dashians. A barrage of articles and op-eds about the grav-elly, creaky vocal quality—some warning of an epi-demic of lazy, annoying speech patterns used by young women, others rejecting the idea that women should have to change their voices to please other people—have flooded the media in the past year, making it likely you’ve encountered “vocal fry” even outside your work as a speech-language pathologist. There’s feminist writer Naomi Wolf in the Guard-ian, advising “the most empowered generation of women ever” to stop using vocal fry for its own good. There’s the VICE reporter who recounted taking his girlfriend to an SLP because he was an-noyed by her vocal fry. There’s journalist Ann Friedman writing for New York magazine, calling for an end of prescribing how women—specifically young women—should speak. Amateur speech police/vigilantes can discuss their hatred of or pride in vocal fry in the comments sec-tion ad nauseam—but with a topic as controversial and complex as vocal fry, SLPs know they have a responsibility to approach vocal fry carefully and appropriately, with evidence to back it up. But defining “appropriate” in this situation isn’t so easy. It’s requiring SLPs to navigate different un-derlying causes, the person’s opinion of his or her own voice, and how to handle the sometimes tricky area of billing. Add in perceptions of poten-tial harm caused by vocal fry and the social issue of whether overwhelming focus on its use by young women is sexist, and the territory can get rocky.

Figuring out the fry First, a terminology refresher. When news articles cover vocal fry, they’re usually referring to the use of a creaky pitch at the end of sentences, or some-times consistently throughout someone’s speech. SLPs, however, more often use the term “glottal fry,” says SLP Starr Cookman, assistant professor at University of Connecticut Health’s Voice and

Speech Clinic, to describe the lowest register under the modal register of normal speech. Linguists will often call it “creaky voice,” “laryngealized voice” or “glottalized voice,” says Patricia Keating, a linguistics professor who specializes in phonetics at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and president of the International Phonetic Association. Regardless of the terms, vocal fry can appear in a per-son’s speech for two reasons. The staccato, irregular vibrations of the vocal folds can occur because of pathological issues, Cookman says, such as vocal-fold lesions, hyperfunction of the larynx (muscle tension dysphonia), respiratory pathology and neurological is-sues. In these situations, vocal fry is likely to be per-sistent throughout an utterance, rather than appearing only at the end, and is treated as part of a “constellation of signs and symptoms,” including vocal fatigue and/or laryngeal pain. Vocal fry also can appear as a linguistic style that is a standard part of language, usually at the end of sen-tences to mark the completion of a speaker’s thought, says Bruce Gerratt, director of UCLA’s audiology and speech pathology clinics and professor of head and neck surgery. “Vocal fry is not normally considered a vocal deviation,” he says. In either case, a person who has or uses vocal fry speaks with a low pitch and suboptimal airflow, with the vocal cords in a relatively lax position. But this isn’t a new thing. Contrary to media reports describing a “phenomenon,” all of the SLPs and linguists inter-viewed for this article say it’s long existed in the Eng-lish language. “Vocal fry has always been there,” says Laura Purcell Verdun, a Washington, D.C.-based SLP who takes medical and professional caseloads of voice disorders, including vocal fry. “This didn’t just crop up in 2010. It’s always been a component of American English,” as well as of other English dialects, including Australian and British. It predated the Kardashians—they didn’t invent vocal fry,” says Verdun. In her hospital setting, Cookman says she hasn’t seen complaints of pathological vocal fry—which she treats in about 15–20 percent of her medical cases—increase over her 20-year career. But is it on the in-crease as a fashionable—not biological—speech pat-tern, as some in the media have charged? Both Keating and Verdun say it is possible that the use of vocal fry as a style of speech has spread.




“It’s not just at the ends of sentences, it’s not just in the aid of low pitch—it’s now on longer stretches of words,” says Keating. “And so now people no-tice it because it doesn’t seem to be part of a gen-eral strategy for lowering pitch; it’s just a more per-vasive quality that identifies younger people.” Interest in and awareness of vocal fry has in-creased over the last five years, says Verdun, who thinks more access to new types of entertainment like podcasts and reality television may have given the vocal style more exposure. “There’s definitely increased interest,” she says, “with this over-whelming trend toward criticism, whether it’s war-ranted or not. It’s really coming from a place of judgment and questionable prejudice.” Prior to a 1966 paper by Harry Hollien in the Jour-nal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, vocal fry was considered a “vocal disorder.” How-ever, Hollien and his colleagues suggested that because many people speak with this quality in everyday speech, its use should not exclusively be considered abnormal, but rather, in nonpathologi-cal cases, as a normal register—below modal—that exists as “a physiologically normal laryngeal capability.”

Who has vocal fry? Fifty years after the Hollien paper, young women are finding themselves the target of negative at-tention for their use of vocal fry—typically from older men, but also from some women, including Naomi Wolf, the feminist writer whose July 2015 column in the Guardian (U.K.) most recently re-vived the vocal-fry debate in the press. The head-line: “Young Women, Give Up the Vocal Fry and Reclaim Your Strong Female Voice.” Although Wolf has fervent supporters, other femi-nists argue that Wolf herself is telling women how to behave, railing against the point of feminism it-self. And hey, Wolf’s critics wonder, what about men? Men use vocal fry, as well as other speech styles, such as “uptalk,” that are usually associated only with women.“I hear people complaining about [women using vocal fry] all the time,” Gerratt says.

“I don’t know why they pick on the women and not the men, because this occurs in men, too.” A popularly cited 2011 study by Lesley Wolk in the Journal of Voice studied the use of vocal fry in female college students. They found that two-thirds of female college students ages 18 to 25 used vocal fry, usually at the end of sentences. In a 2014 follow-up study, Wolk and her team studied the prevalence of vocal fry in male college students, finding that they, too, used vocal fry at the end of sentences, though at a signifi-cantly lower rate than that of females. Verdun, who treats vocal fry for a professional client list that includes male and female attorneys, execu-tives, politicians, and radio and TV personalities, says she finds Wolf’s argument prejudicial. “It was perhaps a little overly dramatic. … It’s a matter of the individual, versus making these overarching generalizations to women under their 30s or all women professionals. There’s nothing to be gained by that because you’re continuing to reinforce the older white male perspec-tive of the female voice.” Another vocal fry study by Duke University research-ers, led by Rindy Anderson and published in PLOS One in 2014, looked at how vocal fry affects women’s job prospects. The answer? Not in a good way. The authors found that women who used vocal fry were less likely to appear “hirable” than their counterparts without vocal fry, and they were also seen as less at-tractive, competent, educated and trustworthy. Men, with and without vocal fry, were also studied—and al-though the men with vocal fry were also perceived more negatively, they were still rated more highly than their female counterparts. Ira Glass, who speaks to an enormous audience each week as host of the “This American Life” podcast/radio show, uses vocal fry. But of the many complaints (or “hate mail,” he says) the show has received over the years regarding voice quality, none has been directed at Glass. The subjects of all of the complaints were women who had worked on the show. (NPR’s “Fresh Air” has also recently dedicated a fair amount of air-time to thedebate surrounding vocal fry and women’s voices.) Noam Chomsky also has a distinct vocal fry, and Ann Hepperman, a producer of the Slate podcast Culture Gabfest, recently cut a mix of many prominent male podcasters using vocal fry. And the list goes on. But still, young women catch most of the flack, which


ALL ABOUT VOCAL FRY

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may be because of an inherent difference between men’s and women’s voices. “It may be that people are accustomed to the sound in men’s voices be-cause they’re already at a lower pitch,” says Ger-ratt. Vocal fry also may be considered annoying in any gender for other reasons. Verdun notes that a 2014 study by Sei Jin Ko in the journal Psychologi-cal Science showed that listeners found authorita-tive, hierarchical voices to be “steady in pitch, more varied in volume and less strained,” whereas the creakiness of vocal fry does not maintain a regular pitch. It also may just come down to people not liking a perceived change. “Some people are annoyed when they notice that something about the way their language is spoken changes,” Gerratt offers. “They were taught to speak in a certain way, and they consider this new way to be not good. They don’t like to see things change.” Research and anecdotal evidence indicate that vocal fry most greatly offends older listeners. A study by Stanford University linguist Penny Eckert found that while those older than 40 thought a ra-dio reporter with vocal fry did not sound authorita-tive, those younger than 40 actually thought the creaky-voiced reporter, in fact, sounded authorita-tive. Another study by Ikuko Patricia Yuasa, pub-lished in 2010 in the journal American Speech, showed that although college-age Americans say that creaky voice makes a speaker sound “hesitant, nonaggressive and informal,” they con-currently thought it made the speaker sound “educated, urban-oriented and upwardly mobile.” If the style persists as young people become mid-dle-age people, “all of a sudden everyone uses it, and it’s standard again,” Gerratt says. Maybe it’s mostly a matter of perspective, posits linguist Keating. “As a linguist, I’d say, ‘Speech patterns change and this is what they’re doing now—whatever.’ But as an older person, I think, ‘Oh, those nice, smooth voices—that’s so much bet-ter,’” she says with a laugh. What it means for Speech-Language Pathologists With such a loaded topic, how should SLPs ap-

proach the treatment of vocal fry? Although some peo-ple with vocal fry argue that it’s just the way they talk—it’s not a choice they make—SLPs Gerratt and Verdun say that unless vocal fry is present throughout every syllable of every sentence spoken, it’s more than likely a choice—albeit a subconscious one. “If a person can shut it off at will, that’s not a disorder,” Gerratt says. “The thing about glottal fry is that it’s inconsistent,” Verdun says. “It exists among otherwise normal voice production, whereas somebody who has muscle ten-sion dysphonia clearly has excessive tension, com-plains of pain or soreness or tightness or constriction, and every word that comes out of their mouth [sounds] the same.” And unless it’s the type of vocal fry that’s pathological and appears alongside other disorders and symptoms—like in the patients Cookman treats at her hospital—it’s only something that needs to be fixed when a person decides that it needs to be fixed, they say. “If it’s not a concern for them, I’m not going to make it a concern,” says Verdun. “But there’s no reason that it can’t be addressed, [though] it has to be addressed from a physiological perspective, not from a judg-mental, prejudicial, generational, sexist perspective. It’s all about making sure the words that you use are coming across as powerfully as you want them to.”Choosing to work on eliminating vocal fry is akin to choosing to modify or reduce an accent, say Gerratt and Keating. “You know, a Henry Higgins and Eliza Doolittle sort of thing,” Keating offers as an example. Although every professional and medical case is unique, Verdun and Cookman both use education and awareness techniques to treat vocal fry, which usually takes about two to three sessions to alter. “The focus is always on how to optimize or normalize vocal physiology for optimal voice production,” Verdun says. “Everyone learns differently, hears things or feels differently, so that needs to be teased out. Medi-cal cases may be less stimulable or may warrant more patience and persistence.” And vocal fry could be just one aspect of the voice that male and female clients are looking to change. They may think their voices are too soft, too high-pitched, too nasal. “It’s a pretty diverse clientele,” Verdun says. Typically, “their concern is that it’s somehow getting in the way of their ability to communicate effectively at work.”

Debating damage (Continued on page 10)

ALL ABOUT VOCAL FRY

(continued)



Another common charge against vocal fry is that it hurts the voice. But in the case of end-of-sentence use, no research confirms this. The authors of the 2011 Wolk study suggest vocal fry may cause damage, but did not test the suggestion. “There’s no evidence that shows that glottal fry, in and of itself, causes injury,” says Cookman, who adds that her patients’ vocal fry usually naturally accom-panies their primary medical issue. Verdun echoes Cookman, adding that although she’s heard anecdotes from some otolaryngolo-gists and other physicians who “very much sug-gest it’s medical, and if you don’t do something about it, it can cause nodules or polyps,” she has never personally seen it. “And I’ve practiced for a long time. I do believe that more chronic use could lead to laryngeal tension and vocal fatigue, but that’s really individual cases versus the standard expectation across the board,” she says. “Perhaps if the user is overusing their voice in that way, trying to project their voice loudly while main-taining that glottal fry characteristic, then that’s more likely to create an environment where there could be a secondary injury,” Cookman suggests. From a global perspective, linguist Keating notes that languages around the world incorporate vocal fry. In fact, Gerratt estimates there are probably more languages in the world that use creak than don’t—creak is part of one of the tones used in Mandarin Chinese, he says, which hundreds of millions of people speak. “When so many people use a phonation type commonly in their language, to me it strongly implies it is not a disorder.” But in America, where English does not call for vocal fry, strong negative reactions from others can certainly make it seem like something is wrong. For example, fiancés, parents and supervi-sors frequently call Verdun, requesting her ser-vices for their partners, children or employees. However, she advises taking on such clients only if they themselves want to change their voices. And insurance companies won’t reimburse an SLP for something they don’t consider medically neces-sary, such as altering a speech style. Many provid-ers also do not cover treatment for muscle tension

dysphonia. “Insurance can only be billed if there has been a physi-cian’s exam of the larynx and voice … and the patient has been referred for therapy with a specific diagno-sis,” Verdun says. “Insurance would not be billed for professional clients” who are looking to change their voices but do not have a diagnosed voice disorder. But for those clients, Verdun says she can see how eliminating vocal fry could fit in with any other type of professional development.“How is it different than learning how to manage crisis situations or how to give bad news?” she asks. “That’s very much reasonable and may not be judgmental or prejudicial at all.” But she poses another perspective: If your 50-year-old boss doesn’t like your voice, “is that something [the boss] needs to adjust to, or do you need to adjust? You really have to decide that for yourself. But no mat-ter what, you shouldn’t feel bad about yourself.” It’s all about bringing it back to the clients themselves, says Verdun. “It really comes down to, are you able to do with your voice what you need it to be able to do?” she says. “Does your voice reflect whatever image you’re trying to project? Does your voice support whatever mes-sage you’re trying to convey? If it is, then fine. Who am I to say otherwise?”

ALL ABOUT VOCAL FRY

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TOM HOOTEN: ON BEING

CURIOUS, AND ELEVATING

LEARNING, AND GROWTH

ABOVE EGO by Dr Noa Kageyama

from bulletproofmusician.com

L egendary UCLA basketball coach John Wooden once said “If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you have time to

do it over?” It’s one of my favorite quotes now, but I wonder if I could have grasped this when I was younger, and in the thick of weekly lessons, rehearsals, perform-ances, auditions, and so on. In the sense that when I look back now, I can see how much of my practice was oriented around simply trying to not sound bad at my next lesson, or rehearsal, performance, and just doing what I had to do to sound presentable at the next thing. And what exactly is wrong with that? Well, someone once said that we overestimate what we can do in a day, but underestimate what we can do in a year. Meaning, when we are too focused on sounding good tomorrow, it can be easy to neglect to ex-plore new techniques or approaches that might appear to set us back today, but actually lays the groundwork for a much higher level of playing months or years from now. Like continuing to make do with our less than ideal chinrest/shoulder rest setup, because we’re afraid to go through the growing pains and adjustments of a new setup. Or turning a blind eye to our vibrato, rather than exploring ways to develop a more varied vibrato, even though we know this would enable us to be a much more communicative player in the long run.

Meet Tom Hooten Tom Hooten is Principal Trumpet of the Los Ange-les Philharmonic, and has previously held posi-tions with the Atlanta Symphony (principal), Indi-

anapolis Symphony (assistant principal), Richmond Symphony (2nd), and “The President’s Own” Marine Band. Despite getting serious about the trumpet a little later than most, and encountering his share of challenges along the way, Tom seems to be uniquely capable of putting his ego aside, and focusing relentlessly on learning, growth, and being curious. It’s a mindset that’s ideal for learning and performing, and one that I hope this episode will help you incorporate into your own practice and approach to learning as well. In this 38-min chat, we’ll explore:

• The problem with practicing to avoid sounding bad – i.e. practicing to hide weaknesses vs. prac-ticing to fix the actual underlying problem (though this may take longer). (1:53)

• The importance of having the courage to play the long game, and not feel like you have to prove yourself every single day at the expense of your long-term goals. (6:22)

• How the emphasis he put on playing the right way, and cultivating ease and flexibility are now paying off in his ability to meet the demands of his day-to-day responsibilities with the LA Phil. (8:07)

• The 5 key basics that he came to feel were really important in auditions. (10:38)

• The potential downside of finding a “shortcut” that seems to work pretty well. (12:00)

• How he came to be able to put his ego and pride aside and elevate his commitment to learning and open-minded-ness. (13:40)

• I ask Tom how he cultivated curiosity and his re-lentless focus on wanting to figure things out vs. proving himself. (18:58)

• A way of conceptualizing knowledge that could help you become more open to learning. (20:54)

• The best remedy for dealing with nerves and ego in auditions. (26:05)

• Feedback about imperfections as nutrients that sustain him and his continued development. (32:58)

• Be wary of information overload; Tom suggests taking one thing and seeing how far or deeply one can take it, rather than moving from one thing to the next, engaging in each on only a very shallow level. (34:22)

http://traffic.libsyn.com/bulletproofmusician/2019.7.7.tom.hooten.mp3


BREATHING, SUPPORT, AND

ESTILL MODEL by Anne-Marie Speed

from thevoiceexplained.com

A slightly late blog after the course in Feb-ruary at the RAM with the fabulous Ed Blake, physiotherapist extraordinaire.

While it’s pretty hard to argue over the importance of breathing to life generally, its rôle in voice work is seriously misunderstood and often inappropri-ately emphasized by many voice teachers, both in speaking and singing. Many people mistakenly believe that because the Estill Model does not directly address breathing (meaning that it doesn’t present a schedule of breathing exercises) that breathing does not fea-ture or is not considered to be important. This is taken to mean that Jo Estill didn’t look at breathing, that it wasn’t something that she thought was important or even blatantly ignored. This is accompanied by an adherence to a view that her response was inexplicably contrary be-havior allied to a stubborn refusal to address an area of teaching that forms the cornerstone of technical work in other systems of voice training. Nothing could be further from the truth. As someone who was fortunate enough to attend many courses given by Jo Estill, to hear her di-rectly present her own research as well as her views on breathing, I can say with some assur-ance that I have never come across any teacher who was as informed about the physiology of breathing, the research on breathing and relation-ship between breathing and voice as she. Too many teachers teach ‘breathing’ that is di-vorced from any physiological process or anatomi-cal understanding, following a line of received ‘wisdom’ that states that more is always better, accompanied by aggressive abdominal pumping that is optimistically, but erroneously, identified as support. It is unarguable (to me, at least) that in order to teach breathing effectively, a sound understanding of the relationship between breath and voice is es-sential.

So to give an overview of what was presented on the breathing day by Ed Blake and me, I would like to offer a few key points: 1: The vocal folds CLOSE in order to produce voice Closure creates resistance, which generates sub-glottic pressure which in turn produces the sound pressure wave that is the basis of voice. Firm, unpres-sured contact is the basis of all good voice production. Yes, the vocal folds open but it is the contact that is so important to sustainable voicing and is what we can both feel and control. The ability to register low level muscle messages leads to the ability to register that feedback which in turn allows the performer to train those muscles. While the sensation produced is small, it is not only possible but essential that the performer learns to identify and train the voice referring to those sensations. Without this, the performer is overly reliant on their own ear and as what you hear is not what we hear, it is not objective or reliable. The ear is certainly important but it can trap the performer into what they are used to, inhibiting progress and causing very real frustration. 2: The key indicator of good voicing is CLEAR TONE This is the simplest way to tell that voice is effectively produced. I would always recommend that when TRAINING the voice , the objective should be CLEAR TONE. Breathiness as part of interpretation is of course absolutely fine but as persistent huskiness or inability to produce clear tone indicates potential vocal problems, it is something that should be directly ad-dressed in lessons. If it proves difficult to shift, then the performer should be referred to an ENT clinic for an examination. 3: Breathe according to need, not habit. Breathing should be determined by the demands of the phrase, tone and interpretation not just by volume, meaning how much you can cram in on one breath. Over breathing is one the most common problems that I encounter and one of the most tenacious. 4: The abdominal wall must release on the in-breath. This allows the diaphragm to descend freely and also releases the deep abdominal muscles that engage with the closure of the vocal folds on the out-breath. If these muscles don’t release fully on the in-breath and remain tight, then they overwork on the out-breath



CHAPTER QUARTETS

Facts Only

Brian Kerr, tenor Mark Graham, lead Mark Roblez, bari

John Alexander, bass

Slice!

Terry Ezell, tenor Eric Grimes, lead Jason Dearing, bari vacant, bass

On Point

Dillon Tidwell, tenor Daniel Pesante, lead Timothy Keatley, bari Alex Burney, bass

No Name Yet

? tenor ? lead ? bari ? bass


(when speaking or singing) increasing air pressure to a level that is much greater than the voice needs or can manage. The regulation of this un-necessary, high air pressure then causes other, compensatory behavior that builds tension and a locking of musculature that need to be flexible and responsive, specifically the neck, jaw and tongue. Let it go. 5: Abdominal pumping is not support! Once you have breathed in, you have positive pressure in the body, meaning greater pressure inside than outside. The air will come out through speaking and singing; you don’t have to push it. Support is using specific muscles to maintain strain-free vocal fold contact across changes of pitch, dynamic and shifts in voice quality. It is not about unregulated, forced air pressure. 6: Don’t forget posture and symmetry Essential in order for the muscles to work effec-tively and economically and it needs constant checking! These are the key points and there is clearly a lot that I have not included but I hope that there is enough here for you to take into your teaching and own voice practice. Have fun!

BREATHING, SUPPORT, AND ESTILL

(continued)


FREE SINGING TIPS by Mick Walsh from a2z-singing-tips.com

Q. Quiet time. I always start my classes with quite, diaphragmatic breathing. Gently winding down from all the stresses of the day. Focus on getting your breath down from the chest and into the diaphragm area. If you have a puppy or a kitten watch how they breathe. Their tummies’ rise and fall gently, with no stress or pressure. Breath in for a count of 7 then out for 11, This fools the body into becoming very re-laxed, very quickly. This is a great technique to try if you are waiting for an interview or an exam. Don’t do this when driving though as it can lower blood pres-sure and increase your vehicle insurance should you crash!!

FREE YOUR VOICE by John Newell, Lead, Realtime

from Let It Out ©2013 Used by permission To help you release your natural voice, know what type of voice you have and sing the styles of music that suit it. Some voices are naturally suited to country, others to pop, or to opera, or jazz, or choral music, or other genres. Very, very few voices can do all of them, and even fewer still can do them all well. Singing music and genres that are unsuitable to your voice is not a good idea. In essence, if it encourages muscle manipu-lation/tension, don’t do it. If it is vocally fatiguing, don’t do it. Sing within the limitations of your natural range. You cannot sing lower than your physical set up allows. Some training may help you extend your higher range a little, but there are limits there also. Accept the range that you have. It is what you have been given and it is your strength,. A later chapter on placement will deal with front resonance and back resonance. Suffice to say here that in my warm-up I establish nasal reso-nance with a completely loose and relaxed soft palate before adjusting that palate to add some back resonance. By the way, do not confuse nasal resonance with singing through the nose. The most powerful resonating space a singer has is above the hard palate and behind the nose. This is the nasal cav-ity. Singing with greater resonance and projection is not about being louder or pushing. It is abouty the sound carried on the exhale being guided into this amplifying chamber. In your own head, it may sound harsh, perhaps even strident, but that is not always what others hear. If you tense your tongue and throat muscles, you reduce the sound that can enter this chamber and be enhanced. If you suc-cessfully allow the sound to circulate in that nasal cavity, your other resonating spaces in the mouth and throat will be free and relaxed to do their mob. However, it you concentrate your efforts on the back resonators too much, your sound will fo-cus there and will not have the brilliance you de-sire.

FREE SINGING TIPS by Yvonne DeBandi from a2z-singing-tips.com

Q = Quit smoking. Quit talking too loudly. Quit talking too much.

FREE SINGING TIPS by Nicole LeGault from a2z-singing-tips.com

Q is for Quench. When I’m recognized in public as a vocal coach, a lot of people ask first: “What should I drink”? I tell them that if they’re singing properly, it doesn’t matter much what they drink. I prefer to avoid caffeine, because I don’t like the crash that follows the artificial stimulation. Avoid hard liquor, it burns go-ing down and the fumes may irritate. Avoid dairy products, they may help generate phlegm. Other than that, just try to remain hydrated and fueled – I like to drink spring water and fruit juice. When consuming carbonated beverages, be sure that you can keep your burping under control! It can be embarrassing, especially during ballads.

FREE SINGING TIPS by Teri Danz from a2z-singing-tips.com

Q = Quit Pushing -- Feeling powerful in singing and being powerful in singing are two entirely different things. While efforting -- pushing chest, singing louder to hit pitches, creating and pushing sound from the throat -- may feel powerful, it actually sounds worse. It's easy to go off pitch, sound strident (even painful), hurt your voice, crack etc... when you sing in this way.


QUARTET CORNER On Point came in 8th in the world at Salt Lake City with an average score of 74.1. What is YOUR quartet doing? Don’t have one? Find three other guys and start one! Can’t find a match? Drop me a line and I’ll run a list of guys looking to quartet up here in the bulletin. It’s one of those really fun things that you don’t fully under-stand until you’ve done it. It’s never too early to be thinking about Singing Val-entines. Quartets are always needed, officially formed or pickup. It’s only a few easy songs. Learning more than one voice part to these songs can help make you easier to fit into a quartet. Men who have indicated interest in forming quartets (entertain, compete, or both) include:

Don Hartsfield and Ken Moyer ...and hopefully more who haven’t contacted me yet.

CHAPTER MEMBER STATS

T he following are our current membership statistics: type active lapsed

Lifetime 50-Year 1 0 Lifetime Regular 0 0 Regular 27 3 Senior 50-Year 4 0 Senior Legacy 2 0 Senior 15 0 Youth 1st year 2 0 Youth 7 1 Total Membership 58 4

PAST DUE MEMBERS

T he following members are listed separately on the BHS website as past due or within two weeks of due. They will automatically be removed from the society roll at 180

days overdue.

Gavin Andrews Brian Kerr Frank Nosalek Jeff Packer

COMING DUE MEMBERS

T he following members are coming due in the next 60 days.

Daniel Pesante


BOARD MINUTE SUMMARY The Board did not meet in July. Meetings are sched-uled as required.

Here’s a simple way to financially support the Big Orange Chorus, at no cost to you! If you shop on amazon.com you can sign up for the Amazon Smile program, and designate the Big O as your charity of choice. Then anytime you make a purchase on Amazon (Smile), they make a donation to us! No cost to you, and a donation to us: win win! To sign up, visit smile.amazon.com/ch/59-1981228 and sign in to your Amazon account. From then on, any Amazon purchase you make (at smile.amazon.com) will help the Big O. Thanks in advance!!

Here’s a simple way to financially support the Big Orange Chorus, at no cost to you! If you shop at any of the more than 400 merchants or like to purchase eGift Cards, FlipGive will give us back from 1% to 20%, depending on the mer-chant. To sign up, visit https://www.flipgive.com/f/570688 and start shopping. Thanks in advance!!

MAGIC CHORAL TRICK #343

SINGING WARMUP - 11 STEPS

TO FORWARD PLACEMENT by Janet Kidd

from betterchoirs.wordpress.com

F or all you visual folks – just up-loaded a video of my favourite vocal warm up tricks – designed to bring the sound forward.

The tricks are: 1. Breath of Fire 2. Brass Buzz 3. Finger in Cheek 4. Zzzzz 5. Bubbling 6. Lip Ring 7. Knuckle Sandwich 8. Peter Pointer Guardrails 9. Moustache Hands 10. Cheek Wings 11. Bugs Bunny Teeth And here’s the Youtube link: https://youtu.be/xTBTTMHWOE8


REHEARSAL SCHEDULE Thu 01 Aug Clay County Library Thu 08 Aug Jumbo Shrimp Thu 15 Aug Shepherd of the Woods Thu 22 Aug Shepherd of the Woods Thu 29 Aug Shepherd of the Woods Thu 05 Sep Shepherd of the Woods Thu 12 Sep Shepherd of the Woods Thu 19 Sep Shepherd of the Woods Thu 26 Sep Shepherd of the Woods

BIRTHDAYS Dave Schubert 07 Aug Brian McGee 15 Aug Bill Conway 26 Aug

NEWEST MEMBERS Hunter Stanford May Tom Frutchey Apr Dillon Tidwell Apr David Scott Feb Seth Brewer Jan Collin Clark Nov Cyrus Dillinger Aug Wyatt Ledford Jun

RECENT GUESTS Bob Ice Charlie Young Barry Flynn Pat Eimers Juan Stegmann Grant Gladden Ted Louckos Shamus McIver Matt Watts Jake Stonecypher Josh Sanders Matt Setor David Pesante Pat Glenn Dale Pratt Cary Quick John Kerr Bruce Allison Jeff Verhoot Juan Stegman Mike Pruitt William Watts James Matti Paul Williams James Langford Steve Woodbeck Joe Plumlee Keyton Rentz Erik Petroni Jerald Carter Steve Moody Winkie DeLoach Wyatt Ledford Robert Hall Wayne Futon Rodney Herlong Tom Rooney Mike Markowski Chuck Cashin Jim Akers Ian Le

WELCOME

{ Big O Buck$ }

PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE Thu 01 Aug Clay County Library show Thu 08 Aug Jumbo Shrimp event Sun 25 Aug Bridges send off party Sat 12 Oct Icemen Opening Night Sat 26 Oct Sunshine District Contest Sat 14 Dec Christmas Show Sun 15 Dec Christmas Show redux

BIG O BUCKS SCHEDULE Fri 02 Aug Why Don’t We Sun 04 Aug Dirty Heads Wed 07 Aug Moe & The Blues Traveller Thu 15 Aug Jags v Eagles (pre-season) Fri 16 Aug Brad Paisley Sun 18 Aug Bush & Live Sat 24 Aug Pentatonix Thu 29 Aug Jags v Falcons (pre-season) Sat 31 Aug Florida State v Boise State Wed 04 Sep Peter Frampton Sun 08 Sep Jags v Chiefs Thu 12 Sep Chris Young Thu 19 Sep Jags v Titans Fri 27 Sep Brantley Gilbert Thu 03 Oct Zac Brown Band Sun 13 Oct Jags v Saints Sun 27 Oct Jags v Jets Sat 02 Nov Florida v Georgia Fri 22 Nov Sara Bareilles Sun 01 Dec Jags v Buccaneers Sun 08 Dec Jags v Chargers Sun 29 Dec Jags v Colts Thu 02 Jan Taxslayer Gator Bowl


EDITOR’S NOTE Article and column submissions are solicited. Help make this a better bulletin. Send me stuff! The deadline for September is 26 August. Items without a byline are from the Editor. The Orange Spiel John Alexander, Editor 2429 Southern Links Dr Fleming Island FL 32003 Back issues are available online at: www.bigorangechorus.com/newsarchive.htm More specific and timely performance information is in my weekly sheet, Orange Zest.

2019 DIRECTING TEAM

Jay Giallombardo Front Line Director

Chuck Griffith Director Emeritus

2019 OTHER CHAPTER LEADERS

Dave Walker Uniform Manager

Jason Dearing Chorus Manager

Frank Nosalek Webmaster Technology

Mike Sobolewski Big O Bucks Coordinator

John Alexander Bulletin Editor

Rick Morin Big O Bucks Bookkeeper

George Gipp Associate Director

Print off two copies of this newsletter

to share - one with your family and

one with someone you are bringing to a chapter meeting. Let them know they

belong here!


2019 BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Terry Ezell

President

Phil Warmanen

VP Membership

Gregg Flowers Chapter Treasurer

Mike Sobolewski Secretary

Jay Giallombardo Director

Brian Kerr Immediate

Past President

2019 MUSIC TEAM

John Alexander VP Music

Mike Sobolewski Presentation Coordinator

George Gipp Associate Director

Imagine 80 men on the risers

Be a singer-bringer

John Alexander Bass Sec Ldr

Steve Mullens Lead Sec Ldr

Terry Ezell Tenor Sec Ldr

Rick Morin Finance Chairman

Robert Reeves

VP Marketing/PR

John Alexander VP Music

Jay Giallombardo Front Line Director

Brian Kerr Bari

Sec Ldr

Jason Dearing Executive VP

Daniel Pesante Lead

Asst Sec Ldr

Tim Keatley Bari

Asst Sec Ldr

Alex Burney Bass

Asst Sec Ldr

John Alexander, Editor

2429 Southern Links Dr

Orange Park FL 32003

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the orange spiel page 1 august 2019 · the orange spiel page 4 august 2019 (continued from page 3)...

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