I believe in freedom when it comes to singing. Here is a description of truly free singing:
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- The sound starts all on its own, seemingly even before you can finish taking a breath. You do not have to induce the sound to start by effort.
- You have plenty of breath to sing whatever you want to sing. You are very little aware of using the breath. You take your breath when you decide to and then just sing.
- You can sing any note in your range easily. This does not mean you can sing any note on the piano. If you are a bass, you probably cannot sing as high as a coloratura soprano, but you can probably sing the same notes as a tenor – they just sound different.
- You have a wide range of at least 2 octaves (24 notes) and probably 2-1/2 up to 3 octaves (36 notes). (Two to two-and-a-half octaves in men; up to three – or more – in women.)
- You can sing any note in your range at any volume level you choose, from the softest to the loudest, most powerful sound possible for your voice type.
- You can make your voice sound very “dark” or very “light” or anything in between. I put these two words in quotes because dark and light are pretty subjective terms. You can convey an emotion with the quality of your voice. Singers call this vocal color or coloring the voice, which you can do at will when your voice is free.
- You can sing music that is very slow and have lots of breath for a long musical phrase.
- You can sing music that goes very fast and has a lot of notes and every note is right on pitch and clear as a bell to your listeners.
- Your diction is excellent. Everyone tells you they can understand every word you sing.
- You can make a crescendo or decrescendo on any note or phrase (louder or softer) while you sing it. Singers consider that the ultimate technique is the messa di voce. This is an expression in Italian which means the ability to start any note in your range on any vowel softly, swell it gradually out to loud and then gradually back to soft. If you can do this, your voice is working perfectly. If you can do it fairly well, even though not perfectly, you are a good singer.
- However you want to “sell” the song, you can do it. This means you can interpret the text and convey the emotion that is in the words with ease, so that people feel what you are singing.
- You voice wants to work for you. You don’t have to coax your voice to sound good by endless vocalizing.
- In your throat you feel little while all this is going on. You are not aware of the pitches changing as you sing or your tongue moving around very much. It is almost like the sound is magic, not connected to your body at all.
I would think this all sounds like something you would want to be able to do.
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