Vocal Anatomy: Phonation

In an earlier post, I stated that "the voice is physiologically wired to respond to and communicate your thoughts and feelings in real time." 

Science still has an imperfect picture of how that actually happens. We just know that it does. Definitions of phonation - how the voice "speaks" - attribute all vocal vibration to the impact of air on the vocal folds. However, you don't consciously expel breath to get your voice going when you speak. Normal speech requires a nearly undetectable quantity of air, especially in comparison with singing. 

Speech originates with the impulse to say something. One of the things that impulse does is mobilize the breath, but speech does not originate with the breath. 

Thoughts and feelings are what make the voice go.

Musical instruments are often described as comprising:

• A generator - something to power the sound;
• A vibrator - the thing that actually makes the sound; 
• And a resonator - a means of amplifying the sound. 

For example, when playing a violin the movement of the bow generates the sound, the strings vibrate and produce the sound, and the hollow wooden body of the violin amplifies the sound. 

Where the voice is concerned, the vocal pedagogy books credit the breath with generating the sound. Air flows through the vocal folds, causing them to vibrate and produce sound, after which the pharyngeal, oral and nasal cavities contribute resonance.

But thoughts and feelings are what make the voice go. They do this in part by making the breath go. But your thoughts and feelings are the real generator as far as the vocal instrument is concerned. Sure, you can produce all manner of vocal sounds by manipulating your breath directly, but only singing motivated directly by your thoughts and feelings will communicate them effectively. 

Therefore, the best way to learn about phonation is to investigate the way your own thoughts and feelings give rise to speech, particularly when you express yourself with intensity and passion, when there is no chance for self-censoring impulses to kick in. In particular, there are a couple of phenomena that deserve your close attention:

• In spontaneous communication, you think, feel and gesture BEFORE the voice engages;
• You don't run out of breath in the middle of a sentence. What you intend to communicate motivates you to take in the precise quantity of breath you need to get the sentence out. 

You need to affirm this for yourself, how thought and feeling give rise to speech and how the optimum intake and expenditure of breath is part of this equation. 

When I sat down to compose this post I wanted to sketch out a diagram of the neural pathways involved in this process. Then I discovered that science is actually still only beginning to study the means whereby thoughts set the vocal folds in motion (the scientifically inclined among you can dig in to this excellent paper that dates from 2007). Speech and language pathologists have tools for resolving anatomical abnormalities and trauma that inhibit this process, but do not yet have a crystal clear understanding of the process itself. 

Your own observations about how thoughts give rise to speech are the best possible tools for understanding this process, provided you try to relate your perceptions to the actual activity of your vocal folds.

 

Vocal Fold Anatomy and Movement, in brief (very brief!)

You don't need to know about all the intrinsic and extrinsic muscles of the larynx in order to achieve a practical understanding of phonation. What you do need to understand is what happens when your vocal folds vibrate and how they create changes in pitch. 

 

At rest, your vocal folds (in this illustration called "vocal ligaments") are about 3/4" long. They sit right in back of your laryngeal prominence, a.k.a. Adam's Apple. They are attached in the front and they open and close at the back. They are relaxed and open during normal respiration, and they close when you swallow to prevent food from getting into your lungs. 

When you speak, the vocal folds gently adduct and vibrate together.

Healthy speech is characterized by a buzzy, focused, well-projected sound, accompanied by minimal sensation. The vocal folds proximate cleanly without any undue pressure or any air escaping. 

However, there are a variety of things that we can do to either over-adduct the vocal folds (i.e. squeeze them shut) or abduct the vocal folds (hold them open so that they do not fully proximate). In speech, over-adduction results in an exaggeratedly heavy, forced sound, accompanied by a sensation of tightness and strain in the throat and frequent glottal attacks. 

(Note: In the two exercises that follow, I ask that you explore and contrast healthy and unhealthy methods. It's a very effective means of examining your own process, but please exercise caution and don't go overboard when doing things the "wrong" way!)  

EXERCISE: 

You can use any phrase to explore your speaking voice, but here are a couple of good ones for demonstrating the distinction between simple, clear phonation and the ways things can get distorted (courtesy of Verandah Porche):

Avaricious angels ogle alabaster apples.

Elephants are in essence elegant engines.

1. Try reciting them slowly with a sustained, smooth legato.
2. Then recite them with exaggerated glottal attacks.
3. Then speak them in a loose, breathy voice.

Here is what these different approaches sound like in my voice: 

Download Phonation 1

 

The length of your vocal folds determine pitch. At rest and on low pitches, they are short and relatively thick. They stretch longer and become thinner when you produce higher pitches.

The larynx comprises two cartilages : the thyroid cartilage and the cricoid cartilage.

When you change pitch, the crico-thyroid muscle causes these cartilages to tilt, which adjust the tension and length of the vocal folds.

This whole fascinating process is set in motion by your ear. Barring any physical abnormalities, the ear will effectively tune the voice to the pitch you intend. Comfortably accessing notes at the extremes of your range requires additional coordination elsewhere in your instrument, but the ear is sufficient to tune the vocal folds.

Once again, singers often complicate this process by manipulating and positioning the larynx every time they change pitch. If you have difficulty producing a clean legato connection from note to note, executing a portamento or scale passage in classical styles, or performing R&B-type ornamentation in musical theatre or pop repertoire, you are probably not permitting the ear to do its job and are directly moving your larynx around to change pitch. 

EXERCISE:

1. Choose any octave that is comfortable in your range. Siren up and down slowly on the vowel of your choice. Keep the pitch continuously moving rather than lingering on the bottom or top note of the octave.
2. Sing a 5-note scale, ascending and descending, with as smooth an approach as you can. It should feel very similar to the siren even though you are singing distinct pitches.
3. Now sing the same 5-note scale, deliberately positioning each pitch by manipulating your larynx.

You can listen to my demonstration here: 

Download Phonation 2

 

If while listening to and trying out these exercises you are able to perceive the distinction I described between what happens when you allow your vocal folds to passively respond to your intentions as opposed to directly manipulating them, then you have a pretty clear understanding of how your vocal folds function. Hopefully you can also conceptually relate all of this to my illustrations and descriptions.

If you are able to perceive these distinctions, the thing I most want you to notice is that when it's right - when you let your intention to speak motivate the sound and permit the ear to change the pitch - there is almost no physical sensation. 

But when it's wrong - when you directly squeeze the vocal folds together or manipulate your larynx - there is quite a lot of physical sensation. 

Glottal attacks and over-adducting the vocal folds create a sensation of pressure that many people associate with powerful singing. Some singers may be able produce a very impressive and dramatic sound this way, but they are working much too hard and risking serious vocal injury. 

Simple, healthy phonation doesn't feel like much of anything - it's just a subtle, buzzy purr. 

For some reason, it's hard to accept that passionate expression would carry so little sensation, even for non-singers. We like to scream at rock concerts and sporting events, and the resulting hoarseness that lingers over the next few days reminds us of what a good time we had. Creating all this pressure and then yelling through it somehow makes people feel like they are putting out high decibel levels. Maybe they are, but it's costing them unnecessary effort and pain.

While healthy projected speech (or screaming, or singing) must be highly energized, it creates none of this pressure or strain at all. 

If you have depended on that sensation of pressure to feel confident that you're singing well (as I did for many years), it can be very difficult and confusing to let go of. 

Trust that you don't need to work so hard. Embrace the subtle and very pleasant sensation of allowing your vocal folds to passively respond to your intention to communicate and vary pitch.

Comments

[Invisible Oranges]

Since I'm not a singer, the science of most of this goes over my head. But I can tell that it is very deep stuff. And it is a pleasure to hear even snippets of your voice!

[Rusty Valentine]

Back in the '90s I became fascinated with the downright evil vocal gymnastics of Diamanda Galas. At that time it was still very difficult to find video of such off-the-beaten-path fare, and I always wondered what she must look like while performing. I imagined something close to Linda Blair in The Exorcist. When I finally saw her (on Jon Stewart's very short-lived late night talk show) I was stunned to find that she showed no strain or discomfort while singing. Indeed, she made it look EASY, which made the impact all the more terrifying. It is this memory that came to me as I read this.

[Scott Stewart]

This realization has been a godsend for me. For a lot of years I equated powerful vocals with air pressure and volume, not realizing the amount of damage that I was doing. Not to mention that alot of live sound engineers hated me :)

Being able to produce the same tone in a much reduced volume is allowing me to go through grueling two hour rehersals with out feeling hoarse at then end of the day.

I'm still loud, but not nearly as much as before

[Claudia Friedlander]

Glad you found it useful, Scott! Always a good thing when the same thing that gives you more stamina makes your engineers happier at the same time.

Many singers associate a sensation of pressure and effort in the throat with making a powerful sound, so when they don't feel all this resistance they think they're not making any noise. In fact, a freer voice is potentially a much more powerful voice. Hopefully, you'll find that you still have at least as much power as before - it just won't cost you as much!

[Rowena28]

Holy crap, this explains a lot. I have a large, heavy voice with extremely limited range, no top at all, and a lot of tension in my throat. After I sing for 10-15 mins, my voice is hoarse, sore & exhausted. I have a completely straight tone &, as my grandmother always put it when I was a child, can't carry a tune in a basket. I've always known that I had to learn to relax somehow, that the tension is not natural or healthy (had nodes once), but the admonition I always received to "just relax you throat" is completely useless. Now I have something more concrete -- excessive adduction -- on which to focus my efforts. Still, old habits are hard to break; I don't know how to sing any other way.

[Claudia Friedlander]

Hang in there, Rowena! I'd focus on seeing what happens if you can release your breath more and experiment with the potentially lighter vocal production that would yield. See my posts on Anatomy of Breathing (particularly #2) and pick up a copy of Steve Smith's book. It sounds like you just haven't started using your entire instrument yet.

[Nagarajan G]

Great piece of work. I have all along been thinking that mellifluousness and emotional rendering should be directly connected with thoughts and feelings and not with forceful adjustments of singing organs. Of course, what we need is having the right organs at the right positions. But, that should not be the result of what we forcefully do with the organs but the result of our feelings and emotions. Taking the help of ear to traverse from note to note is amazing and I will try that out. I belong to southern part of India and Carnatic music is famous here.