Church Choir Singing and a Conversation about Laryngal Tilt

    In addition to being full-time in the choral conducting graduate program, I have worked as the Director of Music at a local Greenfield church for the last seven years. At the beginning of this semester one of my choir members shared with me some feelings she was having about her voice. She brought up a concern about her vibrato and how she felt like she had no control over it. At the time, I had no useful knowledge that felt would help her. I commented that she hadn't sung consistently for a few years due to the lack of choir because of the pandemic but with consistent practice she would feel more control over her vibrato. I assured her that if I found out any more information, I would try to make it applicable to her situation. I hadn't thought about that conversation until we discussed larygnal tilt in our vocal pedagogy. Learning that we have direct control over our vibrato because it is activated by the on/off tilt of the larynx was a huge lightbulb moment for me. 

Image used from: https://sites.google.com/site/vocaltechniquetips/advanced-techniques/the-classical-sound

    By demonstrating the hand gesture for tilting while modeling that we as singers are able to control vibrato made that so clear. I then was able to make that same demonstration to the church choir member and she was amazed. I modeled the movement a few times and she was able to mimic meaning she would have direct control of her vibrato with additional practice. We were able to have a great conversation about the singers ability to control vibrato and what we she can do to practice finding her own control. It was wonderful to put some real world application to our vocal pedagogy learning with a singer who has been singing longer than a few years. This excited me to find ways to integrate our vocal pedagogy learning into my church choir rehearsals. 

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