Chest Voice VS Head Voice/Falsetto - Vocal Technique Breakdown - Aliki Katriou

[@balzzers92]

As a med student myself I found this EXTREMELY appreciable quality and precise content, and I ended up here just by chance! 😂

[@AlikiKatriou]

yaaaaaaaaay!!!! ^.^

[@rodrigolaporte274]

Hahaha "if you're having an existential crisis now" I LOVE how you explain concepts

[@AlikiKatriou]

Thank you XD

[@antonellomulas5854]

Imagine breaking your leg while photographing a stream in the middle of a forest. Just you and your dog, very few hikers, no phone signal. It actually happened to me and I suddenly became a black belt in both chest voice and existential questionings 🤣 (great video! 👏👏👏)

[@AlikiKatriou]

Yup, that'll work for chest voice XD

[@andreasgoniotakis4655]

the best video I 've seen so far, please explain (in a video) how to blend registers

[@AlikiKatriou]

Hey, thank you :) I'm planning on making a video on registers first, but that might answer at least one basic question behind the question of how to "blend" registers. I should be uploading the video in May...

[@michaelwhy79]

This is brilliant. So well explained. As a male, how can I retain the grip of the TA more so that I don't 'flip' or 'squark' heading from the end of the 4th octave and into the 5th? It sounds horrible.

[@AlikiKatriou]

That's the magical question... Honestly, your best bet is very slow sliding exercises. Think a semitone in slow motion. Pick a spot where you can still feel some sense of TA and slide up very slowly.

[@sbxamedhi]

Hey! I'm an ex ballet dancer and singing teacher and I've come to cross use different techniques that I've learned to make your leg stretches more efficient, and it helps a lot. First of all we gotta establish that the Vocalis part of your TA will stiffen and thicken when you do the valsalva maneuver, or what some people call "granpa" voice, or hypercompression. It's a very tight glottal coordination that makes the TA stiffen a lot, along with the arytenoid cartilages and false folds coming together too. So thinking of "holding" your breath will most of the time trigger your TA stiffening. Now, how to apply that as an exercise. When stretching legs it's very commonly used now to tense up your isquios WHILE you're max stretched, why?? To teach them neuronally that the range is useable, and anatomically to trick them into useable strength in extended ranges. We'll do the same with the folds!! We can do this by doing a vocal fry on chest voice, on a mid comfortable note, then while HOLDING the vocal fry coordination, we will flip into falsetto and yodel. This means the body of the folds, the vocalis part of the TA will deactivate, which is awesome. Now if you did it correctly you will either sound like a very clear crystalline thin voice, or a mid sized cat, maybe even with a bit of gnarly distortion, both are good for this exercise haha. The important thing is that if you're still holding on to the the fry/creaking sensation, and you're really in falsetto folds wise, you're very likely in a flageolet mechanism too. This means you can easily go up to notes you can't get to in your hooty normal Mickey mouse voice, and maybe even break into whistle register. We don't want that just yet. Now we'll take that crystalline thin voice or gnarly cartoony cat configuration and stretch it in a speaking volume up to a C5 if you're a tenor, high baritone ish voice. The coordination should clear up a bit and start sounding a bit like Axl Rose lol Once you're in C5, we will try to add the "holding air" coordination, but just focusing on the folds, try to avoid any distortion kicking in. The sound should get considerably louder and metallic. Try to alternate the granpa voice/hypercompression on a mid range note and then this stretch back and forth so that you're able to trigger the correct glottal compression, which should be from the folds as much as possible. Now after the hold is established you gotta hold it for some seconds, 5 secs is good, and then siren down to your mid range SLOWLY to build coordination in your Vocalis. So that it stays evenly activated in all the notes. There shouldn't be any flips or cracks if the vocalis (TA) tension is even throughout.

[@sbxamedhi]

If the granpa voice is not working you can also try to use a semi occluded phonation with a B consonant with puffy cheeks. Lips very closed and tight, because focal folds tend to imitate and mirror what the lips do ( its the next sphincter higher on the chain haha ), and try to hold the air this way. So get up high with your fry/creaking+falsetto folds and then add the tight B with puffy cheeks, it will stiffen the vocal folds and then you siren down.

[@ThomasFoskolos]

Thanks for that! I have a bit puberphonia or mutational falsetto and I will add these exercises to my regural warm ups

[@AlikiKatriou]

Ooo cool, let me know if they make a difference!

[@michaelwhy79]

Could you PLEASE do a video on the cricothyroid and how it works with the thyroarytenoid? Would be awesome to get an accurate explanation for it for once!

[@AlikiKatriou]

Sure, I'll aim to make this. Let me know if you have any specific questions/confusion around it that you'd want me to address within the video :)

[@greendrummers]

You are amazing! Thank you ! I found it very funny when you mimicked people who speak in head voice! Reminded me of many people, both men and women!!

[@greendrummers]

PS have you thought about becoming a "gender affirming vocal coach"? There is a lot of money to be made in that nowadays, when looking for "false vocal cords" videos on google where l found yours, before yours l found this woman's who has found her niche, to help people finding a more "female sounding" voice. But in my opinion, the lady herself, even though she mostly uses her chest voice to speak, does use her head voice too and that head voice sounds very false so l am not sure she really is the best coach for wannabe women, to sound like real women. She also does singing (may have been a failed singer, nobody was interested? familiar story haha) and has a guitarist with a covid mask on which is very funny, but her singing voice (l am gossiping now, karma will get me) is not one l like, it is quite false again, she has good pitch and soft sounding but it is very "forced" to sound high. l wonder what you would think of it. Personally her videos make me feel sick so l had to come back to your channel to get my energy back. You could teach her one or two things. (sorry for the gossiping)

[@greendrummers]

PPPS l have subscribed and much looking forward to your future videos! Will you do some Tibetan overtone singing video some time? Just to see what you can make with it. l love overtones.

[@AlikiKatriou]

@@greendrummers I offer singing and voice lessons to anyone interested. I personally wouldn't focus solely on gender affirming vocal coaching as I have ethical concerns, but I am happy to help anyone with any aspect of their voice :)

[@AlikiKatriou]

@@greendrummers At the moment I don't plan on doing anything on Tibetan overtone singing but I have nothing against doing it at some point :)

[@greendrummers]

@@AlikiKatriou you replied so professionally, it is amazing!!! I have ethical issues also, but I won't get into conspiracies, as it is no use to anyone.

[@Oberon90]

How dare you to compare La Callas with the Timberlake😂😂😂 Love the video!!!!🙏🎶🔥

[@AlikiKatriou]

🤣🤣 I know, right? The shame!

[@denisandreyev3593]

Hi, Aliki! Love your videos very much, but didn't quite understand the moment about glotal attacks. Do true vocal folds interrupt sounds, or false folds? Is is the same as when coughing? If yes, why is it supposed to be effective to find false folds while coughing, shouldn't we get more fryish sound if true vocal folds activate?

[@AlikiKatriou]

Glottal attacks are complicated. In most humans, glottal attacks will close the true vocal folds "harshly"/strongly and the false vocal folds will typically also move inwards (although probably won't vibrate). Coughing can be more complex, with even more supraglottal (above the true vocal folds) closure... When we cough or clear our throat, the false vocal folds vibrate (assuming we aren't doing it really lightly). When we do a glottal stop, the false vocal folds don't vibrate. Fry would need to happen at an extremely quiet volume with very little air. You can get fry during glottal stops but you'd have to be super quiet....

[@Thiago_Alves_Souza]

What in the Pirates of the Caribbean was that 3rd example?? Lol! I want a LOTR based example next for bass/baritone black metal low octave fries ( my range) (imagine you're Sauron, and you see Frodo again wearing the ring and you want to make him tumble with fear for the 100th time because he's on his way to mount doom and the Nazgul can't find him so save their undead lives).

[@AlikiKatriou]

Think of it more as a guideline :P

[@iolairmuinnmalachybromham3103]

So is there anything to the idea that in M2 less of the vocal fold mass is vibrating compared with M1? Or is it just the vibratory pattern that distinguishes them? When you’re belting or shouting and the vocal folds are closing very quickly compared to crooning a jazz ballad with a high open quotient, but you’re still for all intents and purposes in “chest voice,” is there still a common vibratory pattern that distinguishes it from M2?

[@AlikiKatriou]

Ok... Yes to the question about the vibratory pattern. So a strong, belted M1 will have a high closed quotient, while that breathy, jazzy M1 will have the same vibratory pattern, without having the same degree of closed quotient. Closed and open quotient will be relative to each other and to other sounds. The idea being that, M1 - on average - has a higher closed quotient than M2. However, we can make very breathy M1 sounds, and solidly compressed M2 sounds, so closed to open quotient ratio isn't necessarily a good strategy for predicting register (it 100% is a great strategy on an average Joe off the street with no vocal training). A couple of things: vibratory pattern isn't exactly the same as closed quotient (it can be and it might not be, depending on who is talking and what they're saying). Closed quotient isn't the same as collision rate. Collision rate being the force with which the vocal folds are coming together. So, in my breathy M1, I might have high closed quotient when the vocal folds make contact, but a low collision rate, and in my solid M2 I might have relatively low closed quotient but a really strong collision rate, which will make everything sound louder in psychoacoustic terms. Use your hands to replicate this concept to make it easier, for the breathy M1 clap your hands together, making full contact along the entire length of your hands (quotient) but bringing the hands together very lightly (collision rate). Now for the solid M2, only allow your fingers to clap together (quotient) but really give them some momentum (collision rate). If done correctly, the finger clap should be much louder than the full hand clap in this scenario. Of course, we have the problem that our hands aren't exactly flubbery waves of mucosal tissues that are also vibrating from bottom to top so it isn't a perfect replica and it can start to blur/confuse quotient and ideas of thickness of the vocal folds, but it's a starting point! For the vocal fold mass, hell if I know. I'll tell you what my brain makes of it so far, based on the way I understand anatomy. We thicken the vocal folds by contracting muscles of the thyroarytenoid muscle. We have a tendency to think active thyroarytenoid muscle only means M1. I see no convincing evidence for this hypothesis. We seem to be able to contract some thyroarytenoid muscle fibers separately (for the nerds, "vocalis" to bulk the muscle VS "muscularis" to shorten the muscle). If this is the case, we should be able to "thin out" the sound down low, which we can, and "bulk up" the sound high up, which we also can. On average, M2 tends to be used on higher pitches and higher pitches are achieved by a certain degree of "thinning" the mass because we have to stretch to get high. I choose to live in a very uncertain space when talking vocal fold mass and I wouldn't connect it to any register. I remain unconvinced that M2 as used by opera singers is the same mass as used by pop singers, it really sounds to me like there is slightly greater thyroarytenoid engagement in classical head voice - and biological sex is irrelevant to this, because males and females are perfectly capable of replicating both those sounds. Potentially, I didn't answer your questions, confused you further and subjected you to the longest monologue I have ever written on KZbin but isn't it interesting? * nerd mode fully engaged * XD

[@iolairmuinnmalachybromham3103]

@@AlikiKatriou Oh, very interesting for sure! I’m a total nerd about this stuff now, and your videos and lessons bear a lot of the blame for the fact that only half of the scientific papers I look at are actually relevant to my degree, and the other half are about voice. :) Your answer made a lot of sense. I had an idea of the fact that collision rate and OQ were different things, but I wasn’t sure exactly what to call the former (I know they sometimes use spectral slope to predict it, but I’ve not come across a consistent term so far). I find it fascinating that collision rate would be independent of register and CQ/OQ might be more consistently related to register. I had assumed mass was a lot of what defined register, and I think CVT people would probably classify registers according to variations in “density”, which I assume is getting at the same concept. So the prospect that thickening/thinning out can happen independently of register as well is exciting! Thanks for the info and thoughts as always!

[@AlikiKatriou]

@@iolairmuinnmalachybromham3103 yeah, my understanding is that the CVT guys think thinning/thickening relates to register. I also have the impression that Estill might have said so too. However, it's much more relevant to pitch than anything else...

[@giannis_tar]

My existential crisis is you being a soprano. Which is silly coming from me, considering I've been a passionate advocate of "don't classify voice type based on speaking voice", but still... 😅

[@AlikiKatriou]

🤣🤣

[@m4xamillion966]

Whenever I do try to decrease my volume for head voice I either just peter out or go into vocal fry, I don't know if I'm doing anything wrong or just bad at accessing my head voice rn

[@AlikiKatriou]

I love that, and I often tell students in lessons that I love those sounds! That moment when you descrease volume and your voice just fails to produce sound, I think that space is magical and there is so much to unlock in that zone! You're probably doing the right thing. I would say keep singing when the sound cuts out. If you flip into fry, you have successfully changed vocal registers, it's just that your body gave you fry instead of head voice, which is fine. Either sing in the zone of no sound (which is probably your head voice, but your vocal folds can't figure out how to vibrate yet) or, if you go into fry, start increasing the airflow (think loose and breathy) without increasing the volume and you might just unlock head voice :D

[@DestroyerMariko]

"If we cut you in half..." not sure if vocal lesson or cannibal kitchen hahaha 😋 I definitely prefer these existential crises to my usual kind lol 😬 I still remember the first contemporary singing teacher I ever had finding it weird that I was so strong in head voice but so clueless about chest voice and me having no idea that most people didn't actually sing like me... I think I'd assumed that singing had to be different to your speaking voice back then...! 😅

[@AlikiKatriou]

Well, in a way, historically, you're correct. Women always sang in head voice in classical singing, and then in a lot of contemporary music they still sang in head voice, there was loads of pop music in the 90s that was mostly head voice and there is always music in the top 10 that has falsetto, even to this day... So, it's a reasonable assumption to make...

[@DestroyerMariko]

@@AlikiKatriou I guess I did get exposed to a lot of classical when I was younger 🤔 my grandparents used to play me opera etc when they picked me up from taekwondo lol 😅

[@Sweet-guy]

in chest voice the closed phase takes up more time than the open phase and in head voice is the opposite. then that's why I run out of breath faster in my head voice?

[@AlikiKatriou]

Yes and no. So, yes. It's much easier to be efficient with air use in chest voice than head voice because the vocal folds are letting less air "escape". "No" in the sense that chest voice actually needs some air behind it because the vocal folds are often thicker and need a bit more air in order to vibrate, head voice really doesn't need much air at all. So, it's all about about finding strategies to make everything equally efficient. If you use the same amount of air for chest voice and head voice, you will run out of breath faster in head voice (or in audibly breathy chest voice, if that's what you're going for stylistically) :)

[@Sweet-guy]

@@AlikiKatriou actually I find it tricky to sing in head voice and having good chord closure I think it's about air pressure.

[@AlikiKatriou]

@@Sweet-guy Probably, I find most humans sing in head voice with way too much air & pressure overall. Head voice is very "easy" once you let it be easy...

[@patrickwunsch]

On a random note, the way you talk sometimes reminds me of Robert Sapolsky.