In part one I divulge the two categories of instruments we find in music: the one that breathe and the ones that don’t.
Let’s talk about singing, since this is the title of the blog.
In a melody, you get some high and some lows. The notes ascend or descend as the music plays. Let’s zoom in.
If you are at home reading this blog and are not afraid of looking silly, you can do a simple experiment: sing a melody you like. Any of them. Go ahead. I’ll wait. That’s the experiment. Yes, yes, I’ll be right here when you’re done.
Are you done? Good! Have you notice anything?
For example, as you try to reach the high notes, were you as soft as when you were on the low ones? No. That’s because in order to hit the peak of the melody, you need to push more air out of your lungs. Have you noticed something else? For example, that the melody usually finishes lower than the middle part, which is where you had to scream those high pitches. A lot of melodies are built that way, they are on an arch. They start let’s say on a C (doesn’t matter if you don’t know what a C is) (I can show you, by the way), they go up, maybe reach an A and then they come down to the same C. Your breathing will do the same. You’ll attack the first note with gusto, ramp it up to the highs and then slowly run out of breath to land on a low note.
Let’s stop with the singing, thank you for participating, and let’s go to a piano. Ah! Problem! You got your arms, wrists and fingers and you can do whatever you want. yes, you can play those low notes loud and those high ones like a whisper. But should you? Because if you want to develop what is called a singing tone, you’re going to have to conform to the way a singer would execute (and not murder) the melody. You’ll have to go fairly strong on the first note and get louder as you climb the keys, and then you’ll have to release the pressure and ease up the hammering as you descend. If you understand that, congratulations! you are on your way to develop a singing tone, and also, to understand why musicians drive themselves crazy without any help from the community.
There is much more than what I just wrote on the singing tone. As you probably guess, books the size of the Encyclopedia Britannica have been written about it. I’ll call this blog a teaser, if you will.