Anatomy and Physiology Series: Mandibular Musculature

I'm gonna truck right on through the mandibular musculature here, and go through some of the muscles of the lips next so I can get on to the interesting stuff about articulatory physiology and then the nervous system.  The mandibular muscles primarily function as muscles of mastication, but of course, the lower jaw is certainly involved in speech.

The mandible is your lower jaw bone, as you can see above.  There are eight muscles associated with elevating and depressing this jaw bone, so I'm going to start with the elevators.

The first mandibular elevator is the masseter. 

This is the big muscle you can see right where the man's cheek should be above.  This is the most powerful, and most superficial, of all the mandibular muscles...and if you suffer from TMJ (or TMD), then this muscle is the source of a lot of discomfort for you.  This muscle originates from the zygomatic arch (or cheekbone) and inserts into the mandible.  You can feel it bulge out near the outside of your cheeks if you clinch your teeth (hence why this muscle gets extremely tight in cases of TMD).  This muscle elevates the mandible, bringing the jaw closed.

The temporalis muscle is under (or deep to) the masseter, and it's bloody huge!

Seriously!  Look at that thing.

This muscle happens to be the reason I get tension headaches above my ears during exams.  (I tend to clinch my teeth during deep concentration.)   It originates from the zygomatic arch (or the "cheekbone") and inserts into the mandible.  This is the muscle that elevates and also pulls the jaw back if the jaw bone is protruded forward.  It also appears to be capable of more rapid movement than the masseter...but it's not as powerful as it. 

The medial pterygoid is not the name of a dinosaur, as much as the word "pterygoid" seems like it (at least I think so).  It originates from the medial pterygoid plate and inserts into the mandible.  This muscle acts along with the masseter to elevate the mandible. 

The arrow is pointing to the medial pterygoid, and the lateral pterygoid can be seen as the top muscle here.

The final elevator is the lateral pterygoid and comes from the sphenoid and inserts into the upper portion of the mandible (the part that comes right up near your ear.)  Contraction of this muscle moves the jaw forward, which is very useful when used along with the other elevators during chewing. 

The first depressor we'll go over is the diagastric muscle, which was also mentioned as a laryngeal elevator.  This muscle does elevate the larynx via it's connection to the hyoid bone, but it also depresses the mandible if both the anterior and posterior bellies work together.

In fact, a lot of the laryngeal elevators come back into the picture here.  The mylohyoid and geniohyoid are also both laryngeal elevators and mandible depressors.

The last mandibular depressor is the platysma, which is a large muscle of the face as well as a mandibular depressor.  This muscle originates from the tissue around the clavicle and inserts into the mandible and a few other facial muscles we'll go over next time.  It's runs above the sternocleitomastoid.

Don't know if you can read it when you zoom in, but the blue thing in the middle of the platysma is the jugular vein.  I think it's in the picture more for orientation.  The vein actually runs deep to a lot of the neck muscles.

I know it looks like one big, impressive muscle, but the truth is, it's not that strong.  This muscle's tissue is actually a rather thin layer of tissue, and so, it's not a very strong muscle.  It's more like the side-kick-best-friend of the other main characters, the stronger muscles of the face and neck.


*Seikel, J. A., King, D. W., & Drumright, D. G. (2010). Anatomy and physiology for speech, language, and hearing. Clifton Park, NY: Delmar.

Anatomy and Physiology series: Tongue musculature

The musculature of the tongue, much like that of the larynx, is divided into intrinsic and extrinsic musculature.  As such, the distinction is similar for that of the larynx:  Intrinsic muscles all have attachment points within the tongue structure and are involved in fine motor movement of the tongue, and all extrinsic musculature have one point of attachment within and one outside of the tongue and are involved in gross motor movements.  I'm going to start with the intrinsic muscles.

One more note:  The tongue is divided regionally into the tip (the front part that touches the teeth), the blade (the part that contacts the hard palate), the dorsum (the part that touches the velum), and the root.  The tongue root makes up the front wall of the pharynx, (which is why contraction of the root will directly impact the size, and therefore the, resonance of the vocal tract during speech and singing).

The superior longitudinal muscle makes up the upper layer of the tongue.  It is a fan-like muscle that runs from the area near the epiglottis all the way to the sides and front tip of the tongue.  It elevates, retracts (along with the inferior longitudinal muscle), and deviates (moves from one side to another), the tongue tip. 

Both superior and inferior longitudinal muscles can be seen here, but they're labeled as longitudinalis superior and inferior.

The inferior longitundinal muscle is the counter to the superior longitudinal.  It originates from the tongue root at the hyoid bone and runs to the tongue tip.  Contracting it pulls the tongue tip downward, retracts it (when simultaneously contracted with the superior longitudinal muscle), and deviates the tongue as well.  

The transverse muscle runs from the lingual septum to the sides of the tongue.  This muscle narrows the tongue. 

And finally, the vertical muscles of the tongue come from the base of the tongue and inserts into the membrane covering the tongue.  These muscles pull the tongue down into the mouth floor.  

Okay, so those are our intrinsic tongue muscles.  We have five extrinsic tongue muscles to go through.  Remember, these muscles are involved in gross motor movements, so while some of their functions might sound identical to the intrinsic muscles, the actual movement is much larger when the extrinsic muscle is contracted.

Extrinsic tongue muscles.  Click on it to zoom in and read the labels.

The first one is the genioglossus muscle.  This muscle originates at the inner side of your mandible (jaw bone), and fans inward to insert into the tongue tip and dorsum and the hyoid.  It's the big muscle in the front of the above picture.  What does it do?  Better question to ask is:  What doesn't it do?  So the front fibers of this muscle retracts the tongue, the back fibers protrude (or stick out) the tongue, and both sets of fibers contracted together end up depressing the tongue.  Whew.  It does a lot, doesn't it?

The hyoglossus comes from the hyoid bone and connects into the sides of the tongue.  Contraction pulls the sides of the tongue down.

The styloglossus comes from the styloid process and inserts into the bottom sides of the tongue.  Contraction moves the tongue up and back.

The chondroglossus is one of those funny muscles that is also considered to be a part of another muscle, the hyoglossus up there.  The reason it's listed separately sometimes is in its function:  It depresses the tongue.

And finally, the palatoglossus makes another appearance here because it does elevate the tongue while it pulls the soft palate down.  

Now when it comes to singing technique, we all do some battling with our tongue at some point in our vocal journey.  So does knowing these muscles automatically grant you some magical ability to be able to tell  your genioglossus to relax when you need it to?  NO!  Of course not.  Knowing the A&P of the musculature is just one part of knowing the A&P of the whole speech (or singing) system.  We've got to get to the neural organization that manages the whole system to understand why it's useful to know for teaching and/or singing, so hang in there and let me peel my intended onion for ya.

*Seikel, J. A., King, D. W., & Drumright, D. G. (2010). Anatomy and physiology for speech, language, and hearing. Clifton Park, NY: Delmar.

Anatomy and Physiology series: Muscles of the soft palate

Now, we're getting into the articulatory system...which also doubles as the chewing/swallowing mechanism.  We're gonna start with the soft palate, or velum.  The nice thing about talking about the articulatory system is that you can see most of it in action with your own open mouth and a mirror, but I'll put up a couple of pictures to help out anyway.

Front view of the velum from an opened mouth.  It ends at the uvula.

Side view of the velum.  Allows you to get an idea of how it opens and closes the nasal port.

The velum opens the nasal port when it's elevated, and closes the nasal port when it's depressed.  As such, there are velar openers and velar depressors.  There is also one curious little muscle that used to be thought of as an elevator, but we now know that it is not.  I'll also go over that one too.  So on to the elevators:

The levator veli palatini is the primary elevator of the velum.   It originates from the petrous portion of the temporal bone, and inserts into the palatal aponeurosis.  (I know that contains a fair number of heavy anatomical terms.  Seriously, the first time I heard the term "aponeurosis" my brain just went, "huh?".  If you've never heard of them before, just click the links to get a quick definition at the top of each page.)  This muscle elevates and pulls back, or retracts, the back of the soft palate when contracted.  

Another elevator is the musculus uvulae.  If you look at the first picture I posted, this is the muscle embodied within the uvula there.  Contraction of this muscle shortens the soft palate, basically bunching it up towards the back.  

The two depressors are the palatoglossus muscle and the palatopharyngeus muscle.  The palatoglossus originates from the palatal aponeurosis and inserts into the sides of the back of the tongue.  So, really, this is both a palatal and a tongue muscle.  Contraction both elevates the tongue and depresses the velum...but don't over think that as a singer, cause this coordination is all under the nervous system's control (so if it's functioning well for you, over-thinking it could muck up what's already working well.)  This is why I am going to culminate this whole A&P series with a introduction into the nervous system, so stay tuned for that!

The palatopharyngeus muscle is another duel-duty muscle, being both a palatal and pharyngeal muscle.  This guy originates from the hard palate and inserts into the back of the thyroid cartilage, so it's pretty long in comparison to others.  Contraction of this muscle both constricts the pharynx and lowers the soft palate.

*So here's a little physiology note:  When at rest, the velum is depressed, allowing us to breath through our nose comfortably.  So why do we need velar depressors?  Well, the velum is elevated most of the time during speech (or singing), but when we want to make nasal sounds, like /m/ /n/ or nasal vowels, we've got to depress it very quickly.  This is where the depressors come in, especially the palatoglossus.  Allowing the elevators to simply relax would be too slow for comprehensible, flowing speech.  

And the last muscle is the tensor veli palatini.  Did you go to the link and read about it?  Cause if you did, forget what you just read.  This is an instance where wikipedia is out of date and inaccurate.  For a long time, we thought this muscle tensed the velum thereby assisting the levator veli palatini in elevating the larynx, but we now know that this muscle doesn't elevate the velum at all.  It's sole function is to open the Eustachian tube to allow the air pressure in the middle ear to equalize.  This is the muscle at work when you either yawn or chew gum on a plane to get  your ears to "pop."  (This is also why babies always cry after take-off, cause they don't know to "pop" their ears, and this muscle doesn't work as well for them.  They're just uncomfortable when the pressure changes, and an uncomfortable baby is a crying baby.)

Up next is tongue musculature, which is gonna be a long post 'cause there's a lot of them!

*Seikel, J. A., King, D. W., & Drumright, D. G. (2010). Anatomy and physiology for speech, language, and hearing. Clifton Park, NY: Delmar.

A PSA for all careers: Don't practice perfection, practice life-long learning

How many singers out there dread practicing in some way or another?  How many of us want to keep going until we know we've 'accomplished something.'  But what are we trying to accomplish?  Perfection?  Being better at that high note than your peers?  What drives you in the practice room will become what drives your performances.  If your motivation is to compete with peers, then you will always be disappointed, because you will never be "the best" at any one time to every person who hears you sing.  

Singing is so subjective.  We all know this.  Ask ten singers who their favorite singer is of all time and you will probably get ten different answers.  Why?  Is one of those world-class singers really better than the rest?  No.  Not really.  The truth is we all have our own unique connection to the music which will communicate that music in a way that will speak to some and not to others who hear it.  If you're more concerned with being the best than you are with communicating the human element, you're not going to get anywhere, either professionally or in the practice room.  

If, however, you know vocal technique is the tool that allows us to express the music as we wish, then you might be in a rush to attain "perfect" vocal technique.  But that goal is nothing more than a dangerous rabbit hole many excellent artists get stuck in during their youth, and one many folks who suffer from vocal distress or injury get trapped in as well. 

How many times have I heard from my students, "Sometimes I'm afraid to practice at home, because I'm afraid I won't get it right."  What do I say to that?  First, getting it right takes a long time, so it won't happen in one day in the practice room and conversely, one week of practicing something slightly "wrong" won't kill your voice or end your career.  But second, I say:  Find joy in practicing through taking on an attitude of journey and discovery rather than the drudgery of wanting to get everything right the first time out, cause the second attitude is setting yourself up for failure.  The singers with real longevity in opera don't try to compete with their peers or the up-and-comers, they try to constantly better themselves so they can better serve the music they love.  That's what keeps them at the top of their profession, not the attitude of competition.  (Don't believe me?  Search out any great singer's interviews on youtube, and you will see what I am talking about.  Their love for their art form imbues every word and gesture they make when they talk about what they do.)  

I believe it is that sense of discovery, of adventure, that will allow a person to make larger gains in the practice room with shorter practice sessions than they will with the attitude of "giving 200%" to force something to happen. We all know in singing that the idea of using "force" of any kind tends to hinder vocal development rather than helping it. 

I am now finding out this concept applies to pretty much every field out there.  In SLP, especially among students vying for a position in a graduate school, there are plenty of "competitors" who aren't enjoying the field much at all.  They're so invested in competition that they have forgotten why they wanted to be in this field in the first place.  Then there are the folks who are very passionate about why they want to be an SLP, usually to help people who need their services, who are absolutely impeccable SLPs, even if their test scores aren't the top in the class.  People perceive excellence in these students and professionals because the job they do is not impeded by comparing themselves to others.  They just simply do their job to the best of their ability.  These people aren't interested in having success for successes sake; they are in love with life-long learning.  They are in love with the process of bettering themselves so that they might help others to the best of their ability.

May we all, what ever field we find ourselves in, find joy in the journey, have a passionate love affair with life-long learning, and seek to do our best for the sake of our field and for the sake of others affected by what we do.

Anatomy and Physiology series: Pharyngeal Musculature

It's that time again.  Time for some A&P!  Oh yeah!  The next few posts in this series will be just straight-up anatomy.  I'm going to cover pharyngeal musculature here, tongue musculature, palatal muscles, and possibly a few facial and jaw muscles as well.  It's going to be a little while before the physiology really shows up here, because I will also cover the nervous system, at least conceptually, that's in charge of this whole thing before getting into the really interesting physiology of the articulatory system.  On to the pharyngeal musculature!  As you read, remember that the pharynx refers to the space, as well as the structures, above the larynx.  There are three sections of the pharynx, the laryngopharynx, oropharynx, and nasopharynx that I'll refer to just for orientation.

Pharyngeal musculature is biologically big-time involved with swallowing.  As such, these muscles are divided into pharyngeal constrictors and openers.  There are three main pharyngeal constrictors:  The superior pharyngeal constrictor, middle pharyngeal constrictor, and the inferior pharyngeal constrictor.  (Can't tell you how much I loved the easy naming system during my final exam last semester!)  These three constrictors overlap, a bit like shingles, and form the side and back walls of the pharynx.

All three of these muscles have a lot of attachment points, so I won't get into them too much here.  Let's just talk about the main function.  The superior pharyngeal constrictor forms the sides and back walls of the nasopharynx and also a portion of the back of the oropharynx.  It's function is to pull the pharyngeal walls forward and constrict the pharynx.  The middle pharyngeal constrictor and inferior constrictor both constrict the pharynx, but the inferior constrictor is divided into two parts, the cricopharyngeus and the thyropharyngeus.  The cricopharyngeus constricts the upper portion of the esophagus.  

Our pharyngeal openers, or dilators, are:  The stylopharyngeus, and the salpingopharyngeus.  (I always thought that last one sounded like a name for a dinosaur rather than a muscle...maybe it's just me.)

Same image, but the arrow is pointing at the stylopharyngeus.  It originates from the styloid process at the top and inserts into the pharyngeal constrictors and the thyroid cartilage.  The stylopharyngeus opens and elevates the pharynx.

And in the red above, we have the salpingopharyngeus.  This image is looking from behind, as if you could peek through the back of the head to see the pharynx.  This muscle originates from the lower part of the Eustachian tube and inserts into one of the palatal muscles we'll get to later called the palatopharyngeus.  It elevates the side of the pharyngeal walls.

These muscles are pretty closely tied into muscles of the tongue, face, and laryngeal musculature.  In normal speech, these guys don't usually do too terribly much, since they're much happier and better at being swallow muscles, but during singing, they can create issues in terms of constriction if you're compensating for something.  I'll get into some of that a lot later if you hang in here with me.

*Seikel, J. A., King, D. W., & Drumright, D. G. (2010). Anatomy and physiology for speech, language, and hearing. Clifton Park, NY: Delmar.

A voice teacher vs. medical professionals: An important distinction

Of course, there are those of us who either are working toward, or who already are, both a medical professional and a voice teacher/singer, but there are distinctive differences in these professions that need to be remembered.  I'm going to draw that line of distinction the way I see it.  Why?  Cause when the lines get blurred about who the true "vocal experts" are, the people who suffer the most are singers who are the most in need of guidance.

There is an epidemic in the voice-teacher community of folks who feel they have enough (cursory) scientific knowledge about the voice and vocal disorder stuff that they feel they can successfully assess and diagnose specific vocal problems in their students.  And you know what, maybe a few decades ago those voice teachers did know more than the medical community.  But now, this epidemic needs to be stopped.  Along with the many, many singers I've known whose voice teachers "diagnosed" vocal nodules, acid reflux, etc., I myself fell into this "assumers paradise" when critiquing other's voices that didn't sound "quite right."  Luckily, though, I was humbled out of it quite quickly with my therapy experiences and SLP classes without actually putting any of my assumptions onto my own students.  Whew!  But, although I survived without public humiliation in class or otherwise, I still felt ashamed of myself for being so presumptuous.

The truth is that the medical field has made huge advances in their knowledge of vocal and articulatory function, down to the neural organization of coordination for these functions, in the past two decades, and the advances are expected to just continue. Voice teachers and singers should know about the healthy function of the vocal system for the sake of monitoring their progress and protecting their voice from harm, but normal, healthy function is the point where medical professionals begin their understanding.  They must start from normal function, because their ultimate goals are to help treat and/or cure people suffering from disorders or injury.  And the level of detail needed to fully understand each and every disorder and effectively treat them is rather mind-boggling.

A very condensed look at the responsibilities of these folks is something like this (for the singer suspecting vocal difficulty):

An ENT is the guy with the medical license to actually diagnose an issue using advance technology in combination non-invasive assessment tools to determine the source of a problem.  They also can perform surgery and prescribe medication, so they have some ability to treat the issue they diagnosed with those steps.  They can give a general timeline of recovery for surgeries based on how invasive the procedure is and the patient's own medical history, age, etc.  In order the have the ability to legally diagnose and treat disorders requires a whole lot of knowledge to diagnose and training to treat.  But, if regaining vocal health requires more than just surgery and/or medical prescriptions, then the ENT needs to refer the patient to a therapist for further treatment.  This is where the SLP typically comes in (at least in relation to ENT offices.)

The SLP is the person with similar medical knowledge as the ENT in regards to the systems of communication and swallowing, but they are not able to diagnose legally at all.  This is because their assessment tools can show if something is wrong and can narrow down where in the body the issue is located, but they cannot say specifically what is wrong.  SLPs can assess the health of a person's linguistic and communicative system, from higher processing of language all the way down to specific anatomical functions, and they are trained to treat whatever problem might be present with therapies proven to be effective.  They have a professional license that they must maintain, like ENTs, in order to legally do these assessments and therapies.  This makes SLPs very good compliments to ENTs who are not trained to treat with non-invasive, therapeutic methods.

A voice teacher is someone who, ideally, takes an intricate knowledge of healthy vocal function and applies that knowledge to train a person's voice to do something beyond ordinary vocal function.  But, that singer's voice/communicative system only requires healthy function to train effectively.  No more, no less.  (Just as an Olympic gymnastic coach only needs a healthy body to train to do gynmastics.)  A voice teacher does not have the full medical knowledge to either diagnose nor scientifically assess the health of a person's system.  What a voice teacher can do is suspect an issue...much in the same way a mom or teacher can suspect a child has an illness based on a handful of symptoms they observe.

So what happens if you are a voice teacher and you suspect a student has a possible medical issue?  You can inquire about symptomology and try to narrow down the possibilities, which can be useful in getting the student to agree to see a doctor.  But all a voice teacher can really do is refer the student to an ENT, or an SLP, for a vocal assessment.  An SLP assessment is usually a cheaper option, but since they can't diagnose, if the screening turns up results that are outside of normal function, then they will have to refer to the ENT for full diagnostic tests.  If it turns out the student does have an issue that needs surgery and/or therapy, the student just needs to be in the hands of excellent medical professionals for a while.  Once treatment is over and further assessments have determined that the student has returned to perfectly normal health, vocal training for singing can resume with the voice teacher again with the understanding that training might have to start at "square one" at first if any old compensation exists from the injury or disorder.

But, what a voice teacher should not do is try to officially diagnose the issue, try to treat the issue, or distrust the medical professionals assessment of normal, healthy function.  And likewise, a singer should not seek a voice teacher for those issues.  What I see happening most often is voice teachers using technical issues during singing as evidence of a problem, which may or may not be true, but this is exactly why SLPs assess vocal health from speech and measurements taken during speech.  Healthy speech is some thing they have data on that they can use to compare/contrast someone's unhealthy function.  Tension during singing, however, has so many possible origins that only having that to go on can only lead to assumptions that may or may not be correct.  In contrast, when my voice teacher suspected my vocal injury, she wasn't only going on my technical issues during singing, she also noticed tension present when I was just speaking too...even speaking before singing at all at the beginning of a lesson.  This teacher also works very closely with SLPs and ENTs, so she knows a bit more of vocal assessment than the average voice teacher.

Now, are there medical professionals who get things wrong sometimes?  Of course there are!  ENTs misdiagnose, miss problems altogether, and SLPs can miss some abnormality on assessments if they're only thinking about communicating for daily speaking.  Also, the SLP field is a very, very broad field, so getting someone who doesn't specialize in voice might not do a whole lot of good.  This is why seeking out the best, most meticulous professionals that are available to you is vital for a professional voice user.  But if you're going to seek out the best, trust them too.  The prevailing attitude of "They might not really know what we singers require" is not only inaccurate, it is arrogant and insulting to the medical professionals who are trying to help us.  And the prevailing epidemic of voice teachers using their cursory knowledge to diagnose or treat anything is a bit like a teenager assuming they know everything and therefore don't need to listen to adults ever.  Both attitudes are damaging to what I believe should be the goal:  These three professions collaborating and working as a team, with responsibilities allocated to the right person at the right point in the singer's recovery, to ensure the singer's recovery is on the right track.

Anatomy and Physiology Series: Laryngeal Physiology (Part 2, muscular coordination)

In my last A&P post, I went over the air pressure laws that keep the vocal folds in motion during phonation.  Now, we're going to go over the muscular effort required in changing the pitch and volume of the voice in general.

There's one thing very basic to the muscular process of phonation to understand:  It is only the onset of phonation where active muscular contraction is required.  During sustained voicing, the adductors are being held in position by background muscle tone, which is regulated by the information the sensory nerves of the muscle spindles send to the central nervous system.  So the continuous vibration of the vocal folds is a result of subglottal, intraglottal, and supraglottal air pressure/air flow and the physical shape of the glottis from the vocal fold properties and not from repeated adducting/abducting of the musculature.  Also, your folds need not be completely adducted in order for voicing to occur, although that usually results in a slightly (not abnormally) "breathy sound."  So onset is all about the active contraction of the adductors moving simultaneously to close the glottis.*

Now, the ideal adductor position for phonation would involve the minimal contact needed to maintain the minimum driving pressure, 3-5 cm H2O, of the vocal folds.  (Typically, this results in a vocal volume of comfortable, conversational speech.)  If a person goes past that ideal by increasing medial compression to an uncomfortable amount, pressed phonation occurs.  Pressed phonation increases the volume of the voice, but also tends to have a harsh sound quality, like someone shouting.  (This is pretty much the equivalent to "pushing" the voice in singer-language.)  Breathy phonation is the opposite of pressed, resulting from inadequate closure allowing too much air to escape during the closed phase of the vibratory cycle.  It can be a sign something is wrong or it can just be when you're trying to speak softly, like in a library or something. In solo singing, excessive breathiness it can also be a sign of inefficient coordination or it could be due to age in that young voices are naturally more breathy.  (Important take-away here for teachers:  Don't jump to "diagnose" a voice disorder from breathiness alone, refer the student to an ENT if you're concerned.)*


I think we should certainly go over pitch change in the voice to better understand the coordination that singing requires throughout the vocal range.  Most students of pedagogy know that pitch change occurs from the cricothyroid and thyrovocalis muscles stretching and tensing the vocal folds.  But why does that change the pitch?  It all comes back to physics, yet again.  It works the same way tightening a violin string works:  Increasing tension and decreasing the mass results in a higher fundamental frequency for that string.  Now, we don't actually change the overall mass of the vocal folds.  But we do change the mass per unit length by stretching them out over a greater distance.  This is called the effective mass of the vocal folds--or the mass that's actually making contact during vibration.  If a body has more mass, it will vibrate at a slower rate, resulting in a lower frequency.  If we decrease the mass per unit by increasing the distance (stretching the folds,) the vibration will be faster, which will result in a higher pitch.* 

Here's where things start to get messy for us singers:  Increased subglottal pressure typically results in increased vocal fold contact time during each vibration and complete glottal closure during vibration.  This results in a louder voice (or higher amplitude sound waves).  Because increasing pitch increases the tension of the folds, the vocal fold edges don't normally completely meet up at extreme ranges, resulting in that falsetto sound we all know so well.  If you want to maintain vocal loudness at extreme ranges, it could be through increased vocal fold contact during vibration and thus maintained subglottal pressure like when you were lower, or you could create the impression of maintained vocal loudness by shaping the vocal tract such that certain harmonics get an amplitude "boost" without having to actually increase vocal fold contact.  The tricky thing to figure out as a classical singer is when you are voicing loudly in an efficient way and when you are "pushing"--where you're really on the verge of screaming.  Most advanced singers I know mentally consider their loudest dynamic to be mentally within their "normal inside voice" speaking loudness.  That would require a lot of resonance work to balance out and still produce a professional sound that travels, but it does explain why so many of the greatest singers look like they're just hanging out with their mouths open on high, loud notes.  It's likely that advanced singers use a variety of these coordinations in their high ranges to produce various dynamics.  It's also likely that figuring out the ideal coordination on high notes is very individual, involving an intricate, flexible coordination of the respiratory system to the laryngeal system to the vocal tract such that different vocal colors and dynamics can be achieved.  So, if it took you a long time to "master" resonance and dynamic contrasts throughout your range, you're not alone!  It's the hardest and most complicated thing to master as the "how to" is so very individual--and receiving guidance requires a teacher with both the skill to explain things well and the ear to hear professional-level resonance/vocal balance versus vocal strain.  (Let's face it, a lot of amazing voices out there can still produce pretty good sound when they're straining.  The issue with this is they might not be able to sustain that throughout a career and it puts them at higher risk for voice injury in the future.  I see just as many classical singers "push" as belters out there and just as many well-balanced, unstrained singers in both genres, so singing "classically" does not in itself "protect you" from strain.)

Now, when we speak, we're changing the pitch and loudness of our voice all the time with our inflections, so these changes occur waaaayyy in the background of our conscious mind.  Where this becomes an issue in singing, I believe, is when we consciously train this correct balance of muscular tension, adduction, and subglottal pressure as we move well outside of our daily speaking range.  I believe the correct coordination requires training the proper balance of subglottal pressure throughout the range. The ideal balance will result in the unconscious coordination of subglottal pressure with medial compression up and down the whole vocal range.  When this coordination is relegated to the background functions of our brain, it tends to be the most efficient and therefore, it feels as though you're doing "nothing" to sing the way you do.


I feel, as a singer and a teacher, that we have a tendency to keep this coordination under our conscious control for far longer than we should, which does result in inefficiency since the conscious portion of our brain is not the best equipped to maintain fine-motor coordination.  Conscious muscular training is a pretty quick process, and once that is completed, it is time to allow the body to discover the proper coordination without encouraging our "control" over it, which requires an attitude of educated play and discovery rather than control or "right and wrong."


I feel I would be remiss in not mentioning a little about the extrinsic musculature here.  The extrinsic musculature can make adjustments to the laryngeal posture--raising it or lowering it.  The larynx tends to rise in coordination with an increase in pitch in untrained individuals.  The muscles that elevate the larynx are usually coordinated to the pharyngeal muscles that constrict the vocal tract.  This coordination is really, really important when we swallow, but we don't really want it to activate when we sing.  If you're painfully aware of those raising or lowering adjustments in the form of neck tension, the coordination at the fold-level is very likely compromised and inefficient.

(Updated: 08/23/2015)  


*Seikel, J. A., King, D. W., & Drumright, D. G. (2010). Anatomy and physiology for speech, language, and hearing. Clifton Park, NY: Delmar.

What made me choose SLP?

Good question.  I intended to answer this question a while ago, but got side-tracked with life and my A&P series I've been all geeked-out over.  I'll go ahead and answer this question now.

About six months after the end of my voice therapy, my singing was coming along fairly well.  I began to toy with the idea of going back to school for a DMA (Doctor of Musical Arts for any non-musicians, or non-Americans out there).  I got myself a vocal coach and started planning my hours-worth of music I'd need for the auditions.  My brilliant idea, I decided, would be to go back for a pedagogy-intensive degree and to do a lot of research in voice science while I was there.  I was thinking of finding schools that would allow me to sort of build my own curriculum of speech pathology courses instead of vocal pedagogy courses so I could go into more detail and perhaps even do some research with speech paths. on the treatment of the professional voice.  

It seemed like a decent plan, but it came with some reservations on my part.  First:  I was not sure how viable this plan really was.  It seemed great in my head, but I wondered about the practicality of being interdisciplinary like that in a DMA program.  The other reservation I had was going back to music school at all.  I had never fared well at music schools.  I'm sure part of that was from the deadly combo of my paresis-inflicted voice and lack of confidence, but the dynamics and politics of most music schools always rubbed me the wrong way.  I'm a very straight-forward person, so trying to figure out how to "play the game" of "politeness above all else with some back-stabbing on the side" that seemed to be the MO of my previous music school experiences tended to make me very, very unhappy.   But, I thought maybe this time, it wouldn't be so bad since I'd have my fiance (now husband) with me for the ride this time.  Since he's very much not in the "musical world," I figured I'd have a great source of grounding waiting for me whenever I got home.  

So I went to a voice lesson with my plan in hand.  At the end of the lesson, I discussed my plan, my main objective, (the interdisciplinary research idea,) and I discussed both of my reservations with my teacher.  She was very patient listening to my whole plan, but at the end of everything she just simply said:  "Why don't you go back for a degree in speech pathology directly?"  I was a little stunned...mainly because I wondered why, with all of my planning and reasoning, did I not think of that?  She continued to tell me she thought I would make a great voice therapist, and I would be able to get a much more detailed grounding in voice science and therapy if I just get the actual degree and the actual license to practice.  I left saying, "I'll look into that."  

It was seriously not more than five minutes after leaving that lesson that my mind was set on getting the SLP degree.  I was so excited about the idea of going back for a degree that calmed both of my reservations about going back at all and provided even more science training than my original plan.  It was brilliant!  And, what's even better, it returned a fire to my belly that had been missing for some time.  I had a mission and a plan to complete it!  Very little in life feels as good as finding that plan, or path, after a few years of floundering.  

I immediately set aside the graduate school applications I had printed off of music schools' websites and looked up SLP programs in my area instead.  I bought a GRE study guide and signed myself up to take the test one month from when I bought the guide.  (Didn't do as well as I hoped, but fared pretty well for someone who hadn't touched algebra-level math for nearly 15 years.)  Everyone kept telling me I'd make such a great candidate that I did not anticipate not getting into the program that year, and so, of course, I didn't.  Not as a master's candidate like I had applied for.  I was bummed, but undeterred (thanks to the fire in my belly), so I called up the program that rejected me and asked what I could do to make myself a better candidate for next year.  They suggested an SLP "leveling" program, which allowed me to take the necessary junior and senior level undergraduate courses that I would have to take anyway before becoming a full-fledged master's candidate.  The leveling program also turned out to be far cheaper than taking the same leveling courses at the institution with the master's degree, so that actually turned out rather well.  

That is just one example of how this journey has been far less straight-forward than I originally thought it would be, as nearly every journey you ever take in life is.  But here's the big secret:  The path I'm currently on, although not very straight-forward, is turning out a whole lot better than the one I originally envisioned for myself.  Sounds pretty cliche, but that might be because it's the one thing in life you can always count on, inconsistency.  And when you get joy out of the turmoil of life's inconsistency, you just have to laugh at the genius of the whole thing.