Setting the scene
Jenevora
You first came to see me in April 2023. Can you remember what had been going on for you up till then, and why that was the moment you chose?
Alice
I was happily teaching and singing the occasional recital up until 2006 until I moved house and area. I dealt with a huge house renovation project and schooling issues for a child who didn’t fit easily into to a new school. There was a family split, a divorce, and I finally moved into my own house in 2012. I taught throughout this whole period, which kept me focussed on what I really loved to do and helped me deal with my changing personal life.
I lost focus on my own voice in 2013 and let my singing drift. Finding the time and the motivation for my own singing was difficult. The emotional upheaval was taking its toll and singing lost its joy for me. Emotions were easier left in a box while I juggled my personal life with becoming a single parent. Singing opened emotional doors and I needed to leave those behind and move on.
Demonstrating was becoming less free and the voice was tightening. Covid hit and my teaching went online for a whole year. During this year I became aware that I was only ‘squeezing’ a sound out to give an idea to pupils over the internet. I was not caring properly for my voice.
I returned to face to face teaching in September 2021 and continued to spend little time on my own voice. A nasty bout of Covid in December 2021 hit me hard but I kept going through the aftermath. The voice was tighter and the top getting harder to sing and I was beginning to think that in my mid 50s, this might be the end of my singing.
Eventually, in Dec 2022 I had a bad chest infection but returned to singing teaching in very early January when I should still have been in bed!!
From here the voice basically seized up and I began to think I had damaged myself so went to see Declan Costello [voice specialist consultant ENT surgeon] in late Feb 2022, he told me there was nothing wrong with the physiology of my vocal equipment. He very gently suggested that I may need some help technically to restart singing. I said I knew about you and he said you were exactly who he was about to recommend. I immediately arranged to come and see you.
In Declan Costello’s office I was struck with the horrifying fact that at this moment I couldn’t manage my voice on my own, I couldn’t bear to lose my singing voice and at the same time I felt huge relief that there was nothing physically wrong, maybe this wasn’t the end and that I could find my means of expression once again…… after all, since 2012, I had successfully managed my own life, cared for and helped my teenager and found a fantastic, fulfilling relationship with someone who supported me this time around. It felt like I could dare to look into expressing my emotions through singing once again - over to Jenevora!!
Jenevora
When you first came to me, you had been to see Declan and your vocal folds looked fine. However, your voice was cutting out at about Eb5 and feeling tight and uncomfortable.
There was no obvious reason for this loss of higher pitches, you had been a good singer, why would your voice have been getting more and more difficult at this time? Whatever we tried in that initial session, we came up against a brick wall. Your voice was not going to make any sound at all above a certain pitch.
This was a complex situation – there were many contributing factors. Any one of these would have been a small problem, but the combination of these, building over time, resulted in a total tangle. This often means that the first session is spent mostly talking and we did some of this. I’ve realised, since I’ve got to know you better over time, that there was so much you didn’t tell me initially. I think you genuinely didn’t believe that it was relevant. I tell people that our psychological state can be the result of everything that has ever been said to us; knowing what is important and relevant is the difficult part to unravel.
When we went back over your history, you said that your voice last felt good in 2013. Going back further, 25 years ago you were a good performer, despite a vocal fold polyp in your 20s. After that there were family stresses including divorce, early menopause, and a shoulder op in 2018. These all got in the way of feeling at ease with your singing. You then had covid in 2021, followed by a bad cough; after this your voice felt lost both top and bottom.
Your personal complexity was a combination of technique that was not flexible enough, the need for security and safety, in the context of emotional instability within your personal world. Your technical habits were from your student days and the belief systems around this were confusing. What was ‘space’ – where and why? What did raising your soft palate feel like? Were you consciously controlling your larynx height, and what was going on with the back of your tongue? There was a mismatch between what you believed you were doing, the reasons for doing this, and what you were actually doing. This needed very gentle handling; your singing had always been the part of you that was adored and valued by everyone else – if I challenged any of those belief systems, your identity could come tumbling down, and you’d be too upset to come back.
Tentative first steps
Jenevora
You had a lesson a month for the next few months. I worked from a place of experimentation, far away from ‘beautiful singing’. You were making random vocal noises, moving things around while phonating, doing a lot of exercises with your tongue out while making silly noises. My notes are full of singing to scatting sounds, trying to ‘forget’ technique, and trusting what might happen. At the time it is very important to experiment without any judgement and without any analysis or explanation. Let the subconscious motor system discover for themselves what they are capable of, if they are uncoupled from previous habits and beliefs.
Do you remember what you were feeling and thinking during this process?
Alice
At first I felt immensely relieved that there was no damage to the vocal folds and that I was finally doing something positive towards restarting my voice. It felt like an old rusted, uncared for old banger that needed a good old crank to start again! I felt guilty that I had not cared enough to put its health further up my priority list but also realised that I had spent a lot of time getting the rest of my life in order and now it was time for my voice. I couldn’t imagine not having the tool to express music anymore. There was no choice - feet first into a remedy.
Although I wondered where this new journey would go, I was happy to have little exercises to do. It was like taking medicine - keep doing these tongue wiggles and waggles and silly noises on and off through the day and I might be able to make a noise again. Being a musician, practice and tiny changes at a time were not unusual, so I had a pretty strong determination to see this through. I was happy just to be taking daily ‘medicine’ at the beginning.
Jenevora
I could see that there was confusion, anxiety and frustration at every level here. Your singing had been easy, reliable, admired by so many, and now it just wasn’t there. I could see many potential technical issues that might be contributing, it’s always hard to tell if these are long-standing habits or if they are more recent compensatory strategies. If I am to challenge older, more firmly-held beliefs, this can be unsettling for someone who is already worried.
With this in mind, we embarked on some more playful connections with sound, to avoid preconceptions and set strategies. These included SOVT glides, scatting, singing with the tongue out, various emotional prompts, moving and singing, speaking into singing, keeping the mouth space small, and distracting from any sort of analysis in the moment. The resulting sounds were often surprising, sometimes triggering an emotional release, often difficult to repeat.
Where we are now
Jenevora
The most important part of all this was to provide a space that was experimental, playful (lots of laughing), non-judgemental, exploratory, and creative. In this process, you have effectively re-learned your technique, selecting the feelings and directions that are helpful, and letting go of the habits that have been getting in the way. It took about a year for you to be able to reliably sing a song through, without everything tightening up, and another year to feel confident with your singing. Gradually you have learned to trust your voice, finding songs in keys that feel easy and focussing on what you can do, rather than what you felt you had lost.
Alice
Looking back, I was really so tied up and knotted voice-wise and also mentally knotted about getting to this stage. It was a relief to have help and understanding from someone who could guide me through the baby steps to starting from the beginning again! To have no ‘musts, shoulds, oughts’, really began the journey to more freedom. To ditch the scores of music my voice could no longer access and find keys that were manageable meant that I could eventually start making music again and the world of singing for pleasure is opening up once more.
I am discovering a ‘new’ sound - the same sound but maybe richer, and I am touching again the musicality which has been locked up along with my voice. It is still an ongoing journey of release but a much happier one! You are absolutely right that I no longer focus on loss but on the next stage of my singing.
Jenevora
Every person I work with has a unique story with a different path through it. There are, however, some patterns I have noticed. When there is an imbalance causing the voice to tighten or cut out completely, this can be called Muscle Tension Dysphonia, or Functional Voice Disorder. The description tells us that there is no observable pathology (lumps and bumps, inflammation, nerve damage etc), but the larynx is overworking and underachieving.
I have noticed two distinct types of voice loss in singers in this category: there is the type that is tight and squeezed throughout the range, the voice can range from sounding ok but fatiguing more than expected, to complete voice loss all through the range. At the extreme it is like a cry. The other type seems to be loose and easy in the lower range, but cuts out completely at or below the upper passaggio. My personal theory is that the former, the tight throughout, is often linked with ‘not being heard’. When the person is or has been ignored, gaslit or silenced in some way. The second type, where the voice is ok in the speaking range but cuts out in the singing range, seems to be linked to supressed emotions; almost like a sob that can’t come out.
Finally, there is the classic ‘tipping point’ where one final stressor can trigger a complete collapse of the system. In Alice’s case, this was getting two viral infections and never really recovering her voice after this. The problem wasn’t the viral infection – the issue had been simmering for years, the infection was the final straw that caused a system under duress to finally give way.
In a way, these recognisable patterns can inform our working. I know which aspects of the person and their voice to really nurture and encourage. I also know that when a situation is complex in the long-term (in this case, the build-up was over 30 years), then it may take a long time to help the singer to untangle all these elements of body, mind and soul.
These journeys of discovery can be surprisingly profound. Not everyone is ready for this, and many singers just want a reliable short-term fix to get them through the next few months. This approach has value too – if I can help them to sort their technique, the anxiety will have less to feed on. If you don’t feed and water these worries, they will fade away; we choose what to nurture.
However, in your case we couldn’t ‘fix’ your technique, there were too many unsolved and unrecognised emotions pulling you back. Your journey took more time, and we’re still working through it, walking that path together for now.
Alice
I am now singing again, thanks to Jenevora. I have found a new voice, one which works for me. I am not singing ‘just like’ I used to but I am enjoying expressing myself with a new found, richer voice which perhaps encompasses a life of experience with all its emotional ups and downs, one which reflects me in the here and now. It still holds excitement and interest for me. It remains a way to express myself but as part of my life, not all of it!
I am seeing how my emotional make up and the emotional roller coasters that life deals us all have played an important role in the health of my voice. The times when music was a joy and the voice flew and when physical, hormonal and emotional experiences added knots which have remained as physical habits in the voice.
Music and my voice have always been things I have worked at throughout my life but also whose development and journey have been stifled and put aside at busier or more difficult times. However, they have always seen me through and I’m still here discovering with open ears and an open heart. Thank you Jenevora!