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How Does the Human Body Produce Voice?
Find Your Voice
As actors our voice and our bodies are the two most important tools. In order to have full use of our voice, we need to understand the science behind how voice is produced.
Lesson 1: RESPIRATION (Stage 1)
Let's start at the beginning... sound travels on air. Therefore your voice starts with breathing.
Respiration is the act of breathing. In order to make sound air must reach the vocal folds (chords). A well-controlled voice begins in the diaphragm.
Where is the diaphragm?
Your diaphragm is under your lungs and protected by the rib cage.
To test your diaphragm: Stande up straight and place both thumbs where your last two ribs meet at the bottom of your chest. Then place the index fingers from each hand on your belly button. The diamond you just formed is the best place to test your diaphragm. Push gently in this area while taking a deep breath... do your diaphragm inflating?
What is the diaphragm and how does it work?
The diaphragm is made of a web-like membrane of muscle and sinew attached to the lower rib cage. When air is exhaled, the diaphragm contracts, pushing against the abdomen, raising the rib cage as air fills the lungs. As we exhale, the diaphragm can be used to control the flow of air, giving our voice support.
Why use your diaphragm when projecting your voice?
When you attempt to be loud using your throat, your voice is weak and you may damage your vocal chords. By using your diaphragm you protect your vocal chords and give your voice power. ABC’s of Breathing: In order to use your diaphragm you must breathe deeply so that the air reaches into your "abdomen," then your "back" and finally into your "chest" expanding the rib cage and allowing the lungs to fully inflate. We refer to a deep breath as an ABC breath as it activates your diaphragm much like turning on microphone.
Do we always ABC breathe?
Exercise 1: Using both hands, push gently on the area over your diaphragm. Take an ABC breath and project the sound “Ho, ho, ho.” Do you feel the diaphragm jump and the hand move at each sound? This is the diaphragm working to push the air from the lungs. Try the same exercise without taking a deep breath. You will notice that the hand doesn’t jump against the stomach. This is a weak voice, unsupported by the diaphragm. Try saying “Hello, how are you?" "My name is…. " You need to focus on using all the air so that your voice does not sound choppy and you don't run out of air on the line.
To improve your diaphragm you can practice breathing exercises.
Try laying on your back with heavy books on your stomach and breathing into your stomach and raising it as high as you can, then sing any song and try to keep your stomach at the same height it started out at.
Lesson 2: PHONATION and the VOCAL CORDS (Stage 2)
Phonation: Is the passage of the air from the lungs out the mouth and nose (exhale) causing the vocal folds (cords) to vibrate.
It is very important to relax the throat as the air passes through. We often raise the pitch when trying to increase the volume, by tightening the vocal folds and causing the voice to strain. This is both unpleasant to listen to and damages the folds, leading to a sore, scratchy throat by the end of the performance.
WATCH THIS VIDEO ON VOCAL CORDS
Relaxation exercises help prepare the voice for projection.
Exercise 1: Head Drops: Drop the head to your right shoulder and then to the left shoulder. Keep your shoulders down and let gravity do the work. Now drop your head forward and then to the back.
Exercise 2: Rag Doll: Standing with feet shoulder-width apart, drop the head forward, followed by the shoulders and back, finally dropping forward from the waist. Keep knees gently bent and then bob up and down like a rag doll.
Exercise 3: The Puppet. Start with your hands in the air. Inhale deeply, as you begin to exhale drop one joint at a time. Drop your fingers, then wrists, elbows, arms, neck, each vertebrae of the back and finally drop from the waist. As you inhale, come back up one joint at a time until you are standing with your hands above your head. The exhale triggers a repetition of the exercise.
Lesson 3: RESONATION (Stage 3)
Have you ever been inside a vacant room or house? Did you make noise? How did the empty space effect the sound?
When there is no material to absorb sound, the waves of sound reverberate or bounce around the room, creating a very full sound. This is called resonation. High ceilings, such as those in a church, also demonstrate resonation. (This is not the same thing as an echo.)
Resonation: Your mouth and throat act as a resonation chamber for your voice. Without resonation, the sounds made by the vibrating vocal folds would barely be audible (heard). The more open the resonating chamber, the stronger and clearer the sound. We call this quality good resonance of the voice.
Trivia: Why does a vowel sound carry better than a consonant?
Exercise #1: Starting at a mid-range, comfortable pitch, perform this exercise using all of the vowel sounds, rising one note with each repetition: A-E-I-O-U. ***Notice how your mouth needs to be more open as the pitch increases.
(Think back to the video we watched on the Vocal Folds... remember how the fold opened differently depending on high and low pitch.)
Two Exercises to Open the Resonation Chamber
Exercise 1: Open your mouth wide and yawn. This is the ultimate throat-relaxing exercise. Now, keeping that same open feeling in the throat, release a slow sustained AHH sound.
Exercise 2: Picture the shape of a pear. Imagine opening your mouth wide and putting the top of the pear into your throat. Feel how your throat relaxes to fit this shape. Hold this position, as you try out certain sentences. Ex. “Drama is wonderful!”
Obviously while on stage it is not appropriate to start yawning or pull out your imaginary pear, so you must learn what it feels like to open the muscle at the back of your throat. A quick breath is all it takes!
Lesson 4: ARTICULATION (Stage 4)
Lesson 4: ARTICULATION (Stage 4)
We now have vibrating air that is being amplified in the resonation chamber, but how does that become the sounds we recognize as words?
Articulation: The vibrating air in the resonating chambers is modified by 6 parts of your face to become the sounds we recognize as words. Do you want to guess what the 6 parts are?
Answer: The lips, the teeth, the tip of the tongue, the soft palette, the jaw and the cheeks!
When you exercise your body it's important to warm up. Here are some articulation exercises to warm up your voice.
Exercise 1: Peanut Butter. Pretend to have a mouthful of peanut butter. Use the tongue to clear it out of first one cheek, then the other, the roof of the mouth and even around the front of the teeth.
Exercise 2: Relax the lips and allow them to vibrate, blowing air out on a BRRRRRR sound. Now allow the tongue to relax and vibrate, RRRRRR. Add the letter B to produce the sounds BREEEE smiling widely and BRAAAA with your mouth open and pressure on the jaw.
Exercise 3: Keeping the jaw and neck relaxed; repeat tongue twisters as many times as possible in one breathe. Keep the volume and strength of the voice constant until the end of the breath.
* The lips, the teeth, the tip of the tongue. * Toy boat.
* Lemon liniment. *She sells seashells at the sea shore.
Lesson 5: VOCAL VARIETY (Stage 5)
Lesson 5: VOCAL VARIETY (Stage 5)
HOWEVER…it is not enough for the voice simply to be heard! There are other elements of speech that can be focused on to improve the quality of a stage voice.
1. You must be interested in what you are saying in order to convey this interest to your audience.
2. You must understand what you are saying. Never deliver lines you do not fully understand.
Finally, in order to keep the listener interested in the words, the voice must have vocal variety.
There are technical ways of bringing variety to the voice. This is achieved by varying:
1. Pitch 2. Emphasis
3. Tone 4. Tempo/Pauses
5. Volume 6. Rhythm
Pitch refers to the highs and lows of the voice. The speaker should stay within a comfortable range, in order to sound natural.
Emphasis is to stress the important words in a sentence to convey meaning or emotion. Ex. "I am VERY angry!"
Tone refers to the mood or emotion the speaker wishes to create for the listener. The tone is dictated by deciding what the author’s intention is towards the material. The tone can be light or dark and can be created by varying the tempo, volume and pitch.
Monotone: Literally translates as One-Tone = Boring
Tempo is the speed or pace of the voice. When tempo is varied, the interest of the audience is maintained. It also varies according to the mood of a piece.
Pauses are the rests or breaks a speaker adds to speech. A pause after a word or phrase gives the audience time to ponder its significance or adds drama to the moment.
Volume is the loudness and quietness of the voice. The voice will naturally increase in volume to make a point and soften to create a warm loving mood. The volume of the voice must be appropriate for the size of the audience and the distance it is away from the speaker.
*Projection is making the voice loud enough to be heard.
Rhythm refers to the beat. This is more often found in poetry and song, but can be used with choral reading. A natural beat can lull your audience, but if you vary the beat you can excite the audience and force them to keep up with you.
PIPES Rubric used in Grade 6 RLA: LINK
REVIEW
REVIEW
Think about the 4 stages of the voice.
1. Respiration
2. Phonation
3. Resonation
4. Articulation
Read the sentences below and match it with one of the stages. In your notebook write A, B, C, D and then the correct response.
A. By opening your mouth & throat the sound of your voice will be amplified. _______________
B. Learning breath control and how to use your diaphragm will help you learn to project your voice. _______________
C. By warming up the parts of your face that produce words you will speak clearly and not mumble. _______________
D. By relaxing your neck muscles you will keep your vocal chords relaxed and not strain your voice. _______________
Study Guide: Here is the study guide to help you prepare for the test. You can print it and do it on paper or make a copy and answer on your computer. Try to answer as many of the questions as you can without checking for the answers above. Once you get stuck, then feel free to check for the correct answer. The more you can answer on your own, the more prepared you will be.
Here is the link:
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