About the Belting Voice When Singing

Series Summary

Because of its virtually limitless potential as a platform for the creative manipulation of sounds and melodies, music is one of the most influential and exciting forms of human expression today. Music is unique in that it facilitates a conversation between a musician and an audience that language alone cannot, creating a special connection between people, one not limited by time, distance, or relationship.

It comes as no surprise that the human voice is one of the most complex and capable musical instruments known to man. Thanks to the group effort of the lungs, diaphragm, sinus cavities, larynx, vocal cords, palate, mouth and lips, with a restraint or release of breath, the voice can change pitch, timbre, and volume. The training that goes into understanding how to best utilize these vocal techniques are of varying degrees of difficulty, and usually require a vocal coach or trainer…which is why you are here today.

In these free singing lessons on video, learn from vocal coach James Meny about some of the ways in which you can damage your voice with bad singing technique, including overworking and vocal chord strain, bowed vocal chords, and nodes. He’ll also delve into classical voice training and present middle voice, a good balance of head and chest voices for delivering a strong vocal sound with little damage to the voice. James can be contacted at jamesmeny@gmail.com or 512-659-7799.

Video Transcript

"JAMES MENY: There are basically three kinds of voices that are commonly used here in United States which are legit voice, mix voice and belt. Belt's probably the most common that you hear for untrained voices that you hear in most pop music. And what I mean by pop music? It's anything that is not classical or opera. And so let me tell you the differences between the three. In belt, basically what you're doing is you are taking a bunch of air in your lungs and slamming against the chords and the chords have a natural instinct to close because their main function is not to phonate but as a sphincter. Every human being has three sphincters which keep amniotic pressure inside of our bodies in case of a fight-or-flight response. So if you're running from a lion or if you're having to fight off the lion, the anus there behind the testicles or in the cervix area will closed and the throat will close so you get this sound, this ho ho, to fight things off, just like when you lift something heavy. And that's what most people use when they belt. The positive things about the belt is that it doesn't take much training to do it. It actually takes--not almost--we can do it just instinctually. The other is that it gets a nice, big loud sound if you can maintain it or sustain it."