Do You Like (Or Hate) Your Voice?

How do you feel about your singing voice?

  • I love my voice!

    Votes: 95 12.4%
  • My voice is o.k., but could be better.

    Votes: 186 24.2%
  • I have mixed feelings about it.

    Votes: 214 27.9%
  • My voice is not so good, but I live with it.

    Votes: 103 13.4%
  • I hate hearing myself on tape. Sometimes I want to quit.

    Votes: 170 22.1%

  • Total voters
    768
Do it yourself vocalists

This thread has brought up some good stuff. In my early stages I didnt like my voice because I couldnt sing like my favourite artists. So I took a few vocal lessons from a good teacher who as well as helping my technique, helped me realise I should develop the voice I was born with. I sometimes practice to songs by artists who have a similar type of voice and vocal range but when I'm doing my own stuff I'm trying to capture the emotion and energy of the song so the vocals have to serve that end. I think everyone would agree that the most 'powerful' songs capture the passion and sincerity of the singer and thats what hits the listeners ~ not whether they have perfect technique. It's good to learn which keys suit your voice too. I've drop tuned my guitars on occasions so I could use the original guitar voicings/phrasing but not strain or miss notes. Sometimes I get pedantic about pitch and do more takes than is necessary. So I ask my wife who is not a musician but has a great ear for whether a song works. If something isnt right she'll pick it without any technotalk :cool: . Also, its good to leave some recordings for a few days and come back with fresh ears. How many times have you thought something was out of tune or no good and a week later you listen back and cant hear what you thought was wrong ~ or sometimes vice-versa :rolleyes: Alot of my favourite vocalists these days have some unique quirks to their voices but they write great songs and sing from the heart ~ but they wouldn't make the cut for an American idol audition :rolleyes:
 
Eh my voice sucks. I always write songs for other people to sing. It must be hillarious for people to hear me sing the song to them to learn. *groan...voice crack...arguuguhhuhg!* My father is a vocalist on an operatic level so I should try to see if I can do it better some time. I've thought about taking voice lessons anyway. Even if I still sound like rocks being thrown into a lawn mower blade afterwards, at least I could apply some of that knowledge in coaching vocalists that I work with.
 
TerraMortim said:
Eh my voice sucks. I always write songs for other people to sing. It must be hillarious for people to hear me sing the song to them to learn. *groan...voice crack...arguuguhhuhg!* My father is a vocalist on an operatic level so I should try to see if I can do it better some time. I've thought about taking voice lessons anyway. Even if I still sound like rocks being thrown into a lawn mower blade afterwards, at least I could apply some of that knowledge in coaching vocalists that I work with.

Man you're lucky you could just ask your dad to give you vocal lessons. I've been thinking about giving them a try, but I doubt it will have much of an effect. I just don't think I have a singer's voice. I might learn to sing in tune but it still probably wouldn't sound good. :(
 
vocal lessons

Hey Danny, dont give up on your own voice. One thing I found that helped my voice was learning breathing techniques from a vocal teacher. It made a huge difference to my control and confidence and it also improved my tone. Now I've accepted that my voice is what it is and use it to serve the song. A few lessons would be worth doing ~ you've got nothing to lose and you'll find it helps.
 
first off - I really like my voice... during those rare moments when it does what I want it to do :p .

A fairly long time ago (when I was much worse a singer than now) I thought that having a good sounding voice and sing well are two completely different things, like you're born with how your voice sounds and you can only improve your pitch or things like that but not really the basic sound of your voice.

Then I learned (by reading a lot about it and by singing) that I was wrong: if you're voice sounds fine but you're constantly out of tune you can do something about it - that's kind of obvious to everybody. but the same goes for the opposite: if you're on pitch but it still sounds bad you probably don't produce your voice the right way.

... my biggest problem with my voice is that I don't really know how to produce it in a certain range (only about 4 to 5 halftones). there are days when it just works, and days when it doesn't and I gotta choose between horrible sound or bad pitch :o .
 
I have mixed feelings about my voice. I can sing in key, but I have a limited range. The D note on the B string of a guitar is my upper limit, the G note on the E string is my lowest. That's about an octave and a half.

Plus, I dislike the sound of my voice.

On a related note, why do people insist on telling me that Dylan can't sing. I have never NEVER heard him sing out of key. He has a decent range too. Generally, it's non-musicians who can't differentitate between tone and pitch who claim he can't sing. Sure, his voice is rough, but always in key.
 
32-20-Blues said:
I have mixed feelings about my voice. I can sing in key, but I have a limited range. The D note on the B string of a guitar is my upper limit, the G note on the E string is my lowest. That's about an octave and a half.

Plus, I dislike the sound of my voice.

On a related note, why do people insist on telling me that Dylan can't sing. I have never NEVER heard him sing out of key. He has a decent range too. Generally, it's non-musicians who can't differentitate between tone and pitch who claim he can't sing. Sure, his voice is rough, but always in key.

Hmm ... While I don't have a problem with Dylan's voice, I can't agree with this statement. He's out of tune sometimes.

I'm not exactly sure if that's what you mean by "out of key." I mean, if a song's in G, he may be singing a B note (which is in key) but it might be a little flat or something.
 
32-20-Blues said:
I have mixed feelings about my voice. I can sing in key, but I have a limited range. The D note on the B string of a guitar is my upper limit, the G note on the E string is my lowest. That's about an octave and a half.

Plus, I dislike the sound of my voice.

On a related note, why do people insist on telling me that Dylan can't sing. I have never NEVER heard him sing out of key. He has a decent range too. Generally, it's non-musicians who can't differentitate between tone and pitch who claim he can't sing. Sure, his voice is rough, but always in key.

By the way, an ocatave and a half is not that small of a range. The general ranges assigned in classical music are usually around an octave and a 6th.

Plus, range depends on volume as well. I find it VERY hard to believe that you can't sing higher than that D note if you're belting out at full volume with everything you've got. Unless maybe you've smoked like a dragon for 40 years or something.

I can sing from around the low G on the 6th string to about the open high E string with a quiet volume. But if I'm really belting out at full volume, I can get up to the A on the high E string and even to the B for brief notes.

However, before I learned how to sing out, I thought the E was the top of my range.
 
32-20-Blues said:
On a related note, why do people insist on telling me that Dylan can't sing. I have never NEVER heard him sing out of key. He has a decent range too. Generally, it's non-musicians who can't differentitate between tone and pitch who claim he can't sing. Sure, his voice is rough, but always in key.

Maybe they're talking about live performance. :confused:Any live performance I've ever heard of the Stones,Mick Jagger sounds absolutely awful.
 
I've never considered Dylan (or Jagger) singers. Any live performance I've heard - they both hit bad notes with little or no tone.

Now I agree on recordings, in a more controlled environment - they can "sing" (meaning they can hit the right notes) but neither is the least bit pleasant to listen to.

I tend to make a distinction between a "vocalist" - which to me is someone blessed with an instrument, who has developed that instrument vs. a "singer" (someone who has good tone and can hit the notes) vs. someone "who can sing" (someone who is not blessed with decent tone, but can at least hit the notes).

Most people fall into the last catagory (these are people in bands who get to sing maybe 1 or 2 songs a night - and one of the songs is "Taking Care Of Business :D ). Some fall into the "singer" catagory (they get to sing more songs one of which is likely "Free Bird". Only a precious few are true vocalists - and those are the people who charge me $100 per song as session singers!!!! :(
 
austinm08 said:
It was VERY VERY VERY (that's three very's) hard for me to break the ice and sing in front of people. I think I was a pretty good singer, but there was just some wall between me and singing in front of people.


man just go to kariokie did wonders for my confidance! if you feel it was a terrible set then blame it on being hammered (i usually was) and people will just say fair enough it was all in the name of fun! and after while youll warm up. hell i killed at least 5 songs untill i did a good one. i even got in the finals by the end of it!
 
famous beagle said:
By the way, an ocatave and a half is not that small of a range. The general ranges assigned in classical music are usually around an octave and a 6th.

Plus, range depends on volume as well. I find it VERY hard to believe that you can't sing higher than that D note if you're belting out at full volume with everything you've got. Unless maybe you've smoked like a dragon for 40 years or something.

I can sing from around the low G on the 6th string to about the open high E string with a quiet volume. But if I'm really belting out at full volume, I can get up to the A on the high E string and even to the B for brief notes.

However, before I learned how to sing out, I thought the E was the top of my range.

Hey, that makes me feel better :D

Yeah, I tried earlier on today - I can hit the G on the high e string okay, with a bit of a push. It starts to get a bit shaky after that, though. Thanks for that bit of advice.

(And I smoke about 40 a day at the moment - I'm cutting down)

I have gone from a position where I was convinced that I couldn't sing a note (my Dad is classically trained, and, while he encouraged me on the guitar, he told me I'd never be able to sing worth a damn) to a position where I am reasonably hapy with my voice. It took a couple of years of sitting in my room with a guitar and singing scales over and over, but I'm getting there.
 
famous beagle said:
I can sing from around the low G on the 6th string to about the open high E string with a quiet volume. But if I'm really belting out at full volume, I can get up to the A on the high E string and even to the B for brief notes.
I have a fairly decent range in full voice but not in falsetto. I can hit a low F (fet 1, low E string) and up to a high D (fret 10 high E string) That's just shy of 3 octaves but can only reach a G in falsetto when I've warmed up

edit: just picked up the guitar to test myself again and I hit low E easily, tuned to D and hit it but now totally comfortable
 
Enchilada said:
I have a fairly decent range in full voice but not in falsetto. I can hit a low F (fet 1, low E string) and up to a high D (fret 10 high E string) That's just shy of 3 octaves but can only reach a G in falsetto when I've warmed up

edit: just picked up the guitar to test myself again and I hit low E easily, tuned to D and hit it but now totally comfortable

Wow that is quite a good range. The B I mentioned on the high E string is with my chest voice, but as I said, that's really pushing it and not comfortable. With falsetto, I can up to about the E a fret 12 (or maybe the F or F#) fairly comfortably, although I do have to have some volume behind it (kind of like a Little Richard "woooo")
 
i love the quality of sound i get from my voice but it needs alot more trainig before i could do any serious performing because it is inconsitant and very sensitive to weather, sleep, mood...ect...
 
I love my voice but would like better range

My highest note is middle C and my lowest note is about the G two octaves down. My vocal range is about 440 Hz to 100 Hz not counting the overtones and undertones.
I sound like Johnny Cash, only lower.
I am just beginning to learn how to record so I can't post anything.
Other people have complimented me on my voice but I don't have much of a falsetto without busting a gut. Unfortunately, I don’t like my gut. :D

PS. I have not had voice lessons.
 
i did this week in my training excersises hit an Aflat above high c which was really cool but i do not have anywhere near that range in my usable voice. just in theis excersise. i cnanot sing that note in a song. but it is cool to know it's in there. in the moring, when i have my moring voice i cansometimes hit a B below middle c which is sorta cool 'cept i sound like a guy when id o that
 
Limited

I'm a limited singer, but I've come to like my voice. I really used to bounce back and forth between hating and liking it. I'm still pretty sensitive about it, and I know my limitations.

What I hate about my voice is that I don't have good breath control and my sustained notes aren't strong, they sound almost trebly and lousy. I also have trouble putting power to my singing. But most of what I sing is folk styled music anyways.

I hate the part of Danny Boy (at least the version I know) where you have to go from a G to an e, that's like 9 half tones up, with no notes in between. I can't really hit that note, but going up like that is really what bugs me.
 
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