Obviously I didn't mean stop practicing forever.
Maybe like, just a couple of months..
It's just way too easy to keep making the same mistakes over and over again when left to your own devices. You will need to learn to accept sensations that sound just plain wrong to
you in your head. The normal, essentially reflexive response we have to these sounds is to immediately and unconciously avoid them at any cost. To an extent, this natural aversion
presents, perhaps the most insideous challenge to an aspiring singer, IMO.
You are far better off just singing for your teacher once a week, and trying to grasp what is being said. Improvement is slow, so accept that-- good singing takes years to learn at best. No wonder, it's an art!
I adamantly oppose learning from books/CDs that promise instant results for this reason: there's no feedback loop that is so critical for learning singing, and fools like me think they can use their tape recorder to supplant it. Well, it just aint happening that way, my friend. Trust me, I tried it all: Seth Riggs, Roger Love, just about any book I could get my hands on, for years-- I was going to figure out how to sing, on my own, come hell or high water. Well, it didn't work, and I wasted years in the process.
I relate to Cyan's 'small mosquito' thing. If I were to venture a guess, I would say that he is probably well on the road to becoming, if not already, an accomplished singer. It sounds like
he is trusting his teacher, against his better judgement, and that is what I advocate. If I were to explain to you the recent breakthrough that actually allowed me to start singing songs
with any real control, I would say that it felt like a small, thin, very buzzy sound that was stuck into the roof of my mouth. In order to make this sound I find, at least for now, I need to clear my nose in an odd sort of way-- I pinch my nostrils, close my mouth and try to force an exhale, which results in my ears popping (perhaps not the safest thing to do). After doing this wierd act, I sing, and then I have to accept a much "smaller voice" that's "stuck up there" sounds "thinnner" and sort of "jacked-up" or "higher". I cannot unfortunately describe it any better than this. It definitely doesn't sound "right". Then I do a lot of humming (m and n, with mouth closed/open), trying to get the whole thing to be as buzzy as humanly possible, while keeping
that "jacked-up" placement. When I sing after a bit of this sort of thing, my teacher says it sounds good, and so does my girlfriend (who is a professional singer), so I listen to them, and
ignore the other voices in my head that say "shit!".
I could never have navigated these waters on my own, with or without a book, a CD, a tape recorder. I am sure that the next singer will have a completely different set of sensations/ procedures to describe that works for them(I've heard the descriptions "glass breaking" or "steel grinding" used by others) I think one person cannot tell another what to feel. When a superior sound is made, a good teacher will tell you so, and the student can then try to remember the sensation/procedure that was stumbled upon, and then attempt to repeat/refine it the next time. And you will miss that whole thing completely if you are going it alone with a tape recorder and your CD set.
Of course, tape recorders obviously are not completely useless. But do not be duped, as I have been, into thinking that a tape recorder can replace a trained set of ears. I have used casettes and admittedly there have been times that I was able to learn something from listening to myself. But there are other times that I think I was just fooled: sounds that seemed right
on tape were leading me down the wrong path. And there was noone there to say "stop!". I once heard a tape recording (once again, I am talking about a cheap cassette portable) of several singers performing in a number, after hearing them do it live, and in the recording the best singer sounded the worst and the worst singer sounded the best-- because relative frequencies/volumes are so erroneously reproduced on those boxes.
I am not talking necessarily about pitch problems, here. If pitch is the main problem then perhaps a tape recorder is the tool for you. I don't know about that one.
IMO, choral singing isn't all that helpful. If you must sing in a chorus, then at least put yourself in a seat where you are not "pushing" your voice one way or another. Particularly if you think you are a tenor, but aren't very proficient yet-- DON'T sing with the tenors-- you will fuck yourself for sure. Better off singing baritone or bass. Trust me, I made that mistake too. The only advantage, I believe, to being in a chorus is listening to good singers, if there are any there, and maybe absorbing some of their good technique. I am not alone in this particular opinion either. If you read any of the speech-level books (Singing for the Stars, Roger Love) they say basically the same thing:
beware of choral singing if you want to be a solo singer. It can lead to bad habits. Of course, if you can already sing well, it's a different story. Then you can do what you want.
As far as group lessons go, I would also agree w/Cyan-- you really want to focus on on-to-one feedback, with someone who's good. But if you need to save bucks I think a group lesson would probably do you better than CDs/books-- you will be a lot less likely to fuck yourself up that way, because at least someone will hear you.
In regards to being stopped every second by a teacher in a lesson, I understand the frustration. But I look at it this way: that is what I am paying for. If I knew how to do it I would be giving the lesson myself.
Best wishes to all,
jk
