This ebook, An Alexander Technique Approach to Singing (Singers’) Technique, is published on this website in a PDF format. It is very detailed and practical, and it will give you the physical tools you need to take the limits off of your ability to create the accurate singing technique you want without sacrificing your body.
This ebook is also for sale on all AMAZON websites in a KINDLE format.
Located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, U.S.A. (MOVEMENT THERAPY)
My experience is that many singers believe it is easier to make mistakes, than believe it is easier to sing with precision. What if these singers are wrong, even if the evidence says that they’re all correct?
What I mean by the evidence proving them right, is that many singers find making mistakes consistently easy, because they make mistakes easily.
As an Alexander Technique teacher, when I look at the way most people use their bodies in singing, many singers move poorly and wear out their bodies over time. Does this mean poor posture and poor use is easier than good posture and good use in singing?
IT IS INCREDIBLY HARD ON YOU EMOTIONALLY TO SING BELIEVING IT IS DIFFICULT TO SING ACCURATELY, THAN TO BELIEVE IT IS EASY TO SING WITH PRECISION. This means every time you sing, at least at the deepest emotional level, you will approach singing with fear, if you believe singing is difficult.
So, it seems to me, it is actually incredibly hard to approach singing hedging your bets. Hedging your bets means that when you begin to sing, you DON’T assume you will sing easily and accurately.
I really like challenging singers on what they believe. When you go with what many singers believe, you’re going to find singing a struggle to do with ease and accuracy. But what about singer prodigies that find singing easy?
In a very perverse way many singers find it easier NOT to trust themselves to sing with extraordinary ease, so is this going with the flow? What do I mean?
IF IT IS EFFORTLESS TO BELIEVE THAT SINGING IS DIFFICULT, AND THAT THE BEST VOCAL LITERATURE IS HARD TO SING, THEN YOU ARE EFFORTLESSLY BELIEVING SINGING IS HARD.
Beliefs and habits based on what many singers believe about singing are pretty unforgiving, when these beliefs and habits make singing something to be feared.
Again, what about singer prodigies? They have found a way to make singing easy, and accuracy and interpretation something they do with ease and facility.
So, what is the hardest part of making singing a joy? Is singing hard, or does it seem incredibly difficult to give up your belief that singing is hard, given that probably the majority of singers frighten each other to death when talking about the greatest vocal compositions?
Look, I understand. As a former concert guitarist, I believed the guitar was an incredibly difficult instrument to play with ease and accuracy. At a certain point in my twenties I realized I was wrong.
IT FINALLY BECAME EASIER FOR ME TO ACCEPT THAT THE CLASSICAL GUITAR COULD BE EASY, THAN TO GO WITH THE MAJORITY OF GUITARISTS I HAD KNOWN, WHO BELIEVED THE GUITAR WAS INCREDIBLY DIFFICULT TO PLAY WONDERFULLY, ACCURATELY, AND MUSICALLY.
I have the book on my Kindle, now, today, 09-16-12. I’ve only read half of it because I have only spent about an hour reading, today. (I read very fast.)
And so many things are on point. For I see things in myself and others. There are a number of fellow singers at a forum that I go to that feel that it must be a herculean task to sing. And when I point that it is mental, that all you need to do is what your voice can do, it gets me labeled as lazy and not doing enough with my voice, even though my range is C3 to C6.
As it turns out, with comfirmation from a classical coach (even though I sing rock), I am a light tenor. And have given up the false idea that I will ever have baritonic qualities, like I expected to, growing up and even in adulthood.
So, like in the book, I have had to learn how to sing all my favorite songs without the detuning caused by me thinking I would eventually develope some “baritone” qualities. That took some doing but it has freed me up. Even the naysayers say that I am doing well for an “untrained singer who has not injured himself, yet.” That one came from a singer that has already recovered from a vocal cyst and absolutely believes that singing must require great effort and strain. A deep well of analysis, there, I think.
Anyway, your book is astounding and thanks for sharing with the rest of us.
Thank you very very much. Contact me with any questions.