Do you need a voice coach or therapist?
Reading a book on voice therapy a few years ago, I was struck by the writer’s assessment that most people speak too softly: pitch is the pitch or gravity of the sound, not the volume, which is the loudness or softness of the sound. Having worked with thousands of voices, I discovered the exact opposite.
Why were that writer’s opinions so different from mine? Those who work in voice or speech therapy are faced with people who have voice disorders and experience difficulties in phonation, the production of audible sound. Your problems may be the result of physical damage to your vocal cords (strings), or they may be psychological in nature.
When physical damage occurs to the vocal cords, the result is often a lowering of the pitch of the voice. Self-taught DJs and others in the media are the ones who sometimes try to tone it down to sound more authoritative and over time can damage the voice. Remember Ted Knight’s character on the Mary Tyler Moore show? Every time he went on air, he lowered his chin to speak in his lowest voice. If your chin touches your chest to produce a deep sound, you are definitely speaking too softly.
While speech therapists deal with patients, my clientele are those who, in most cases, have no physical problem producing sound: ordinary people who would like to find their ‘real’ voice.
If you are interested in discovering your ‘real’ voice, it is likely that your pitch will go down to some degree because one of the goals of voice training is to identify your optimal pitch. It can be a mere ½ step or it can be several steps as it was in my case. Once the pitch drops, you will feel vibrations in the mid-torso region when you speak. Two good examples of those who speak within their optimal range are James Earl Jones and Diane Sawyer. If Mr. Jones spoke to you in the same room, you would feel the vibrations of his voice in your own chest due to the tremendous depth and power of his voice.
Could you be the next James Earl Jones or Diane Sawyer? It is quite possible. You have the ability to experience a richer, deeper resonant voice that will vibrate once you allow your chest to feed or amplify your sound. Also, your voice will sound warm. That is the characteristic that identifies all the voices that are driven by the chest.
Imagine sounding more mature, not too old not too young, ageless, and having the ability to turn up your volume without yelling. However, the latter is only possible if you’re talking within your optimal range.
If you want to find your ‘real’ voice, stay away from therapists and work with a voice coach who understands proper voice placement.
