Nasality

[iamjames]

Hi guys, I'm a regular karaoke singer and I just wanna ask you guys about nasality.

I have had quite a few constructive comments on my singing by my friends in the karaoke rooms and it went mostly like, "Nice, but your nasal tone is really strong" (mostly in chinese, sorry for a lousy translation if it is one)

How do I get rid or cut down on it? I really love to sing but I've had comments before that were bad too, saying it was stronger than even Wei Lian.

 

[momentum]

what is nasal???? i still dun geddit

 

[thedevilri]

nasal?

Nose sound?

My teacher say I have that too. ._.

 

[iamjames]

Yeah, nose sound. ._. Mine's reeeeeeeaaaalllyyy strong. Did your teacher say anything about it which you can share with me?

 

[btherl]

Can you show us a recording? Dealing with the nasality depends on why your voice is nasal, and where your voice is now.

I used to have a huge problem with nasal tone. It's been gone since I started SLS lessons though. I suspect that my nasal tone was coming from a raised larynx, and training to lower the larynx removed it.

I've heard that an ideal voice should be around 10% - 20% nasal. Anything more and it sounds bad. But cutting off the nose altogether will cut off your high frequencies, which is also bad. Another thing to consider is that high notes resonate in the back of the nose (nasopharynx), and that's fine. It's only when your resonance moves too much into the front of the nose that you sound nasal.

Breathing-based singing methods will of course tell you that nasal tone is related to your diaphragm It all amounts to the same thing, just different ways of accessing it. Look for "nasal eric" and you'll get Eric Arcenaux's take on nasal tone.

Edit: Look for "nasal eric" on YOUTUBE! Oops, forgot to mention that.

 

[iamjames]

Hmm, okay I'll have a look at his video. I've heard about him! As for a recording.. I don't have a mic and I can't really sing at home, I have tenants around the house and I'd be disturbing them lol. I'll try to in the near future though. =)

 

[sage]

I have a very quick fix to nasality;
I put my fingers on my chin and push my chin down so that the jaw becomes relaxed and allows a more open throat. I'm not gonna bother you with the body part talk and techniques on how this might work, but it's a tip you might wanna try to see if it works first?

 

[ShyamRaj]

I'll share with you what i know..but still forgive me if i'm wrong aite...

firstly, to know what is a nasal tone , pinch your nose and speak.

Now let go of your nose and speak . Heard the diff ? The tone you get when you pinch your nose is a nasal tone .

How do you counter that ? Well i guess from my experience of trial and error it has to do with breathing teq and projection. Which pretty much are the basics of singing.

An Example would be , breathing in with your mouth and not your nose when you take a breath before you sing. And proper breathing teqniques such as placing your hand on your stomach and making sure that it inflates instead of goes inwards when you breathe. Coz that is the correct use of the diaphrame which is very useful in projection.

Try singing with projecting simple words such as vowels thru your mouth and try and not let the words escape thru your nose . You would know it when you feel air escape thru your nostrills and feel it vibrate extensively.

Get books which come with an interective CD or visit websites on proper projection and breathing teqniques in singing and you will find tons of websites that will help u .

So i would think that a Nasal tone would be a cause of wrong breathing teqniques and improper projection of vocals.

This is just the tip of the ice berg . there are lots of exercises you could do to counter this. But hey its subjective . Nasal doesnt always mean bad .. if it suits the song , why not rite..

And Sage ! your exercise is kick ass i just tried it !

I hope this helped you ..

 

[fgl]

dont worry abt wat othrs say ..just reply ..BOB DYLAN CAN ..SO CAN i!

 

[iamjames]

Thank you for all your oh so helpful replies. Hmmm sage, I tried pushing my chin down and I still can feel the nasal, but its not that strong anymore, so maybe I should open my mouth more when I sing do you think? Cause I have this habit of not opening my mouth wide when I sing.

 

[sage]

so maybe I should open my mouth more when I sing do you think?

Yesh :} That was my point. It opens up your throat more (or you could see it as having a bigger 'output' space) so that it won't go through your nasal cavity much.

You could practice making a habit by just dropping your jaw, like .. completely just hanging there off your mouth and sing a note. It won't be nasal I'm pretty sure. From there, just work on getting used to opening your mouth more and implement it slowly into your singing habit.

It's pretty logical come to think of it, I mean.. if your mouth is closed, your voice can't "exit" much. So they'll find a detour and get all cramped up into your nasal passage instead, which has no opening at all. So in the end your voice is just caught up in a traffic jam in your face, and they'll resonate there / become nasally. lol

I have to stress that once you get used to singing with your mouth opening more, the usual pros would be that your notes come out clearer and your breath control less restraint.
However, you might have to get used to singing with this new "position", and you'll have to work on controlling your notes (and pronounciation) from there without snapping back to the old "closed mouth" habit.
It's psychological for some, like,... when they feel shy or scared to hit a note, they'll go back to the "closed mouth" position. Try to gain confidence in slowly letting your mouth open more, it'll be much much easier to sing anything you want to once you've got the hang of it.

Good luck sweetie, do try it out; I hope the tip helps.

 

[iamjames]

Ohh, so I'll have to start to learn a new way of singing, dang it'll take some time, but I love singing too much to give up now. Thanks sage! ILY <3

 

[ALiJic]

Hi guys, I'm a regular karaoke singer and I just wanna ask you guys about nasality.

I have had quite a few constructive comments on my singing by my friends in the karaoke rooms and it went mostly like, "Nice, but your nasal tone is really strong" (mostly in chinese, sorry for a lousy translation if it is one)

How do I get rid or cut down on it? I really love to sing but I've had comments before that were bad too, saying it was stronger than even Wei Lian.

I get what u mean.. hmm to sing with NO NASALITY at all sucks because u need to have a proper balance of "chest, head" vocals.. mix that up with nasal sounds and you will nail it..

how to reduce nasality is abit hard to explain.. it requires trial N error..
u can try focusing more on your diaphragm (stomach muscle) and try not to use your "nose" to sing.. its all abt the bretahing techniques.. hhahaah try and try and try..

good luck

 

[btherl]

About the dropped jaw, don't overdo it. If you lock your jaw in a pushed down position (with your jaw muscles) you'll create other problems. So what you're looking for is a relaxed jaw, instead of a pulled up jaw (which it sounds like you have now).

Here's something from another voice teacher (his method is based on Bel Canto):

http://www.voiceteacher.com/legato_line.html

This article talks a bit about the jaw and methods of relaxing it.

 

[iamjames]

Thanks for the reply, I'll have a try at it tomorrow.. Hope I can at least reduce a little bit of my nasality. =)

 

[coeway]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjUf6fpbKTI

 

[iamjames]

Hahaha thanks for the video, I already tried some stuff already. I managed to lessen it a little in some songs.. But when I go too high it becomes very strong. I guess I still have to do some more trial and error.. Thanks all!