Kravetz - The Naked Voice: Steps to Release Anxiety and Tension in Your Body, Brain, and Voice

The Naked Voice: Steps toRelease Anxiety and Tension in Your Body, Brain, andVoice

by Thrse AylaKravetz

Copyright 2016 by Thrse AylaKravetz

All rights reserved.

Interior Design by Thrse AylaKravetz

No part of this book may be reproduced inany form or by any electronic or mechanical means includinginformation storage and retrieval systems, without permission inwriting from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, whomay quote short excerpts in a review.

www.thereseaylakravetz.com

1. Dont Try to Be Pretty, JustSing

2. Listening to Your OwnVoice

3. TheYawn Sigh

4. The CallingExercise

5. The Meaning and Emotion inWords

6. AdditionalExercises

About theAuthor

Endnotes

The human voice is theexpression of the selfOur voices express us inprofound ways, and reveal ourselves, our lives, our hearts, oursouls, and our journeys through life.

- Alfred Wolfsohn 1

Using the Voice toHeal

I found many techniques to learn to speak inpublic, transcend my fears and express myself. But it all startedwith the voice.

When I was at Lesley University inCambridge, MA getting my degree in Education, I took a class Voicefor Actors, from a South African actress who had studied withstudents of Roy Hart, from the lineage of voice coach AlfredWolfsohn.

In her voice classes, we started bygrounding ourselves. We rolled from one end of the room to theother on the wood floor, like a kid rolling down the side of ahill. My teacher would say as we rolled, You are 80% liquid, sofeeeeeel it, in her elegant Afrikaans accent. The rolling meltedthe tension in my body and my mind.

Then we imagined wearing heavy space bootsand trudged around the room in slow motion. The slow motion slowedmy temperament to where it was in sync with my breath.

Next, we let go of tension by at firstbending over and then rolling up the spine vertebrae by vertebraeand sounding out by allowing the sound to emerge. The sound thatemerged was unforced, deep, natural, not loud. The goal was to getthis connection between the breath deep in our belly and body sothat the voice could emerge organically. If you arrive at thatconnected sound spontaneously as an actor, the audience feels thatand believes it. Its authentic, not forced.

During one of these classes I was standingat the piano with my teacher doing the usual jaw release exercise(see yawn sigh exercise) as she played different notes up and downthe scale. She often had us standing by the piano while we weresounding out. I had been working with her for about six weeks onvoice release work.

I had some neck pain, and we were releasingsome sound as I gently pulled down on the lower jaw with my handsto get the jaw to release. Then I took my hands off my jaw and justallowed my whole mouth to open wide with a loud ahhhhhh andohhhhh as she moved down the scale of the piano and I followedwith my voice.

I felt a shift. My mouth opened wider, andmuscles relaxed in my neck. The teacher stood up and gently put ahand on my neck as a loud clear sound that I had never heard beforebellowed out. It was wide, rich, untamed. It broke down a wall ofresistance. I felt a burden lift that I hadnt known I wascarrying. The sound vibration eased the tension in my neck.

Tears fell as emotions and old tightnessreleased. My teacher smiled to encourage me to continue. I let myneck stretch to the side as I let more of the sound out. I giggledand felt as if some old crusty behavior had been removed, and I wasfree to communicate with strength and ease.

I returned my focus to the room and noticedmy neck pain was almost gone. My jaw was no longer locked in ahalf-open frozen position but wide open. It felt like every soundbehind each word Id hidden from the world blew out of me. I hadfelt a shift learning German, but this vocal experience showed me avoice that was strong, deep, and linked to a part of me, a voice Ihadnt acknowledged before.

I was getting curious nowthe craft of vocalrelease and this type of theater wasnt about being the best orsounding pretty, but about releasing tension, and being authentic.Relaxing the tongue and jaw, and connecting to the breath with yourvoice, can help shake off patterns of physical tension, but it canaffect emotions too. If you are shy or anxious it can help youspeak out more or balance your nervousness.

I took more workshops with voice teachersand studied the vocal work of Kristin Linklater, a famous Britishcoach who had developed a more linear method of releasing the voicefor actors. But I was drawn especially to those students who hadtrained in France with the Roy Hart Theater.

From Cambridge to NYC toVoice Coach

Soon after my voice classes with teachersfrom Wolfsohns lineage, I interrupted my degree program and movedto New York City. In New York, I took courses in voice and acting,studying with Catherine Fitzmaurice, an American voice coach. Icontinued to study the work of Kristin Linklater, the British vocalcoach. I taught part time and took courses in education.

I began teaching workshops at a localActors Resource Center. When I noticed tension in others voices,Id create an exercise or use one I had learned, to release it. Forexample, a nasal voice told me I needed to help the person resonatemore in the chest area. It was creative, fun, and exhilarating.

I remember one student, Karen, who came tome for voice lessons. We went through some warm-ups in the studiospace I had rented. Then I went to my keyboard to play some simplenotes starting at middle C. She sang out on Ahh and slowly movedup the scale. I noticed she stood straight but locked her knees asshe sang out. I went over and just gently put my hands behind herknees.

Now, just sound out on that same note,Karen and she began.

With softly bent knees, the sound Ahhhhhhhpopped out of her in a new way. Ah-ha, I thought. Moreproof of the voice-body link.

Sometimes in class I would gently shake anarm as the student was sounding out or make some other slightcontact. Other times I showed students how to engage more of theirbelly in the sound by bending and sounding out. I could tell ifthere was restriction that was blocking their breath and voice andwhat to do about it.

Information about this came through asensing and intuition which was unsettling to me at the time. Mymind wanted specific steps to guide me, proof that I was doing theright thing. But instead, I had to rely on my vocal exercises andintuition in the moment. The process was not linear, and it tooktime to trust it.

In one session in my studio, after a typicalwarmup of stretching, breathing, shoulder shrugs, and sounding out,I practiced some relaxation exercises with a student at the piano.As I played each note, and she sang going up the scales to thehigher registers, she discovered a huge upper register that shehadnt used before. She was opening up with new sound, singinghigh-pitched perfect tones towards the end of the keys on thepiano. I was almost at the end of my keyboard, and her sound wasstill beautiful and buttery.

Suddenly she choked up and started to cry. Istopped playing and looked up at her. Are you alright?

I just dropped right back to when I wasthree years old, she said.

What happened then?

I was in an accident, and my tongue was cutopen. It was bleeding profusely. And I went right back there. Shehad discovered an upper register of sound that had shut down whenshed had the accident. She had released something that was stuckback in time. Now she was beaming, loving her own voice. Just froma simple vocal exercise.

We finished our lesson as the late morningsunlight lit up the wooden floors of the studio.

Relaxing the tongue and jaw, and connectingto the breath with your voice, can help you shake off patterns ofphysical tension, but it can affect emotions too. If you are shy oranxious it can help you speak out more or balance yournervousness.