Observing Adrian's Voice Lesson

I am really glad I chose Adrian to observe for my male from Dr.Hepworth's studio. His lesson was almost opposite from Amanda's. Adrian is a sophomore tenor, but his primary instrument is euphonium. He has two semesters of class in voice, but this is his first semester of private voice. They started out with some warm ups and Adrian was reminded right away to make sure he was breathing "below the belt". He was taking more of  a clavicular breath and after being reminded he started concentrating on it and began breathing correctly. They started out with the ee vowel where Dr.Hepworth urged him to put it in the nose. When they began doing the ah vowel Dr.Hepworth told Adrian that he needed to drop his jaw more. She showed him how to do it and explained that you should feel indentations on the side of your jaw. Adrian did this, but instead of going on he explained that when he drops his jaw that much it clicks on one side. This actually concerned Dr.Hepworth because she explained to us that a clicking jaw could be a sign of TMD which stands for tempromandiublar disorder. This happens when there is an excessive amount of tension held in the jaw which could lead to the very painful lockjaw. She told him to keep an eye on it, and it may be something he might even want to see a doctor about. I noticed that when Adrian would breathe he would use his whole body to get the breath. He would kind of move up to his toes when he'd breathe and after he'd get his breath he would move back to his feet. I imagine that this is just because he's uncomfortable taking the low breath because he hasn't been in a good habit about it long enough yet. As they got higher he kept wanting to put the sound in the back of his throat, but Dr.Hepworth kept telling him to put it in his nose. When he would get the sound forward he had much better intonation. As he was ascending Dr.Hepworth told him to think skinny. He seemed to be getting a little frustrated so Dr.Hepworth stopped and explained to him that it's going to feel really weak. Then she brought up his euphonium. When he ascends he can't use too much air pressure or the sound will crack, and it's the exact same with his voice. She told him that the higher he gets he needs to have a lower jaw and use less force, and the sound will come out really easy. After explaining that he got all the way up to a high F. Adrian just said it felt weird, but that was fine because at first, doing it correctly is going to feel really weird and weak. Adrian sings mostly in the back of the throat so bringing the sound forward is really going to help him. They started on his first song. I noticed that he was having a little bit of trouble finding some of the notes so Dr.Hepworth would sing along. One of Adrian's big obstacles he's trying to overcome is finding a focus point instead of looking at the ceiling when he sings. She had him focus on one point to fix that problem. As he was singing she kept repeating to open his mouth, bring the sound forward, and open his throat. Adrian said it just felt really weird, so she explained to him that it sounds a lot different to him than it does out loud. She had him put his hands over his ears, in front, and behind him so he could hear all the different ways he could sound. Again she brought up his euphonium lessons, but this time it was to talk about phrasing. She asked how he would play it, and she said that's the same way you need to sing it. She explained that there are a lot of connections that can be made through band and singing. He went through his other song once, and she told him that he needs to take everything they talked about and become consistent about it. She said "being a good  musician is about consistency." They talked about how to use Naxos so he could hear his songs and use that as part of his practice as well. It was really interesting going from Amanda who for the most part knows the big things she needs to do to Adrian who is just learning everything. Dr.Hepworth's patience was amazing, and Adrian never gave up either. I can tell a huge difference from Adrian's voice now from when we had class in voice together last fall. The making connections between his euphonium and voice was brilliant. That is where Adrian is really comfortable, and being able to make those connections are going to make things a lot easier for him.