Singing: Music Theatre Vocal Skills

1. Introduction: always gas way, way, step every day. Thoughtless things he'll do. Are you pretending he's beside me? I walked with him to morning. Uh, see the line with this kind seek. It calls me and no one does. How far it goes If the wind in my sail on the sea stays behind me one. Dan, uh, it's like there's just no telling how far Hello? And thank you very much for signing up to this course on singing music theatre vocals on this course. We're going to have some really grid fun. And also learn some vocal technique that you can use a music theatre, but that you can also use and other genre of music. My name is if Williams and I'm a signed singer. I've also been being a singing teacher since 2000 and five on many, many of my students have done very well in Music theatre Exact music theatre vocal Iwas basically my first love I went away on studied it in Scotland, Northern Irish, by the way, and it really is a passion of mine on something, but I hope is a passion of yours. So what are we going to do in this course. Well, the course is divided into sections on We're going to Look at the major eras of Music Theatre High Music Theatre developed over the years. So we're going to look at Music Hall in operetta. We're going to look at Tin Pan Alley on. That's composers such as Cool Porter and George Gershwin. We're gonna look at Classic Music Theatre brought my music theater, and that's composers such as Drew Care on Rodgers and Hammerstein. We're going to look at seventies and eighties music hater, so that is under load. Weber, Boublil and Schimberg I. We're going to look at contemporary music Theatre music that is quite recent, and each section what we're gonna do is we're gonna learn a little bit of background, which one for form the vocal style. Then we're going to listen to a song for the ladies in the song for The Man from that period, we're going to learn vocal techniques that we need to perform those songs on. Then at the end of the section, we're going to sing them, so I hope you really go to enjoy that. There are some very, very challenging pieces in this course. I haven't made it easy for you. You are going to work hard Then at the end, of course, we're going to look at things like vocal health. We're going to look at audition tips on tips on doing music theatre exams on I've put together some resources on useful organisations people that you can go Teoh if you're interested after the course and finding more abi to Music Theatre on Maybe you're aiming for a professional music theater career. Maybe you're just aiming to Dio were fun. But either way I hope you're really gonna enjoy the course. Let's get started. 2. Music Hall and Operetta: Call an opera Rata were really the precursors of the modern music on, I know that you signed up to this course to learn practical music theater singing skills. But we are going to give a little bit of historical background, not like an academic lecture, but a bit of background so that we can explain the kind of signs that were used in this period. And through the course you'll see how those developed into the modern music theater that we know today. Now, if you're auditioning for a music theater course in college, or if you're doing music theatre exams, you will have to sing some early music theater and that's likely to Maine Music Hall and operetta. Musical. What do we mean when we say Music Hall? This was a British popular entertainment from 1850 to 1960. So right the way from the Victorian Age through to this wagging six days when Rock and Pop became popular night, it was a popular entertainment, not particularly high. Bryant was something that was very accessible to most people. It was a variety entertainment. So there weren't just singers, they were comedians and various kind of acts. It was a bit like what Americans would call vulnerable, not burlesque. It was a bit cheeky and risque, but it didn't become actual porn, If you know what I mean. It started in pubs, but that was replaced by axonal, the spoke musicals. Famous musicals include Canterbury Music Hall in Lambeth and London, and Walton's Music Hall and tar, Hamlet's. Now these are both in London. And what's significant about that with regards to the vocals dodge, you've got to learn that it's not that kind of twang, a South London accent and formed the signed. But people were making. So famous musical stars included Marie Lloyd down Leno little techy on George libor. And all the songwriters of the day wanted to write for music halls stars. I'm famous songs your bonds of her, some of these boiled beef and carrots. It's a long way to temporary, I bet you're, you all know that. I'm Daisy Bal as a daisy, daisy, give me your answer. Do. So we're going to listen to a couple of clips of musical performers. And one analytical vast Italy. And she was a male impersonators. And that was very much with the vibe of Music Hall. That's slightly cheeky, slightly Volvo fail. And we're going to listen to a little clip of desi Ballet as well. And boys icon with the exact now. And only ten by the browser. To leave her calling. Very well. We know that our colleague okay and a half now incentivize a lot. But for me a lot of them time the view is going to be up to five com dot au. Now, it differs from Music Hall and Matt. It was like opera, but shorter and lighter, but it was still considered a quite high, broad form of entertainment. If you think you've Gilbert and Sullivan and probably the most famous operand or writers, you know, that, that is high bright entertainment and very, very musically complex. So it was often satirical and content. It tends to be comedy stories and opera. If you think of pirates appends outs by Gilbert and Sullivan or Orpheus and the underworld by often back which contains the Camm Can. The story that it's based on, the great story is clearly a tragedy, but they, operetta is actually quite funny. It can ten periods of dialogue. So it wasn't through sung like an opera as that informed the music theater that we know today, which it is, you have three son shows, 70s and 80s, but which does tans contain dialogue as well as singing. So it was a precursor to the motor musical. It was sung by trend, all singers. So this style is very much that operatic style, as you'll find art because we're going to listen and a few moments to clip off per wandering one from pirates appends ops. It grew out of the French au pair.com IQ in the mid 19th century. And famous composers we've mentioned before, I'm quite often back, and Gilbert and Sullivan. So let's listen to a little clip of some Gilbert and Sullivan, some terminology. So to say, to the news. Vocal skills that we're going to need to be able to attempt songs from this era of music theater. The first thing that we're going to look at in this section is breathing, intercostal lateral breathing, which is on the music theater Sal up syllabi and several exam boards. And that's the kind of breathing where you breathe into your ribcage and it's a silent form of inhalation. You get no going on. We're going to look at speech quality singing because a lot of the musical songs have, have really come from a sort of storytelling slumped. So speech quality, voice and is quite important. We're also going to look at that twine, a sign that comes from the London accent. And this will help with projection. Because remember, and those musicals and those opera houses, there were no microphones. You have to be able to project right to the back of the audience. We're going to practice that operatic sandwich and some methods of teaching voice is called tilt. So we'll spend a little bit of time looking at making that lovely resonant signed. So what we're going to do is go into the technical exercises that we need to be able to sing the pieces. And then we're going to debit a singing. So the guys are going to be saying DSI, bow and girls, you're going to be singing, why am I always the bridesmaids? And I'm going to show you how to find the songs on YouTube. I can't actually post the YouTube videos in the course for copyright reasons. And I'm going to include a little document which will include a link to the versions of the songs that I'd like you to listen to. You know, I, I can't include shaped music to the songs for reasons of copyright, but I can include court sheets. So if you're a pan historic guitarist, you can accompany yourself. And if you're not, if you're purely a singer, that's all right. I will supply links to YouTube videos, but you can use those backing. 3. Example Song: Why Am I Always the Bridesmaid?: So the song I'd like the ladies to perform in this section is called, Why am I always to bridesmaids? And you can see I've typed it into Google search here. And the first video that comes up is the lily Morris version. And that's the version that I would like you to listen to. Lily Morris was a very well-known musical performer. So while you're listening to this performance, I want you to listen might for certain things, what kind of vocal qualities is you using? How would you describe the sign? Is it operatic speci, is there an elements of twang in it? Is it a mixture of all those things? Not I have attached a PDF document to this video, which has a link to this lily Morris recording on YouTube that I'd like you to listen to. It also has the chords of the song. So if you're a pianist or a guitarist and you'd like to play the song that slide. If you're not, don't worry about it too much. There will be a backing track later on that you can use to sing this song. So if you want to head to each shape, I'm really sorry, I can't posted here, but I ran my course passed. And media lawyer who advised that I can only really use clips are linked to YouTube. So sorry about that, but it's not too hard to find. 4. Example Song: Daisy Bell: So for the guys in this section, the summer I'd like you to listen to as ghetto Desi bow, a song that you're quite likely to already know quite well. And I'd like you to go into YouTube, just search for Desi bow and play the first song that comes up in the less the Daisy Bell sung by Gerald atoms. And again, I want you to listen to the vocal style that he is using and ask yourself some questions about it. Is this close to opera? Is that operatic? Is it close to speech style? Does it have Twine? What is it that's really going on here? And once again, I have included a link to this song in a PDF document attached to this video. And the courts in case you want to play it, but of course you don't have to pay. And towards the end of this section, there will be a karaoke track to help you sing this song. 5. Technique and Exercises: Breathing: So the first thing that we need to look out before we start singing the pieces is something that's fundamental to all types of singing. And that is breathing by all the lumps of college music theater exams. And I teach among many other soda by the breathing for music theater is type of breathing called intercostal lateral breathing into cost of basically means between the ribs, lateral, we're breathing onto wide info. So we don't want a short shallow breath up here because it's solids gasping and it won't sustain solid. We want a nice wide full breath and arrived here. So you've probably noticed I have the spark a scarf and my hands. What I want you to do is get the scarf yourself on TI it not tried your wrist, not up under your armpit, but somewhere in-between. Nice uncomfortably. And we're going to breathe in so that scarf moves backwards. So let's have a go at that. Read EMS and scarf wound site reside. We then just discard from a recent breathe out. What we want to try and avoid doing is raising the shoulders to see you live, are raised my shoulders, my voices pinched. We don't want that. We want to keep in mind. Whitespace on right-handers are actually just raise your shoulders. I'm lower than your shoulders. And Northern stretch. Stretch so we keep the shoulders nice and relaxed. Breathe IT. Admin dot. Something you might want to do is test and see how good your lung capacity as you breathe in and then gently let the air right? And, uh, his, like this, sss, you can pause this video and try that. Just tying yourself. How long it takes to get to the end of your breath averages about 15 seconds. So if you're getting 20 or more, your lung capacity is really pretty good. Like with OIT. Good breathing, good support song will go flat. So this is really something very important to master. I'm not going to sing something in this style of breathing. And I want you to count how many times I've raised to sing this song. The breath then, what do we do with it? All I can say a little about Boolean do the drawing can say, what will we do with the onboarding? So you may content I only breeds done at the start that some just once. So I go to get you to try and do the same thing. If you count, if you need to breed, please do. The point of the exercise is not to turn purple and keel over. So let's do that together and I'll give you a bait deep breath in. What will we do with it? Didn't say Did you get that related to if he did if he didn't just keep practicing and every day and it will come. So eventually what we want to be able to do is keep slowing at dawn because the slower it is more challenging it's going to be. So if you do this with the metronome on, you started about one tab BPM quite fast. And you, and to get dawn rashly, maybe over the period of a couple of weeks to buy 80 BPM. So it was on like what will you do? Hot glue, gun, et cetera. So actually let's say infirmity, seven-day BPM, because some of you out there for probably already quite professional singers. So that's the kind of breathing that we're going to be using all this course. And the pieces were about to sing. You're going to need to be able to use that breathing to execute the phrasing well so that you can sing, for example, why ways the bridesmaids, bride, rather than saying y is the bridesmaids. Now the right or to the day is the, give me know around. So do all in one phrase, entrepreneurs do. Is they give me your, so do, which is okay, but it's just not exactly the same for enzyme. So breathing and so said bullet. So foundational is something that people tend to lack sled us. They keep singing over the years. So even if you've been singing a lot recently, it's good to keep going over this video on getting the breathing just right. 6. Technique and Exercises: Speech: So we've talked about the abide to hide. There is an element of speech quality in musicals singing because it's come from a sort of conversational street style. So what I want you to do is count to 10 and starts singing at five. So basically it's got a sign like this. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, it. So if you want to pause the video and do that, that will give you a sign that's very close to your own speaking style. So I'll repeat that exercise. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. It. Okay, once you've done that, let's sing Happy Birthday and a style very close to your own speaking voice. So just side like this, almost like you're saying it to someone. Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, Happy birthday, Happy birthday, Happy birthday to you. And it helps use your own accent. So now I have a little go at that. Okay, Molly, the wonderful thing about this style of singing is that it gives us a really pure clear side, is quite often used invoke. It won't tie ever take you into the higher reaches of your range. This is what would happen if you try it out. So let me just get rid of my POL here. If we start at middle C would be it would go do re, mi, see how by boys tightened and it just stopped. In order to get into the higher reaches of the voice, we have to use what's called Tilt. To get up to the higher part of the voice, we have to make a more operatic solid all of us, so we would need to do this to already be fossa. So it's a beautiful sign speech quality. But it's only useful in a certain part of the voice, which is why we need to learn the operatic style as well in this section. 7. Technique and Exercises Twang: Going to talk about something that is absolutely fundamental and music theater, and that is the Twine. You'll hear it and the musical songs here. So, why am I the brides maid coming from a slightly London accent. But it's in several other forms of music theatre. If you think it's a big cost like American music theater and opera. No, no one's why, but that little bit of kind of Schoenberg and bubbly Les Miserables Assad would share where it's not quite belt yet, but it is very twining. So why is twice so important to the highest assigned developed? Well, you'll notice if I add little bit of twine to my voice is I make it more nasal and more twining. It suddenly an awful lot lighter. It carries farther. And that's because your larynx has a muscle and it killed your epiglottis sphincter muscle. When you make that twining Sanjeev tighten up muscle which turns your larynx one long tube into two concentric tubes. So that makes a solid, much more robust if you think of an opera singer and the Royal Albert Hall with a 103 piece symphony orchestra behind them. In the days where microphone's hadn't been invented or nowadays that considered bond forum and classical music. Hi, do you make enough signed to fill the space on the twang is the answer. So we're going to start practicing twine. And the first thing I want you to do is this. I want you to make the schoolyard bully chunks on and on what you'd go. Yeah. Okay. I know you'll feel crazy doing that, but please do that after me. Well, I try it somewhere high in your range and a place that's comfortable for you don't necessarily just following my voice and saying, well, let's try it where you're going. Mooc. No, no, no, no, no, no. Let's add some notes to it and do a little five note scale with the 20. So I'm just going to turn right. Yeah. Okay, So second flight books give from a middle C and we won't have to be asked clients with top at the top as it is at the bottom to move up one and keep going. So if you have a keyboard or a keyboard, Auckland your phone, if he could take yourself through your range, singing like buzz. The higher it gets, the harder it's going to get. Because when we get a little bit high, this is going to happen. The top note was going to be too quiet. Maybe because you're a little bit shy or maybe because not just muscle memory and what your voices used to do up there. So really let the top note twice. Now I've gone from just the break in the Masaccio, which is between a and F for most people where your voice kind of shifts care. And to make sure that the sign as his Lord and the lower part of the voice as it is, and the higher. So if you want to practice that five note scale and do both, that would be great. Just be careful who you aim at IPO, don't make up songs to anyone that might take offense to it. But this isn't actually a really important exercise for projection and for the kind of signs that we want to make the quality of solid. So it might be a good idea to keep going back to this video and keep practicing the Twine. 8. Technique and Exercises 'Opera' or Tilt: This video, we're going to look at making that operatic signed. You can probably tell from listening to the videos that went before we're operands, Reza was sung by opera singers. Music Hall have that slightly operatic tone to it. And in modern music theater, we still have recipe of that operatic signs. You know, some modern shares that are still playing Phantom of the Opera obviously requires that big operatic side. And everybody needs to be able to make the operatic sound, as we talked about in the speech quality section. To access the higher part of your voice you need that tilt to allow your larynx to travel. The Hawaiian. What you're technically doing when you make that scientists tilting the thyroid cartilage up to the front of your larynx. So if we need to turn back the sign to the high parts, so we need to tone it down to make it say to base, we can do that, but everybody needs to learn to make this solid line to be an actual opera singer is seven years of training. You would train as long to be an opera singer as you read to be a doctor. So we're not going to be an opera singer after one video, but we will have a good crack at mastering the science. The first thing I want you to do is make an inside through your nose. So can you synchrony? And if you hold your nose, that sign should go right? Okay. And I go the big hard Jake, who gave me what the GAS ON does is closes the court between your nose and your mouth and forces assigned I3, my sub d. And you probably noticed that this has a component of twine to it, which is making it a big sign. In the seminar, we're going to do that, but drop the larynx afterwards. So if you can sync for me. And I just let my jaw really dropped as well as learn larynx. Try that again. Okay, let's add a few more tips. Now let's try it. Some are high. And on the highest notes, I just open my lights that wider. Let's try it low. Oh, lots of space and their thyroid cartilage is tilted, larynx is low. Scientists resonant light and some methods of teaching saying that are used by music theater, singer's. This is called low larynx. Singer can also be called tells. I remember when I was sitting at a bus stop and bath in England where I used to live. There was a girl beside the bus stop and she's talking like this slightly like She's swallowing. Her larynx is very, very low, and I thought you are a classical soprano, even though you have a low pitch speaking voice. And that is the conversation progress with their friend. I discovered that she was in fact studying musical performance, IQ balls, a classical soprano. When people have sun classical music, they suck at this time for a loan number of years. Their larynxes do lower of a star. It's a slightly speak like this. So unless you really, really want to be an opera singer, classical singer, you know, there is a point where you've gone too far down the road and you can't really saying anything else. That's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about the classical resonance sign that she used within music theater rather than singing grand opera hair. So the concepts that we've described in this video are to business what's called a complex vocal quality. It might take a while to master. So you might need to do this exercise a few times over. And so you might want to go back and do the, the other exercise again until you've got the hang of that. When you're happy that you're getting the resonance that goes with the style. We're going to do another Happy Birthday. So if you could sing for me as if he were singing to the queen. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you, happy. Manages to you maybe record yourself on your phone doing that to hear that the signed Israeli ringing noise, when it's executed properly and used in the right material, that's really isn't very, very beautiful signs. 9. Now Let's Sing Music Hall: So now let's actually sing the songs and that's going to be great fun. They sound that the ladies who sang the y that I'm, I always surprise bed. As you can see, I've searched for a karaoke track of it on YouTube. What comes up as the ABR SM, associated board of the Royal School of Music. Piano accompaniment night, it doesn't happen to have any words with it, but the words are in the PDF document that was attached to the first video of this sum. So that facilities song nonetheless, for the Jets, that's Daisy Bell. So this brings up quite a few tracks and you can choose which one you would like to use. That way you can maybe move between different keys, fine, what THE best? This is obviously a much more well-known song. Then the why am I always the bridesmaids? So there's more videos on it. While you're singing through the songs. If anything crops up, that's a bit difficult, a bit challenging if you have any problems or if there's just something that you want to know, feel free to send me a message. And also, I would love to hear you singing these songs. So if you want to send me through an MP3 clip, that would be lovely to me. 10. Background: Tin Pan Alley: The next phase of music theater that we're going to look at as ten Pan Alley. And I've written here the American soul, but I'm not includes composers such as Gershwin, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Jerome cares, music that we all know and love, not from the period where it was written necessarily, but from the covers of that music performed by people like Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby. I'm made up by people like Michael bird lie. Now I, I've written the American song, but care. And it's an interesting phenomenon in music theater that there tends to be pendulum swings across the Atlantic. So Music Hall was very much a British phenomenon that when we get to Tin Pan Alley, all the action is happening in New York. That's where the big songwriters are based at that period in history. So we're going to have a little bit of a look at why Tin Pan Alley was so important in the development of music theater. Tin Pan Alley was an area of New York where songwriters went to sell their wares and was where the major music publishers were based. And those days people didn't buy recordings of music or wasn't like these days where you can go onto YouTube. It was shaped music that was salable. So the Tin Pan and Tin Pan Alley refers to the way this already adopted the signs of their pianos to give them a sort of resonant, harsh, slightly harsh signed. So publishers at this point in history, we're starting to specialize and popular songs, not just hems on classical music. And they employed people called song plugger to play the songs in order to sell them. The way that you might go into music shop these days and have someone playing piano or guitar to demonstrate. George Gershwin happened to be a song plugger at 1. Initially they songs were mostly melodramatic ballads, but later jazz and blues were added. Not some very famous names came out of Tin Pan Alley, as we've mentioned before, George and Ira Gershwin, Oscar Hammerstein, the second Richard Rogers, Jerome Kern on Cole Porter and Irving Berlin. I'm sorry that I didn't include Irving Berlin. They're so big stars were given songs for free to advertise them. Initially, the music that Tin Pan Alley produced was quite easy because it was for amateurs. They wanted as many people as possible to buy the sheet music. But over time it became more sophisticated vocally at rests on the twang of the American accent. So, and if you think of say, Gershwin's, I'll build a stairway to paradise. Paradise with the news. Every day. The twang of the American accent on the slight linezolid day really impacts the signed of music theater. Paula, you're always sitting inside. You could be learning the steps of flatness up to be happy when you can do just seeks host. Today. In fact, the quickest way is the thing through the ball. A way to ease with pendulums step every time I bought this tab. So the vocal skills that we'll need to sing this material, we're going to be able to, to perform blue dots hopefully by the end of this section, because of the jazz and blues influence on this period of music theater. We're also going to look at a vocal quality called saw, but which darkens signed. And we're going to need to use the Twine. So I hope you're excited to get going. There's some particularly great music and this section. 11. Example Song: Someone to Watch Over Me: So the song that the ladies are going to sing in this section is someone to watch over ME, which is a beautiful, beautiful song. And there's a lot of versions of it, but come up if you type it into YouTube and the version that I would like you to listen to you. And again, this will be attached as a PDF to this section is the crazy for Vue version. So at sung by reifi Hansel, and it really is an all light music theater performance. Whereas the first one that comes up as Ella Fitzgerald's version, which is absolutely gorgeous, but that is pure jazz. We want to think of it just for the purposes of this course. A bit more like a show Jane. So I want you to listen to rethink Angeles performance and be thinking about what she's doing with her voice. It's a little bit of twang there. It's slightly nasal. And she's affecting a slight, slight American accent, which helps with the Twine. So just listen ICT for all those things as you listen to the song. And again, unfortunately, I can't give you the sheet music, but I have attached a chord shape if you want to play it. You don't have to. There will of course be a karaoke version for you to sing along to you at the end of this section. 12. Example Song: But Not for Me: So gentlemen, in this section, I'm going to get you to compete with an all-time grants and that you will be singing. But not for me in the style of Frank Sinatra. But just so you can see, look at some of the people who have covered this song, Judy Garland, their Elvis Costello, Becker rots Girard, Billie Holiday out Fitzgerald male and female him, John. A lot of really great singers have done this too. But we are going to go with the Frank Sinatra version. And I will of course post, I think as a PDF attached to this video. So this really takes us into the realms of swing and a critic. So I want you to listen really carefully to his voice and think about what he's doing slightly as well. We call that kind of element to the slight slope, which gives this kind of tremolo. So I want you to listen very carefully to the vocal style of this video. And then we're going to do some technical exercises that are going to help you to think and lifestyle. 13. Technique and Exercises: Sliding 5ths: So because as we've heard in the first section, there's an element of jazz and blues in this style of singing, the sort of blue note, the sliding note, which is also a component of creating something important to learn so that instead of singing, they're adding some. But not for me. You know, we can send their writings. I have not fool me. Speed that up a bit there, writing songs I love, but not for me. So to help us to be able to make those little slides, which of course have to stay and hedge. We're going to do a little exercise on that is sliding fifths. So I've got my piano here. Here's middle, say, I'd like you to slide from C to G. So we're just saying the fifth, but we're not going. So we should hear every note on the way up and on the way done. So hopefully, you can pause this video and do this exercise using your own piano or you can sing with me. It gets harder as you get higher. Up in the next couple of notes, we're going to cross the Masaccio and the voice. So the top note needs to not be choked. You must drop your jaw and let it ring. So if you want to go through your own four-inch doing match thought might take a little bit of time depending on your particular range. We've got quite a wide range of takes quite long time to get through it and then try adequately elements to this, all of this to the songs that you're saying. So ladies, if you want to try something like and as opposed to ladies and gentlemen, we've already looked at, but not for me though, writing songs. For me to see if you can practice putting this into the song that you're going to be singing in this section. 14. Technique and Exercises: Sob: Now, a lot of these Tin Pan Alley songs that we're covering in this section, although they were written much earlier, we're really made famous by being sung by the craters singers like Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby. And that is a very certain kind of side. It's got books like Saab to it. So I'm going to sing aligned with art solve and then add a solving sides to it. You can hear the difference. They're writing songs of love, but not for me. Speech quality that was solved, the use of love. But for maybe the side is darker and it's more resonant. So we're going to learn how to make that solving site. But what happens when you make a solving songs, you lowered your larynx. You actually sound like you're choking up the bed. And the larynx has what's called a sympathetic organ. So if you lower your larynx while you're singing, other people who are listening to you will find that they feel sad too, that they feel their larynx chloride and that they slightly want to cry. It's in a way a singers using a bit of emotional manipulation and our performance. So what I would like you to start off doing is to say, is if you're really sad and say, okay, I want you to sing Happy Birthday Gab as if it is the status was tragic birthday eve ever attended? Happy birthday to you? Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, happy birthday to you. So you can pause the video and I'm triaging that. Not a really famous example of this salt is Nina Simone and failing goods, you know, but it's client, you know, food who saw it in the sky. You. What's clever by that is that the song is feeling good. And yet by using the SAB, she's making it slightly melancholic. Melancholic. And that was the genius of Nina Simone. So if you walk to, at some point just I've entrust, go and listen to our singing filler good of YouTube. So you used in the first verse and then it comes off it and the second. So you can really work out what effect she was aiming for. And the first acapella verse, that's an interesting thing to do. In this section. Ladies second, someone to watch over me, gentleman singing, but not for me. This solving style is really going to work well in the short run music. So for the ladies, it was signed like there's some but he see he ties to the set 1, 2, 1. You owe me, get that dark inside. For the gentlemen in your song, I'd like you to pick N to the opening passage of the song and all the rest of cities. But the first virus they're riding. So rooms. But not fool me. Happy Still does. But love with love to go, mow good, loads of gray. The erosion could give you noise. There was a period in history where Saab was a commonly used vocal style. It's nightfall in a little out of fashion. I wouldn't recommend singing a whole song and solve. But if you use it in the right passages of the music, it gives you that beautiful dark side. It gives you that melancholy fail. And it really does something for the dynamic and emotion of the song. 15. Technique and Exercises Anchoring: So we've already looked at Twine, which is a very core component of projection. Because when I add it to my voice, suddenly my voice is lighter. But the mistake that people make about singing it as thinking that your voice is the whole of your instrument. Actually the whole of your body is your instrument. So we're going to look at another way of anchoring signs, making it a little bit lighter safely, which completely take stress off the voice. And it's something that she used quite low and music theater, so this is called arm I great. So I'm going to demonstrate something here. 1234, 5, 6, 7, it see hotline voice got lighter when I pulled back my arms like that. I didn't do anything in my voice. Calls that to happen. That was because I engaged mind maps, which are core muscles, the back of your shoulder glands. So you want to think of sliding your shoulder blades down your back when you do this exercise. So if you want to do it with me, Let's do it together. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 bit. Now, let's add some music to that so you can hear the difference that makes in her second. They're reading Psalms, but not for me. That's why they are gray. They're adding sines, love, but for me to hear the difference. So this is something that you can really do is practically in your singing at there is another method of bank rate and that's called neck I break. It's more common in classical saying that in music theater and rock above, but it isn't another way of increasing side. And what we're gonna do is pretend that there is a pH of your chin and your holding that peach with your chin trying to stop it from running away. So 1, 2, 3, 4, go bottleneck. 5, 6, 7, hit, Let's try that again. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. It not. So happens I have a medical condition that's caused fusion and my neck. So you might not be able to see me doing that very clearly. If you've watched videos on YouTube, if carried to counterweight, for example, she uses this neck. I'm Greg, quite loved. And if you think of the arm, I'm praying well, a good example would be a login page, so you don't cry for me. Argentina. Don't cry. The team. Or either will surely ballsy that goal of God. And it looks like it's part of the performance, but what it's actually doing is engage the lats. So when you're singing, sliding your shoulder blades down your back towards your wrist, which will give you a good saying pollster. It will open up this space. It will keep your shoulders dog. That is going to be really great for the side that you're making. 16. Now Let's Sing Gershwin!: So now comes the fun part, actually singing the songs. Now there's something I'd like to say about the backing tracks that you're going to find on YouTube. They songs. Because this is a music theater form of singing, even though it was later taken over by jazz singers and cleaners, it has an element of what's called recitative. So spoken introduction to the song itself. So before we get into the first verse 9, quite a lot of these YouTube videos may not include that recitative. So if they don't, that's fair enough. You can choose to use one that doesn't have the rest of the tape. But if you can find one that does well and good because it just gives a filler performance. Recitative as normally sung in speech style. So for example, the end of the recitative to you, but not for me, goes, don't want to hear from many Pollyanna supplies and it's nana. And then you make it more singing as you go into the verse there. But not fool me. Not. Another interesting thing to note about songs from this period as they're written in what's called a AABA form. In other words, verse, verse, bridge, verse. They don't tend to have that verse chorus structure that we're very used to. And they tend to come in with that structure out of bytes, 32 bars. So there's some tight musical rules about writing in this style just for your interests. So as you can see, I've done a search here for someone to watch over me. I don't really mind which video that you use. It's all about finding one that's in a good key for you. And Sam with, but not for me. Let's see what videos come up. Someone to watch over me is obviously quite a popular songs. You'll find plenty of options for it. But not for me, Kerry. Okay. Yeah. Again, you've got plenty of options and a girl crazy, that is, they show that the solid is originally from plenty of options. Once again, if while you're singing through these pieces, you encounter any problems, any difficulties, you're not sure how to tackle a particular passage of the song, or you're not sure where the technique that we've used that we've learned for performing these pieces comes in. Please feel free to send me a message. I love to get chatting to my students on here. And also feel free to send me a video or an MP3 of your singing the song because I would love to hear you. 17. Background: Kern, Rogers, Hammerstein and Co: Music Theater, and that's music theater, broadway music theater. So again, we're sticking in America between a bite, the 1940s in the 1970s. So that's going to take us into the realms of Rodgers and Hammerstein. A lot of the songs that you probably know from Mayday is the kind of movies that played Christmas after Christmas. And most of our childhoods. Sophisticated theatrical experience in this era. The music was performed by professional singers and it included very difficult intervals and it required the singers to have a very wide range. So we're going to look at things like range and the technical exercises for this section. Now it covered quite complex things. South Pacific click to themes of racism. You think if the song you have to be carefully taught, carousel look to domestic violence, although it look today at it anyway, which may make a modern audience slightly uncomfortable. The Nazi occupation of Austria was covered in the sound of music. You know, this is not the light comedy of the Tin Pan Alley era or the light comedy of operetta, musical. This is covering serious themes. So some of the Tin Pan Alley composers are still active in this period. Rodgers and Hammerstein, Jerome care, then you got people like Bernstein, Rick composer, NIH. If you think If Bernstein's westside story, the lyrics are then written by Stephen Sondheim. He himself became a great Broadway composer. So as we mentioned before, the music from these musicals became world-famous because of movies. And we've all seen the sign of music. There's the king and i, South Pacific Carousel, oklahoma. Many musicals of this period ended up on the silver screen. I'm not meant that you didn't just have to be able to afford to go to the theater or to live in a city which had these shows running. That this means that became accessible to a much, much wider audience. And nobody knew who was. With songs they have solved for the size and the view wants to succeed. So let's look at the vocal skills will need to attempt this music. As mentioned before, we're going to need to work on range because you need quite a broad range to take on this material. We're going to look at bridging the gap and the pasado that a little bit where your voice changes Guerre, which signs slightly different that the top than it does at the bottom, we're going to work on making the side and the lower part of your voice and the higher part of your voice consistent. And that's what I mean by bridging the break and the facades year. We're also going to look at darkening and lightening signed. So I hope you're ready to have some fun because there are some beautiful pieces in this section. 18. Example Song: Something Wonderful: Okay, So the lead song for this section of the course is going to be something wonderful. And if you look up something wonderful and YouTube, you'll find a whole lot of really cool people singing it lasts longest. Carly Simon, I actually did a beautiful version of that, but the version that I'd like you to listen to is the one from the 1956 film. So it's the first one that comes up. If you type in something wonderful King and I, the reason that I chose and this particular version is that I want you to have a version of it that is that slightly operatic classic music theatre side. So if you want to go and listen to the song, once again, I've attached the link to it and a PDF attached to this video and the chords. If you want to be able to play along. 19. Example Song: Some Enchanted Evening : So guys, the piece that I would like you to sing and this section of the course is Some Enchanted Evening. And like the lady song and this part of the course, this is difficult music. This is going to be a bit challenging. So an awful lot of people have recorded versions of this song, as you can say. And there's Perry Como, don their Frank Sinatra. But I'd actually like you to listen to the version that from the movie of site-specific, which is the first version that comes up under this search. It's not slightly more operatic classic music theatre side. So I'm going to put a link to this song and a PDF attached to this video. And the courts in case you'd like to play it. But as ever, you don't have to plant. There will be a backing track and collated at the end of this section. 20. Technique and Exercises: Range: We're good to do some exercises NADH that are going to help with your wrench because the pieces that were singing in this section require quite a broad ridge noise. I'm sure you've all seen shows like the X factor in the UK, American Idol, and what people audition. They warm up by dig a whole lot of mat exercises like arpeggios. Quite less, you would be prepared to run the marathon by running a marathon in order to warm up any muscle and to make it more flexible, you just need to stretch it gently and high. We do this with the voice, is using the following exercise, which is called the siren. So first of all, I want you to say for me saying So just say that after me saying No, I take the ass off to start saying My make a kind of humming noise. And if it's in the right place, when you hold your nose, the song should disappear. So okay, So now just take your voice through its full range of movement. Just don't push it too hard, top or at the bottom. Just let it go through a comfortable range of movement. And let's do that again, almost to the thicker of it. So you can see why it's called the siren. Not any notes that you can hum through your nose like that. You can save this if I know. I can actually make that note. Might also educated, but it is possible to date. So if I've got a student and they're having a little bit affair arrived the breakthrough the solid year at A&M. Or they tell me they can't hit or G RNA. But I know when they siren that I've heard them say coloratura notes, that I know that that's something psychological rather than physical. This is a terribly important exercise, not just for your ranch, but it kind of lets you know how healthy your voices at any given point. If you have a call for a cold or some kind of larvae coming on, there might be little breaks and cracks and your voice were a swale to flag was developed by, you can tell through this exercise of your voice sounds a little bit, a little bit raspy that maybe you're dehydrated. And you can also tell from this exercise, if you've lost range, which can be assigned to all kinds of things. And acid reflux is something that can cause that to happen. But that's something we'll talk about in the vocal health section. So really fundamental exercise. I've had some students who founded an octave to the ranch and just over a month through doing that every day, not making any promises. But if you do two or three times a day while any muscle that you stretch regularly is going to become more flexible. Now let's look at one other exercise. If you don't have a keyboard or a piano, you could easily dawn load a keyboard onto your phone because it is supposed to be necessary to find notes to do this. So it starts in the middle, say, I want to hear it staccato with a five note scale. But let's just do that to the Twine. So let's go. Yeah. Okay. And then we'll go up once more, et cetera. Now you notice when we hit the high note, we come back, died again. So we're not leaving our voice out. It's very highest point when we come to the end of doing this exercise, which is melt the best for it. So your voice is like a bit of elastic. You can't and your pajamas, you can't say, I'm only going to stretch one part of its dice or you count, for example, just work between here and here. And every given day if you go to stretch it, you must stretch at all. So if you're gonna take it up, you must also take it DOD NIH, this is where there has to be a note of caution. We all have this knowledge that if you're singing along with something and the card, it's slightly too high. Do you happen to pitch your voice for a note that slightly too high? You might heard Dutch, but actually you can injure your voice worse, three, pushing it to load. So when your voice starts to get a little bit raspy, when the sine becomes known as clear. At that point, you really want to stroke. We can go up and quite big jumps. This, we're going to combine and tones and semitones and little steps. So we're going to Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing. You, sing, sing, sing, sing, same, saying, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing. You notice again, we're not leaving the voice on the lowest note. We're coming back up again. So I want you to do that within a range that is comfortable. Don't take your voice anywhere that is uncomfortable. Not, you're not going to dramatically increase your range and only a couple of dice on you're not going to increase your ranch and last year quite dedicated to actually doing the exercises. But if you play this video repeatedly, if you do these exercises every day, you will notice a difference in your voice. Now RAM a comma that there may be asked. 21. Technique and Exercises: The Break in the Passagio: We're going to talk about something quite important, knowledge and singing, and that is the break and the pistachio. So I explained to you what I meant by that term. In most people's voices between sort of a highly and high F. There is a little point where your voice changes saw and where it will not actually go into falsetto, a light side or else Enter really all brought a sound. All of its own accord. When you get to that point. This is because when you get to that point in your voice, in that sort of speech quality as we demonstrated earlier, it will hit a ceiling on unique to tilt your voice for it to be able to travel up further. And it makes a difference signed when you do that. So if you were to sing a scale and quite an operatic song and say works, it's a consistent side. But if I was to try that and speech quality, as we talked about earlier, see how it just tightens and disappears. We have to make back tilt. So it basically means that there's a different sound and the higher part of the voice and the lower and in some older methods of teaching. So again, that can be referred to as head voice in the heart and chest voice in the lower part. And just with the methods that I use, either use that particular terminology, but thought might have been phrases that you have heard before. So it has high do we make the song and consistent? Because we have to make that tilt in order to hit the higher notes. Now, if the whole of the song, if you're singing something wonderful mode, whose say, who would say, what's creating the consistency is that you're using the operatic style, which just happens to work in firms parts of the voice. So this is how we can get a little bit of consistency, speech quality, we can't carry on to the upper part of the boys, but the operatic signed, we can, and also the Twine we count. So we're going to practice some scales noise in the 22nd. And I want the top part of the voice to sound the same as the lower part, which means that you're going to have to not be afraid of those notes when they get higher and let them ring out. So we're just gonna do some fifths. Now, you'll notice I went up to top. See you there. When I got really high. Yes, my voice started to sign to let but more operatic because that just can't be helped. But I still tried to maintain some Walt of a twang ITO. So it please don't work your voice through my ranch. Work it through your own ranch where it's comfortable. But if you want to say this Chapter 20 side, you must cross the sort of space between a and F. So I'm asking that you take it up to F sharp. So if you want to pause this video and have a go at doing that. If you've got a keyboard or a keyboard app, startup middle sake. If you don't happen to have a keyboard app, quote, it's easy to download one. But you coach, follow the exercise I've just done, sing it with me and just stop if it starts to get uncomfortable for you and keep on going if it's really comfortable for you. So this is something that a lot of people come to singing lessons for to bridge this gap and the potassium. So we've done that kind of touring and sorry, no, I want to do the same exercise, but in quiet, I have an operatic side. So first of all, I want to use the exercise we used earlier to make the operatic side so AB, AB, okay, So you've got the law cycling much, much easier than the last exercise because that's the kind of tilt to possession that your larynx molts to be in the top part of your voice. So again, if you want to go back and do the exercise, making sure that you go up to at least F-sharp. Further if you won't tell you, but you don't have to. So have a little a little go at that. So again, this is something being able to make that consistent, solid throughout your voice. That's something that won't happen in a day. You have to be quite dedicated to doing the exercises, which I'm sure you are, because that's the reason that you've signed up for a course like this. And once we, once we get this going and we've done this exercise a few times, we're really going to have some fun with the pieces of this section because they are absolutely gorgeous. If you practice this exercise, when you come to saying something wonderful or Some Enchanted Evening, though whole of the song is going to really run out. It's going to be gorgeous. And I'd love to hear some MP3s, all of you singing it. 22. Technique and Exercises: Falsetto: Now we're going to practice a voice quality that is really essential in sigdang, especially in music theater, and not as falsetto. Like I think I'd better start by explaining what I mean by falsetto. Falsetto is not men singing really high. Man have to be able to use a falsetto voice sometimes in order to access the really high parts of their voice. But that's not what felt sad domains. Basically, when you sing or use fake, your vocal folds come together like this. And I'm going to show you a little and diagram of the inside the voice, which will be a little bit more scientific than my doing this. So as your vocal folds come together when you speak, you're saying above, your vocal folds are a pair of flaps culture false vocal folds. And when you sing in a falsetto style, your true vocal folds don't completely come together, so some air is escaping, but the false vocal folds to hence falsetto. Falsetto, the absolute most famous falsetto performance that I can think of off the top of my head is Marilyn Monroe singing happy birthday to JFK. So what that involves is some voice coming out, but also some air. So it sounds like this. People stay. Happy birthday. Happy birthday. Mr. Peres. Happy birthday to it is not whispering. It is not happy. We're spring is actually really not good for your voice. So if you're ever called upon to whisper, it's better to use a better file sadder, which means including some voice. So if we stick that into a scale, setup, allows us to do is to hit high notes and assault dynamics, some status second, I'm able to sing. And higher up puts really important. Because in some cases it's just not appropriate to walk the living daylights out of the top note of the phrase, ways go along with it. He's wrong. See, the falsetto allows you to add a little bit of tenderness to the dynamic. Um, so it's a really essential thing to learn. It's also can be quite unemotional. Assad. A man who thinks his heart, his heart is not always. Of course, an awful law of air is escaping. So it's a high intensity way of singing. So I'd like you to practice. First of all, happy birthday if you want to sing it with part voice, part air coming out. So thank either Marilyn Monroe to Jack hay or you're singing like you're trying not to wake up a baby. So, happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, happy birthday to you. So pause the video and have a little go at that. Okay, Now let's do the large falsetto lied exercise. So now it's obviously a lot harder as it gets higher. But what you want to think of as park voice, part air, that's really the core of falsetto. Three words. 23. Technique and Exercises: Lightening and Darkening Sound: Now we're going to talk about lightning and dark and I signed. So that's a little bit different. The dynamics, which is a glide and soft. It's about the sort of tone of sign that we make and the like and Oprah that r is this word, chiaroscuro, light, dark, and the perfect operatic voice such as Maria Callas is a great example, is a balance of light and dark, but we count purposefully lighten or darken side go more Kiara or more SKU. Okay, So I liked sort of a pure clear, bright side is going to be created when we saying in speech quality. So remember, that was the happy birthday we sang that was close to your speaking voice. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy but happy birthday, and be back to you. And that's not just that it lacks resonance, it's more upright aprotic solvent, but we just haven't done anything there too dark in the sign. We blast the larynx pretty much as is. Then if you want to darken the sand, there are a couple of different things that we can do. We looked at earlier on that the salt, I'm not well dark and solid BIBO to you, to you. Another thing that we can do to dark inside I simply to pull back your tongue. So I will demonstrate this. I'm just gonna say one long note and a half by three. I'm going to pull back by Thomas. Can you tell when I move my tongue forward and when I moved it back, I'll do that again. That's a method that counts or objectives, seems to use a lot to dark insulin to give that that sort of trick Eilish Mexico so lined that she has if you want to practice that with me, I will with my arm at the point where I want you to pull back the tongue. So just want you using your tongue forward and then pull it back. So thought is a way of lightening and darkening side. If you have a fairly dark voice, it's actually more difficult to lighten signs because obviously adding the salt or Polyglot the tongue will darken side. So if you tend to have a sort of Amy wind horse out, dark voices are beautiful, Don't get me wrong. So and that tends to be your natural sand. Just to practice the speech quality. Happy Birthday, quite a lot. In order to lighten the side. Or you can simply do the exercise that we did before with the contact that when you start to cut, just speaking and then sing at five. So 12345678. See how that's a really light right side. 12345678. Okay. So then we're going to continue from there. And at nine, we're going to add the salt. So 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12. Okay. 12345671112. Okay. This time at mine, we're going to pull your tongue back instead of adding the salt. So 123456789, 10, 11, 12. So if you want to have a little go at these exercises, the easiest thing to do probably is to go back over this video and pause it and the places that you need to and continue with the exercises. Like, I've obviously picked some notes that are suitable to my met, some soprano range. And doing this exercise, you don't have to use exactly the notes that I've been using in this video. Put it into your range that's comfortable for you because what we're working on and this section is lightening and darkening signed. 24. Now Let's Sing Something Difficult: And I, both the songs that we're singing in this section are quite difficult. So if you encounter any difficulties and singing this song, if there's anything you'd like to ask any problems, whether or you would like to send an MP3 recording of yourself singing it. Feel free to get in touch. Now if the lettuce or something wonderful, there aren't a huge number of backing tracks to this. It's not, I think it's one of Rodgers and Hammerstein most beautiful pieces, but it's not up there with say, it'll vice as one of the more famous pieces. So the backing track that I personally but go for it would be the second one's on the blue one. That seems to be the orchestral backing from the movie. So now let's look up some enchanted evening. So guys, you might have a bit more of a choice because this is a bit more of a classic Rodgers and Hammerstein chain. So again, if you want to go through the tracks, find one that's in a key that state CA. If you play. And the k that this is n doesn't really sit, you can transpose the chords that I attached to the original video of the salt. And as ever, I'm really interested to hear how it goes. 25. Background: Andrew Lloyd Webber and Boublil Schonberg: Now we're going to look at music theater from the 1970s and 19 eighties. And there are some massive figures in music theater and that particular time period, I don't, I'm pretty sure you can guess. Well, it's written in front of you who were talking about. So I think we're going to have some real fun on this section of the course, because a lot of this music is still very popular today. This period gave us composer, described by the New York Times as the most commercially successful composer in history. And that is this guy, Andrew Lloyd Webber. So I talked a little bit earlier on about high. There are swings across the Atlantic with music theater. And in this period where family back in England where in the West and rather than Broadway. And an Andrew Lloyd Webber was born in England in 1940, the son of composer and music lecture William Lloyd Webber, and he's also the brother of Julian Lloyd Webber, the well-known cellist. Lloyd Webber's music. Part of its popularity was that he fused a huge base of musical knowledge. He had a knowledge of classical music, of Music Theatre, and also of rock and pop. So if you think if the scores to Joseph on the Amazing Technicolor dream coat or Starlight Express. He's passed stating an awful lot of different styles of music from country to Calypso because he knows the forums so well. And in Phantom of the Opera, he showed his knowledge of various, various eras of opera as well. So he is a composer rather than a lyricist. So he writes music and not work words. He's written with many different lyricists including Tim Rice with him he wrote data on Jesus Christ Superstar Charles Hart. Him he worked with on Phantom of the Opera and what should still go? Who added additional lyrics? Take cats amongst the poems written by TS eliot amongst others. Not. We talked about high Rodgers and Hammerstein. Music has come to us today via the medium of film on those musicals were made into films which prolong their popularity in the time that Andrew Lloyd Webber was first starting to have hits. The film musical was really falling out of favor at that point. Other what has been resurrected and recent years, you know, Les Mis was obviously hugely successful Chicago. There was the 2004 film of Phantom of the Opera. Whilst it wasn't the commercial success that might have been hoped. You know, it was still like back. So Andrew Lloyd Webber as a new composer and the same really leveraged the power of the concept album of recorded music. So both of eta on Jesus Christ Superstar were first released his albums and then went on to become stage shows. So let's look at Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical I put in the 1970s nitty, starting with Jesus Christ Superstar, as we just discussed, that began life as a concept album and 1970, it was released on Broadway in 1971 and on the West avid 1972. And it was very Rock inspired as an essence, a rock opera. They music and it is very, very difficult, especially for the two male leads. In 1972, we had a stage West and performance of Joseph on the Amazing Technicolor dream coat, which was actually originally written to be performed and skills. And then in 1976 we have if eta. So that takes us musically into the realms of sort of 20th century music and classical terms. It was a very successful show at it originally Beta concept album with Julie Covington. But they stayed show, launched the career of Aliyun pitch. And it was released in 1976. So it ran for a byte 10 years for a successful show. But that was nothing compared to the next show. Cats, which at 1 was the most successful show or the longest running show, sorry. And both Broadway and West and history. So it was released in 1981 on RAM on the West and for 21 years on Broadway for ten years. In 1984 we have Starlight Express. So that is where all the cast are on roller skates. And remember, the 1980s really is the decade of the kind of gimmick and music theater. So Starlight Express with this rollerskates. And then the next show is most successful show, had a bit of a gimmick to it, and that is phantom of the opera with its falling chandelier. This score, a Phantom of the Opera, written for Andrew Lloyd Webber's Dan wife, Sarah Brighton. Brighton for her vocal range and the role of Christine. And it's actually still running night, having been released in 1986 on the west stabbed and Andrew Lloyd Webber fetish the 1980s by releasing aspects of Love, which really made a superstar of Michael ball, although he had also done well in the role of Marius and Les Miserables, 10 years. A decade is halted. This never ending run of him for me. Public doesn't mean the fact is Christy show has been hacked. And Schoenberg, and that's allowable bravely. And Claude Michel Schoenberg, and you might have heard of a little show of theirs called Les Miserables LA first performed in Paris in 1980 at lapel AD spore. Then it was taken up by legendary Western producer Cameron Mackintosh, who helped the Royal Shakespeare Company to stage it in October 1985, it was met with some quite hostile reviews. Newspaper renamed the gloms. And it was thought to be a little bit depressing. But having open to 1985, it's still running nigh on, of course we have the movie version a few years ago. Huge hips running even longer than Phantom of the Opera. So again, just mentioning camera Macintoshes, involvement and Les Miserables that so, so the most famous show and arguably the most successful, running longer than Phantom of the Opera by biblical and Schoenberg, of course, Les Miserables. And what was important about Les Miserables when it was first performed was that it didn't have a chorus at hot on ensemble. So in other words, everybody in the play, no matter how small your part was hot on actual character. And that was groundbreaking at the time. It also made use of really clever staging and how the rotating stage, and that was a big thing in the atheist, you know, to have a gimmick in the staging of the play. Of course, in their play, Miss Saigon, they have a helicopter onstage, also did very well for them. The eddies really walls, the era of the really big production. You can also think of the falling chandelier and Phantom of the Opera. No, I, both Andrew Lloyd Webber biblical and share back half their flops as well as their hits during this period. For Andrew Lloyd Webber, he had by James that didn't do that well. Martin Guerre by biblical and Schoenberg didn't do that well. But, you know, overall enormously successful composers whose work is still influencing us today. And also, they brought some very famous singers to the forefront. Mentioned Elaine Paige and Sarah Brighton earlier off. And last longer, who we're going to hear from in the next video, did very well out of Miss Saigon, became an international star. And Les Miserables, I think Michael ball, several other of the cast, went old, very high-profile careers. Let's look at the vocal skills will need to sing the material in this section of the course, we're going to need to learn about retraction and that is avoided constriction. Constriction is a tightening of the voice when you saying which stops notes from bringing ICT. And if it's prolonged or if it's particularly severe, can lead to damage to the voice that can make two nodules, amongst other things. So you'll need this scale in any area of singing. We'll look at that in this section. We're also going to look at belting, which is the one vocal quality we haven't yet covered. We're going to look at dynamic control. And we're going to look at being able to discern different vocal qualities. So we will have covered by the end of this section, speech, twine, falsetto, opera, belting, unsolved. We're going to see if you can discern those qualities. And I, singers performance. So I hope you're getting a, are excited to get started with this section of the course. And let's get going. 26. Example Song: On My Own: In this section we have a really, truly beautiful song, all my own from Les Miserables last night. There's many versions of this on YouTube, and I'd really like you to listen to layer so longer as ever. There will be a link to last longer singing this track attached to this video, because she really was one of the big figures of those 1980s musical. She was one of the star singers of the time. So it's really worth listening to her chic, I was a bite the vocal. So while you're listening to the song, I'd like you to be thinking about what kind of voice quality she's using and how that portrays the character. What does the sign of our voice tell you about the character that she's playing. So if you want to go ahead and listen to the track that be grids. 27. Example Song: Music of the Night: Okay guys, I have been slightly main to you in this section and chosen a song that is really, really difficult. But that's because of my faith that you can do it. And if you have some problems with it, feel free to get in contact with me and we can discuss what might make it a little bit easier. But hopefully some of the techniques we're going to look at this section should help. Night. The track is to music of the night, which I'm sure you've guessed. I would rather you didn't listen for the purposes of this part of the course to the movie version from 2004, because that's a little bit rockier. Then the vocal that we're aiming for in this particular section of the course. I'm Michael Crawford. The second video die. It would be great if you wanted to get back a lesson. Because he really was a Titanic figure in music theater of the erase. You know, he was much applauded for his performance as the fountain. So if you want to listen to his vocals, the dynamics that he uses, I think about what that does for the character he's playing high. The character comes across in this song. 28. Technique and Exercises :Avoiding Constriction: This is a very, very important thing to master and singing, and that is avoiding constriction. And singing with retraction of the false vocal folds are constriction and retraction. Constriction is when the voice tightens. And quite often, especially with women, that will happen between high E and F. When we come to the break and the pistachio, the voice just tightens and the notes get sort of stuck sometimes for physical reasons on sometimes because the singer as nervous and that means that the notes don't reside. They don't ring light. If this continues over a prolonged period of time or if the constriction is very severe. Cameras Alt and vocal problems such as nodules, which are little hard bumps like blisters that develop on the vocal folds and stop the vocal folds from coming together properly. So you would end up speaking like this. Not some people sing with constriction for years and have no problems. That very gravelly signs that made by singers like Rod Stewart or Tina Turner, that is constriction and it hasn't harmed their voices. Bono also sings with constriction, but for most of us, it's something that we really want to avoid. And if constriction is used, for example, to make that kind of grilling signed that Tina Turner is famous for. It should be a choice, not an automatic default position of the voice. Retraction is exactly the opposite. That's when the false vocal folds are pulled back so that the voice is open. There's a big space within the voice. I'm not alive sign to be clear and ringing. Let's listen to some examples of constriction and retraction. And for this I'm going to play you two different singers singing the same song. And that song is thinking of me from Phantom of the Opera, which is actually a really difficult piece with some very difficult intervals in it. Now, just to be clear, I'm not saying that one of these singers as a great singer and the other one isn't a good singer. All I'm saying is that one is showing examples of constriction and one is not. And so the sign is ringing item bit more. So first of all, we're going to listen to Emmy Rossum in the movie version singing, think of me, and I want you especially to listen to the lines. When we said goodbye and listen to the good and goodbye, it goes backwards a little bit, it's tightened. But at that point in the song, she's meant to sound like she's quite nervous and not doing our best. But then listen to what happens when she sings. Take your heart back and be free. So listen to the word heart. It slightly tight, you can hear it moving backwards. The Nope doesn't ring, right? So let's listen to this thing called me One Santa. Me. And you'll find that once again, you will not. Let's listen to the Clare mirror version. If you listen to the same two lines we mentioned before, when we've said goodbye, Take your heart back and be free. The notes are wringing out a little bit more because retraction as being employed there. So this signed it's more consistent. Constantly. So we've talked a little bit about what construction is and what retraction is. So let's nylon high to get a nice retracted open space and the larynx. So when you want to listen a muscle, you tighten it first. So if you want to go ahead, Rich shoulders, drop. Your shoulders. Draw. And there is a way that we can do that within the voice and it has to do this. And I'm using my hands to demonstrate what we're doing inside the voice. And that is to close this and open it. And where it falls open, I want you to fail the open space inside your voice, the feeling of it being way so tightened. Listen. This exercise is called the Darth Vader because it sounds a little bit like Vader in the mass. So sale that open space, that's called the inner smile. I didn't call it that. Incidentally, that's just what it's known us. So when you have that lease, space, new voice, just want you to sing as fino sitemap. See how C9 rings when everything is nice and loose, when there's a nice open space within the voice. It is the difference as I just demonstrated in the videos with Emmy Rossum and then the video with Sierra, the gas is the difference between they go when we said when we said harmed up there, but you know what domain it's the closed space. Are they open space? We need the open space for sine terrain and to avoid any kind of damage to the voice. 29. Technique and Exercises: Dynamics: We're going to talk a little bit more about control of dynamic. And there are several different ways of controlling dynamic. Voice quality is one way of controlling dynamic and breath control is another factor of dynamics. So when you think thought twice, sine 20 voice quality, that's a big dynamic thoughts metaphor day or, you know, right up to four tests. What Lord, if I signed that in falsetto, obviously going to be a little bit quieter. We need an awful lot more air for a quiet dynamic than for a lie dynamics. So if you could just saying for me, yeah. Just let's afford I know I won't you just say it really loud and that will involve using the twice. So yeah, I want to hear it. Pianissimo. And I didn't manage to do it completely in chain the first time because I didn't take enough of a breath into my ribcage. You're going to need a lot of air to control that dynamics. And so let's move up and over. Yeah. So if you want to do that little exercise, first the twang and then the falsetto lot on quiet through your ranch whilst practicing breathing. So you'll need more breath to do it in a quiet or dynamic. So while your segment larger singing at quietly, I want you just to even close your eyes, field lots going on in your body and high much air it's taking to mimic those different signs. 30. Technique and Exercises: Belting: In this video, we're going to cover the topic of balancing. So I won't to make sure that you've really mastered the art of retraction before you think it bouncing that when you say you don't have any tightness in your voice, that there's a nice lease space. Not belting is not just twine. I'm going to take a piece of these are between ionic and then with Belt to demonstrate the difference. Okay, So this is twine and note though lens why? But very 2080, this is belt. No, no bones. Why budge? That much much bigger side? It's not fair this way. And it is an extreme vocalization, but done safely. There's no reason it should hurt your voice if you've tried to make the solid in the past on your voice and has big horse or sore in any way. That is likely because you haven't used right for this is a completely safe. So intubate if you use the right form. But if you do experience any pain and divorce, any tightness, doped, do best, sake, and qualified vocal instructor to show you how to do this. So when we make a bouncing signed, we tend to the cricoid cartilage, which is not the bikeable Onyx on when we make the operatic so on. We took the thyroid cartilage, which is at the front of the larynx. So it is basically the opposite to the organic solid. Also, your voice will not go through, through its whole branch. And this side, there's a limited amount of space for it to move. It will normally not go too high in Belt. So just put to demonstrate the difference between milk bread belt here they're both quite extreme songs in the voice of the campaign. Thyroid. Slow, cry coin is both a big solid, but both very different. Not when we say most styles of music, we won't have that into coastal lateral breathing. But for belting, we take a short sharp brand lot pair because too much air will simply be pushing up against the vocal folds which are very tightly together and they start to escape and will stop you from making that big so on. So this is the only voice quality and which we can take the short sharp brand. So just remember that. And what we want to do is take a breath in on sake. Yea. So just saying for me, Yay. Okay. My turn that in to note. Yeah. Okay. Took no, it went up quickly by courts because my point no, you're quite important. Part gets picked board members? Yes. Okay. To move them out to more than 10? Yes or no. If it doesn't work, you can map to pitch for you. Take it to a policing your boards where it does work. You don't have to think exactly the same number to me. But this is the essence of felt the thing that I want you to practice going yay. Yeah. Yeah. I'll try it out a bit lower my voice just in case that helps. I reviewed. Yea, yea. So remember, short sharp breath. Yea. And if you fail, any tightness, any hoarseness, don't keep doing this. Feel free to ask me a question or to go and see a local Vogel instructor. You might be able to help you to do this safely, but practiced with that form, with good posture, with right breathing, with retraction and clear TO this is a totally safe voice quality views on a very effect won't be able to fit. I would say a Black Belt is no certain singers you can think of the whole Christina Aguilera belt the staff. If you've belt too much, if you belts for an entire song, It's a bit like the musical equivalent of typing and capitals. I'm audience who feel you are shorting out them. Save that for the places It's really needed. And they will have enormous effect. 31. Identifying Voice Qualities: In this section, we're going to recap the voice qualities that you've learned in this course and see if you can identify them in a piece of music. So we've learned several vocal qualities. We've learned the speech quality. Remember that was the happy birthday you sang that song ended very like your speaking voice. We've learned that Guang, very important vocal quality. We blurred soap to dark and sort mic big sadder in order to create a lighter side and a quiet dynamic. And there are two complex vocal qualities, as they're known, that we've covered. One of those as the opera, the tilt side, and the other was the belt that we covered in this section. Now let's see if we can identify these and a piece of music. So we're going to listen to Claire MAR again, and this time it's clever or singing. I don't know how to love him from Jesus Christ Superstar. I see in this chapter. Hi. Okay, so she's away. So an interesting thing that you might want to do this week is as you listen to music, if you're just listening to music in the car and your bedroom, and see if you can identify the vocal qualities that the stingers that you're listening to are using. 32. Now Let's Sing 80s Music Theatre: So hopefully, by this point in the course, you feel confident enough to take on some challenging material. So ladies for you, That's all my own. There's a lot of backing tracks to this on YouTube. It's all about finding one that you're comfortable, Western CTA. And as ever, please feel free to get in contact with any questions or comments or anything you want to know about the technique involved in singing. They saw the challenge of this song is the projection. And sometimes you've got to improvise a little bit and change the melody slightly. And especially in the lines All my life I've only been pretending. Different singers do something slightly different that section, and I'd be really interested in hearing your interpretation. Now let's look at the guys saw. Now this is a really difficult song with a lot of re-engineer. If you don't feel that at this point, you can hit the higher notes of this song. You don't have to just feel free to cut those heights. But if you want to take them on, that would be amazing. As ever. Any questions about the technique involved in singing this song, please feel free to get in contact and I'd love to hear your version of it. So if you want to send any song files to me, I would really love to hear them. 33. Background: Music Theatre Gets Wicked: See you in the line with this guy and he said, See me. So where are we with music theater and what are the current trends? We're going to talk about what happened after the whole Andrew Lloyd Webber era and high modern music theater. Today's music theater has grown since then. We're going to start by looking at bat at rent and at some other shows that have big bag and recent years. So where is music theater these days? Something that music theater as doing a lot in this period is fusing assigned that we would associate with chart music, with music theater. So the current top ticket, Hamilton, which was nominated for umpteen Olivier Awards, this share uses it RMB style and we had ears of the so-called jukebox shows. Mamma Mia, we will rock you that brought rock and pop music to the West End and Broadway stage. That all really began with rent. And yes, we had rock operas before that, the likes of Jesus Christ Superstar. But the signs and rent, while some places much closer to chart music than had gone before, rent of course had some very adult things. It was groundbreaking in its day. It began life as a workshop in 1993, and it talked a lot about aids and about sexuality. So it continued on and that grit music theater tradition of dealing with serious things. So Stephen Schwartz, who had written quite a lot of successful shows back in the past, such as God's Spell, had a massive hit with wicked. And wicked became a sort of landmark show for this era, still running today. It's still relied on the big production values that we saw in the Lloyd Webber era and in the 80s. But in a last kind of flashy way. Disney is doing a lot at the moment to spread a Music Theatre saw to contemporary music theater side. If you think of the scores to frozen, to marijuana, they do owe a lot to kind of Broadway signed and the movies are bringing that to a mass audience. Then there are shows like once, which is that kinda singer-songwriter saw and much more paradigm. So the big flashy production still does well, but there are other shows that do well with items. It's all a bite the music. So we've come to the homestretch of the course, and there are just two songs left to be covered. The ladies eagerness saying, hi far, I'll go from Miranda. And the guys are going to send one song, glory from rent. So what we're going to look at in this section is diction. Getting the word site clearly. It's all about the words. It's all about characterization. And we're going to have a little look at posture. So I hope you're excited to sing these pieces. And let's get going. 34. Example Song: How Far I'll Go: In this section we're going to do an absolutely beautiful song. And that's high far I'll go from Milan. I did think that doing let it go, but I reckon some of you are probably sick of that. So my eye, and this is a gorgeous songs. So I just want you to listen to the version from the Disney made me, which is the first version that comes up at a search for high far I'll go. And of course I'm going to include a link to the video and the court cheek as a PDF attached to this video. 35. Technique and Exercises: Diction: no sticking course would be complete without talking a bite addiction. So to start with, I would like you to think about which of these sentences is easier to read, and we're going to have one sentence that has only the vials on one sentence that has only the continent's. So here we have the vials. How easy is it to read that sentence? Not very. On here we have the continent's on the sentences. Of course, the cat sat on the mat. So as you can tell by this little exercise, it's much easier to make sense of the word when the constants are clear, especially in English. Ni Italian is the language of opera because Italian expresses emotion through the bottle signed and it's easier to mix signed when singing on a vile signed think of words like a more right. Where is in English? We have words like love, anger, shock, and quite often when you listen to a track and you can't quite make out what the words are , are people ST Louis. I could never make out the words of that song. It's because the consulates aren't clear, so we're going to work a little bit on continents. Nine. If we use an M continent, we're moving the month forward. Actually, just say that moving them life forward and you'll fail your mouth go forward. If you look in a mirror when dog mess, you'll see it go forward. So I would like you to just rate this little phrase that's on the screen in front of you. Money making Monday morning makes a merry mirthful mind to just do that slowly. Money making Monday morning makes a merry, mirthful mind now lets out a rhythm. 1234 Monday Making Monday morning mix a merry mirthful mind. Money making Monday morning mix a merry mirthful mind. Money making Monday morning makes a merry mirthful nine. That's a good thing to practice every day and as a tongue twister. See how fast you can get it without tripping up knife. The L signed will move the mic backwards on. The danger of that is that the voice might go backwards whether it the sign could go a little bit back to try and rate this sand insight light with ICT leading your voice go backwards. Lovely lotus lilies lie along the lilting linden Lea does not feel a bit sore. Doesn't feel like you're being forced into fake smile. Lovely lotus lilies lie along the lilting linden lea. Lovely lotus lilies lie along the lilting linden lea. Lovely lotus lilies lie along the lilting linden lea, avoiding Sibyl. It's civil Ince's that kind of nasal s seaside and also signs awful when you've got a choir on. All the assets are are all over the place and not together. We want to keep on air signed, contained. So seven swans go swiftly sailing to the sunset in the West, seven swans go swiftly sailing to the sunset in the west. Seven swans go swiftly. Ceiling to the sunset. In the west, seven swans go swiftly sailing to the sunset in the west. Seven swells go swiftly sailing to the sunset in the west. We can't, of course, odd notes to these exercises and turn them into this money making. Monday morning makes a merry mirthful mind. Money making. Monday morning makes Mary my Mary mirthful mind. Money making Monday morning makes a merry, mirthful mind. You want to practice that then lovely lotus lilies lie along the looting. Linden Lea, Lovely lotus lilies, Lyndon Lee. Lovely lotus lilies lie along the lilting linden Lea. Servants want school swiftly sailing to the sunset in the west. Seven swords go swiftly soiling Teoh west through the West seven's Wants goes with please sailing to the sunset in the West. Okay, so can have a little go at that over the course of this week. That's a good one to practice. Another important element in addiction is the death on. That's the I signed. So when Second, it's important to know when to change the A to the A. So I've left the two songs here that force us to do this summer time music of the night. So I began Scimitar and then slightly made aims to listen to that again. So I a music of the night. Similarly, help me make the music of the I Night. Sarah Brightman does this thing where she modified vise and I saw it on all the time. I don't like vile modification personally because it changes the actual word. It's not the word as we say it, so we don't really want to modify vials to change the signed. We want to sing them as is, but with plenty of signed by. Some people are on our person, and some people are an e person. Just one ride of those song signs will suit you better with an E. Your mouth is wide and pull back with an R. You're Joel as lured. So just try a little exercise to see whether you're on our or any person. Ah, it's not easier than E record those into your phone and just say which one signs stronger or if they both saw into the sand in your particular case. So if you want to practice that and also practice just taking the little phrases that I just saw him there summertime music of the night and really think about where it is that you're changing the vile sign from ah to a 36. Auditions: Nine, all Edition Tips. And none of us can go through a second career without ever having to go to them auditioned. I should just doing it fun, which is of course, a perfectly good reasons to it. But no matter how brilliant you are, you're not going to pass an audition. If you don't make the brief, if you're not walked, the Pebble are looking for because quite often not getting an audition is not a reflection of your ability. They just had something very specific that they were looking for and you aren't debt. So do read the brief and tried to be prepared. This is an essence, a job interview. Show high it is that you can fulfill what they're looking for. So if they're looking for a light coloratura voice, don't go in singing in a really dark side and belting over the place to start out with, follow wall to S that you know, the panel are expecting. And also, because it is a job interview, behave professionally, be there on time, dress in a way that would get you noticed but isn't really over the top. You've also got to be comfortable and have appropriate footwear so that you can move around. That's pretty essential. It's good if you know something about the show you're auditioning for. I know that sounds really, really simple, but it is pretty much essential to have some idea of the character on the show when you go to an audition. And it's very easy to find shows these days on YouTube, but not totally legal in some cases, I didn't say that. And you can get dv days of quite well shows very, very cheaply on eBay. You can get a lot of information about shoes on characters on Wikipedia. So really it's quite easy to do the research before you get better. So another important thing and all dish it as, yes, you want to portray a character and you're trying to get a certain role. But be yourself, show the audition panel that you would be a great person to work with, your friendly, that you are professional, that you're thoughtful, that you do research, really showcase your own personality. You've got maybe only a few minutes to do this, but just try to come across as yourself. Try to be, I know it's really hard but trying to be a little bit relax. Well additions can be completely terrifying. But if you go in just willing to be yourself and give it your best shot, and know that if you don't get it, well, to be honest, something else amazing could come up in the future. So it's not the absolute end of the road. You know, don't put too much pressure on yourself. And that's it. Not. Fairing rejection is very important. And the audition process, and I think we can all think of famous actors and actresses who didn't get a certain rule, but went on to do really well. I'm, I'm not thinking music theater here, but the example that comes into my head at the modes is Lisa quadro got fired from the rule of Rawls and Frazier, but then went on to be really famous and friends. And it could be that something that's just right for you as just round the corner. So if you've got any questions about audition preparation or the process of auditions, feel free to send me a message. 37. Music Theatre Exams: So now I'm going to talk a little bit about music theater exams. And in the UK, I teach London College Music Theatre exams. And the thing about music theater and sounds as opposed to classical voice exams are welcome, Paul, is. They're not just a byte singing. You have to be able to project a character. Now your alleged do that through movement and through costume. Try to keep the costume symbol. So. But in order to project a character, you've really got to know that character and you've really got to know the show. We talked in the audition section about high. It's quite easy to access shows these days and high, There's a lot of information about shows on the likes of Wikipedia. So really the white on during your research, remember that a song and music theater is basically a monologue. Sometimes they're at, maybe suggested that another character is onstage and that you're singing to someone so you want to be able to portray that well. And if that's the case rather than just staring at the examiner, but if you know the character that is going to inform the vocal and the kind of focus you use. So you're halfway there. So everything that you do and music theater exam must make sense. The costumes that you wear, it can't just be plugged and then air. The problems that you use can just be there for show. It's got to have it and Hans Rosling effect on your performance. So ask about any material that you're bringing with you that you plan to use. Is this. And Huxley my performance? Is it conveying the character? Because conveying character is all important. Knowing when you're choosing repertoire for your particular greatest music theater, it will give you some tips, for example, at certain grade it you'll have to sing a piece before 1920, a piece before 1950, and a piece after 1950. So you will have certain constraints, but it's really gripped to go with songs that aren't. I'd like to go with songs and art. The sort of show stopper of the show, the Psalm. Everyone knows. It's nice to show your knowledge by going for something a little bit more obscure, but you count, of course, have one very well-known song. And it's also breakage. Choose what's known as I want songs, not an I want song. And music theater tells you about the character and situation of the characters singing and also water is that they want. So all my own that we've sung in this course, that's grip. I won't solve. It tells us that for epinephrine, what she wants is Marius, that's what she wants in life. So a lot of shows have similarly got an I want song. I'm doing summertime from Porgy and Bess with the student at the moment. That is an essence, an I want song because even though the character is ostensibly singing to the baby, There's really an element and avoid her own lack of freedom. She can't spread her wings and take to the sky the way the child count. So I won't. Songs are grit, dramatic pieces. Again, dress very comfortably for the exam. Yes, you could be using calls, Jim, maybe in places you've got to be able to move a bite. You've got to be comfortable. And I think the way to approach an exam is to think of it as a performance to a very small audience. One examiner out lower grades. And then if you get up to diploma level, there may be two examiners. It is an essence, a performance to a very small audience. I'm don't be scared at the examiner. At the examiner is not willing you ill. They're not wanted to turn you Don they won't chew to perform if there are any decent way of an examiner, they want you to perform to the best of your ability. So deep breath. Remember the intercostal lateral breathing helps us with nerves and go over it. So if you have any questions about music fit or exams, if you are interested in taking a music theater examined that something that you've maybe never done. Feel free to send me a PM. 38. Conclusion and Useful Links: Now we've come to the end of the course and I hope that you find it useful and enjoyable as an Introduction to Music Theater and the kind of vocal techniques that are used to music theta. If you're interested in pursuing this topic, I've attached a PDF with some useful links to places that you can go to find out more. I've included exam boards that provide exams across the world in musical theater. And some really well-known, respected international courses and musical theater at postgraduate level at the Royal Academy of Music in London, and also a course in New York as well, just in case you're interested. I've also included links to sites that deal with vocal technique and singing and assign that deals with careers guidance in the arts. So I'm hoping that that's going to be useful to you. Thank you so much for joining me on this course. I hope you've enjoyed the journey of the course. And if you have any questions or comments you'd like to get in touch, really do feel free to send me a message.