Day 10: Head-dominant Mix

From: 14-Day Range Extension Course With Abram
by Abram Poliakoff
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Description:

Today we talk about head-dominant mixing. This type of mix allows us to sing softer and with lots of vocal ease. It’s a great skill to have and can be used to “mark” or gently sing through something before adding any extra force or expression. 

It's very helpful to think of using extra breathiness or air while you attempt this. This is very similar to what we worked on for low chest voice on Day 3. However instead of a Hah sound lets work our breath through a more head voice dominant vowel like HE. 

Keep that vowel tall and slowly exhale through this shape attempting to feel warm air on your hand. We actually don’t need to make too much breath sound with this.

Exercise 1: Nuh Nee (353535323 Groove Maj7)

Let’s use a lighter groove style exercise that starts with switching registers a little closer together in pitch than Day 9 to warm up our mix. The hardest thing is to jump around your break range without flinching or stalling out and cracking when we sing lightly like this. Don’t push, but keep that vowel narrow. You can place your hands here to help guide this a bit.

Exercise 2:  Through It All 8-5-3-1

Now that you have this feeling let’s try to drop right into it with this exercise. Use the breathiness from the Th sound and eventually come to a very light chest voice at the end. The higher we take this more we will find a healthy light mix throughout.

Exercises 3:   Its you and me 1-10-9-8

Now let's add some vocalization with a jumping style exercises. Take a breath with the top note in mind and then allow yourself to gently tap a light breathy chest voice before jumping up into head voice. The rest of the exercise involves coming back down to the middle. 

Don’t let yourself get heavy and allow that breathy H sound to soften and switch you into a bit more chest voice as you descend. Try to keep that “AH vowel in the word  “and” tucked in" like the oo of “You” and the EE of “Me". 


Exercise 4: Zoo-fwee-yah arpeggio 1-3-5-8-5-3-1

This last exercise will take us through our entire light mix. The oo keeps our chest voice light and narrow so we can easily transition into more of a head voice dominant mix. If you try to sing too loud or with too much chest voice, then it can easily get stuck or flip. At the end allow yourself to land into that gentle and breathy chest voice. The F sound gives us some air to help bridge the gap and stay light just like an H.

Great work! In my opinion light mixing is necessary to master before you attempt any belting. Take some time to get really comfortable with this skill before moving on to Day 11 where we will start working on the principles of belting! 


Audio:

14-Day Range Extension Course With Abram 10A
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14-Day Range Extension Course With Abram 10C
14-Day Range Extension Course With Abram 10D

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Instructor: Abram Poliakoff

Abram Poliakoff is a singer, guitarist, pianist, teacher, conductor, and composer. He received a Bachelors of Music in Vocal Arts from USC’s Thornton School of Music and has been teaching music for 8 years. He is currently both the Associate Artistic Director and a tenor in the L.A. Choral Lab, which recently released its first studio album Sonic Visions in the fall of 2019. Abram teaches and performs a wide range of genres including Classical, Jazz, Folk and Popular music in the Los Angeles area. He has also sung with the San Francisco Opera and Pocket Opera in the Bay Area. His teaching mission is to help his students utilize vocal technique to find their authentic and healthy voice while maximizing genre flexibility and a naturalness of expression.