VOICE WORKSHOP: October Edition (3 hours)

On October 30th, our community met for a voice workshop. The theme was based around building an evolving discussion and presentation based on the needs of the community. As an intro we sourced questions and difficulties from the group. Then we had a block of material discussing warming up followed by key rules of practice. Following that, we organized the communities questions into a more optimal presentation path and started going through them. We didn't get to cover everything asked but covered a lot of ground! We cooled down and closed with a themed vocal exploration session which played with spooky vocal sounds! Here is a rough outline! :D

1. Intro
   • Goal: work collaboratively with the group to mine out what is most needed
2. Prompts:
   • What has been the hardest part of voice feminization for you so far?
   • What is something you’ve seen or heard that you don’t understand yet?
3. Warming up
   • Why warming up has value
   • /m/
   • Sustaining an /s/ for a long time
   • Resonance warm-ups
4. Tenants of Practice
   • Practice is fluid and not objective: Construct and nurture a model of practice which is designed in such a way that it gives us a positive feedback loop.
   • Any length of practice has value
   • Practice frequently
   • Practice doesn’t interrupt your life. Great practice becomes part of your life.
   • Observation, reflection, and awareness develop control and skill -- not exercises
   • The perception of “progress” is a moving target you get to define
   • Always experiment and push against the boundaries of habit.
   • Allow no guilt or shame to fester if you perceive you "didn't practice enough"
5. Cloud of Approaches (fill in):
   • Combining the different parts
   • Voice is still raspy
   • Yelling and staying fem
   • Proprioception
   • The mental aspect
   • Psychological blocks
   • Persistent practice
   • Code switching into negative environments
   • Ways to hear yourself better
   • Building core muscular abilities
   • Glottal Control
   • Rise my R1 without sounding choked
   • Maintaining resonance into phonation
   • Why does high R1 make you thick?
6. Spooky sound exploration
   • Ghost noise (low larynx + vibrato)
   • Grudge Noise (creak + stability)
   • Zombie Noise (thick + adduction)
   • Scary Wind (R2 sweeps)
   • Ghoul Hiss (R1 sweep)
   • Vampire Hiss (crushed alveolar fricative for air pressure)