Third Time Might not be the Charm Either

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Living in Louisiana is great until it is hurricane season, so this week's blog will only cover my virtual vocal lesson that I was able to have before the university was closed down for the rest of the week.

    Going into this third full week, I felt like things were on the up! Until, everyone received news that a category one hurricane was heading towards Louisiana. So, I really got to see how the university and more importantly the music program handles the closure. 

    Monday rolls around and everyone seems to be on edge about what this coming week will look like. We received emails throughout the day stating that the university is on watch and will update us about what this week will look like. In the late afternoon, the university would send out an email stating that they will be closing Tuesday at 12:30, fully on Wednesday, and reopen on 12:30 on Thursday. So, everyone started scattering trying to understand what this week would entail. 

    I would email my vocal professor to ask her what my lessons would look like on Tuesday and if she would be on campus. My lesson is at 10:00 but I wanted to make sure that she would be on campus. She emailed me back within a few hours sending me a zoom link and asking if I was okay having an online lesson since she was staying home. I have never had an online lesson before, and with this being my first actual lesson where I will be singing, this was extremely nerve wracking. But, she would send me her number to confirm that I was okay with an online lesson and then sending the password for the zoom call.

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    I had work on campus that morning and would go into an upstairs practice room about 5 minutes before my online lesson. I would set up my phone with the Zoom meeting and have my tablet with my music. She would join the meeting and ask how I was doing and the casual greetings before starting the warm ups.

    We would start on the lower part of the piano and work our way up, but she would stop me before completing my full range asking if I could hear her. I would response saying yes, and she asked if I had the original audio turned on within the setting on zoom. I had no idea that this was even an option, but it took us both a minute to dig through the setting and turn on original audio. My professor explained that the videos audio cuts out on the upper part of my range and she could not hear me singing anymore. We tried to continue these warm up even with my teacher not being able to hear me. So, eventually she just asked me if I would be okay moving to FaceTime. I said this was fine especially if it works better than Zoom!

    I had no idea that vocal lessons would be so difficult over an online platform, but FaceTime would work a lot better and allow us to finish our lesson! We would finish our warm ups and she would then ask me what song I would like to sing. I had already given her a few songs previous, so she went through the list and picked out "Dead Mom" from the production Beetlejuice. She would ask me to play the track in the background while singing on top of it.

    I am fairly comfortable with the first part of the song but struggle with the middle and upper parts. I would sing through the piece stopping at some parts because I knew I messed up or was off key before starting again. I felt embarrassed because this was the first time that my vocal professor has heard me sing a song and it was a song that I have trouble with. My voice cracked and strained through multiple parts of the song and I was mortified. Each time I would stop, she would ask me what I was feeling. I expressed that I felt I could not sing the upper notes in the song because my head voice felt weak. Your head voice is the voice you "switch" to when you sing upper notes that are not where your speaking voice is. I told her that since I am singing musical theatre I feel the need to "push" my voice and I cannot go into my head voice since its not the strong tone I want.

    She would ask me to sing where my voice fell naturally and this would be within my head voice. She would stop and compliment me that my voice was beautiful and felt natural with the music. She even started to explain that my voice is not like anyone else's voice and is not going to be like the recording I am listening to simply because we have different voices and that's okay!

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    I felt almost ashamed through my first vocal lesson when I really had no reason to be. My professor would compliment me throughout and reassure me that even though I was not comfortable with my singing voice that we would work on it and there was nothing to be scared of. Even with the difficultly of technology with our lesson, it was a great first lesson! I learned that our lessons are sacred and going to be difficult or embarrassing but that does not mean I should stop trying. Everyone starts somewhere, especially with a new song that needs work. The professors want to help you succeed and you should always know that!

        - Emma Peppo