Vocal Voice Training
Vocal Voice Training – Is It Just For Singers?
When you first hear the term “Voice Training,” you probably assume “Singing Voice.” However, that is not the only reason someone may want or need it. What about an actor or a public speaker? Voice training crosses that boundary and extends in all directions. A full, rich voice captures clients, customers and associates. It insists that they focus on your words with laser beam precision. Imagine being a teacher with a weak, non-authoritative voice. The image of a mousy teacher with unruly students is unavoidable. A commanding voice gives you presence and it makes people want to listen and follow.
If you are an actor you may need to speak with an affectation to your voice such as an accent, you may even need to master a local dialect. You may covet a career in the media, television and radio both require you to have a pleasing voice, one, minus the lazy speaking habits that we all develop: the colloquial ticks and shortcuts that we naturally take and use. All of this and not one mention of song. Singing lessons require even more than mere speaking: there’s range and rhythm, pitch and volume and the most important of all, breath control. So where does someone seeking voice training go? The Internet is always a handy, dandy place to start. There are over 33 million hits for “Voice training” on google. It would be hard to imagine your topic or need for information not being addressed by google.
Unfortunately, these sites don’t always announce their product fees on page one. Some make you read an extensive sales pitch first. Not exactly certain why they think that works to their advantage, it only makes many people sour to their product. There was one with two levels of payment, the maximum being $49.99, with a free trial offer and a 100% satisfaction guarantee. All you have to do is supply a credit card number and download their software. There’s always the not-so-computer-savvy crowd with money to spend and a need to fill. Couple that with the people that would rather have a human teacher and you’ve probably covered more than half of all voice training candidates.
If your dream is to break into broadcasting, expect to pay. One school offers training by actual broadcasters anywhere from $8000 to almost $12000. Expensive but they do have a payment plan and a user friendly home page.
Another one is “Voice coach” that offers “Executive Speech Coaching” as two, three day workshops. You have to call for the price but the testimonials are brimming with success. Also offered are “Private Voice Coaching by Telephone” which seems just silly to me and the same can be said for their free, 20 minute, over the phone analysis of your voice.
From singing to speaking, costs are not obvious. You can find local teachers in either area but you have to express a desire, designed for you to give up some personal information, just to get a foot in the door and that seems, to me, to be a drawback to the whole Internet way of doing business. Then again there’s always the yellow pages but, since the Internet is driving phone directories out of business, you can now find the yellow pages online.
Searching for “Local voice training” only produces musical sites. The best suggestions are to settle for a CD or a download. It’s relatively cheap and aside from having a flesh and blood person in the room with you, the lessons don’t seem to be much different. If you find it’s affordable, perhaps you could consider a workshop. It may be a lot of fun too.
Tags: singing lessons, vocal programs, vocal training, voice training