A Voice Apart

 I have more and more inquiries from people who used to sing for some time in the past; and suddenly, (or at least so they thought), lost their singing range and some of them even lost their singing voice altogether . Now they are older and in their 40s (and counting), and they still cannot get a grip on the notion that their love and joy of singing might never be present again...? Quite a few years later after the occurrence, they had been still upset and even depressed about it.   Of course, they had been through numerous visits to doctors, speech therapists, pathologists and nevertheless many vocal coaches. However, in the majority of cases, it did not add up to any tangible, needless to say, expected results. With the above said, since they had lost their love and joy to be able to sing effortlessly and painlessly, their lives were never the same. Their passion and desire for expressing themselves, (telling their stories and expressing their emotions through sin...

  Attention teachers! The New School Year Approaches… Does your voice sound healthy and intact? If not, WE can make it happen! We will make your voice sound clear and vibrant. We will also help make your words more announced and pronounced. With our unprecedented efforts, expertise and experience, we will assure the health and the quality of your voice for a lifetime! We advocate a very unique program known as  "The Total Communicator Program" , which is designed to improve your communication and your verbal performance (coupled with an appropriate body language), on every conceivable level! In fact, at any time, our prime clientele is  teachers as well as fitness instructors, lawyers, voice-over actors, TV and radio personal, professional singers and actors ... The above-listed professions do require excessive use of voice…And if those people are not aware of the proper application of their speaking and /or singing voice, they could very easily damage their voice and som...

- My close observations and beliefs. - For at least a decade, about 90 percent of people have been coming through our doors to conquer not only a voice repair but, as experience shows, first and foremost, to acquire a new and improved lifestyle… Our Toronto prominent newspaper, The Toronto Star , once said - “ It is not for the faint of heart ”.  And I would add that it is also not for people who will be expecting change without change, so to speak. If those who are seeking help are not willing to open up and tell us their true story, then it would be very difficult to offer them the lifestyle modification -   and thus the successful results of their voice problems and issues. I’ve said it numerous times that the human voice is an expression of the state of one’s being and the identification of who that person really is…  The voice on its own is a “ tool” for communication and, needless to say, that if that very “tool” is broken, the commun...

When people inquire about their speaking or singing voice restoration, they think only about their voice and nothing else which could be related to the latter.  They do not realize that the voice is an essential part of their anatomy and a very important tool for communication (speaking or singing).  However, there are by far more benefits (in this case) to non-surgical voice repair then just the voice itself. Those regular people (non-singers) who have speech problems, usually come to our studio/clinic completely (by my definition) out-of-balance - Mentally, physically, emotionally and, of course, vocally. They possess a lot of problems and on every conceivable level:   Some have problems with weight - either too skinny or, on the contrary,   with quite excessive body mass. Some of them possess bad habits like smoking, drinking, drug use and other unhealthy addictions. Needless to say, they are not only physically unfit, but, nevertheless, menta...

More and more, I am getting requests to have a video chat ( Skype , FaceTime , WeChat and what have you) with my prospective clients who, on top of it, asking for some tips on how to fix their speaking and singing voices…? ?? + ?? Nevertheless, some of them have pretty serious voice/vocal disorders . One of them very recently told me about his excessive acid reflux , which (almost on the root) ruined his singing voice. --- This is a direct quote from his e-mail: “2 years ago my voice would crack on low notes, and now today I have some good days, but still not 100%   I went last month and had my throat looked at.   He said he seen scared tissue, and 2 pin drop nodules at top and bottom of my vocal cords.   Also he said I had a lot of mucus on my cords.” “I am reaching out for any tips you can help out with on full recovery, retraining the vocal cords to be stable on all notes.” --- So this person (and any other people for that matter) truly ...

Does anybody know…? Does anybody care for that matter…? Vocal Science… The Best or…Nothing.   Quite often, people who require voice repair have some other health problems to start with. These health problems could be a trigger to voice loss, or any kind of voice issues. Sadly enough, our Canadian singer Gord Downie has recently been diagnosed with Terminal Brain Cancer; and peculiarly enough, the tumor is apparently located near the speech center of his brain… I am not a doctor; though it makes me wonder whether or not his not exactly adequate singing (in my subjective professional opinion) and, understandably, a lifestyle of a rocker (which usually comes with the territory), has anything to do with it? This is just speculation on the matter, but it probably has some merit. Let’s also examine a very serious disorder called Spasmodic Dysphonia: I personally call it “Vocal Epilepsy”, as the voice of the sufferer spasms uncontrollably. The disease, in its...

Indeed, should you give up or rather do something which will (at least) improve the quality of your life? What are those untretable, nasty voice disorders ? It definitely is vocal paralysis (paresis) or both vocal cords, the severe forms of spasmodic dysphonia , the severe forms of muscle tension dysphonia , scar tissue on the vocal cords , damaged vocal box and it’s anatomy due to/or during the surgical procedure and many more others . Once, not too long ago, in my office/studio walked in a middle-aged, pretty handsome Asian man with his wife. It was very sad to try to speak with the man, as there was nothing else coming out of his mouth but mooing. I could not understand one word he was trying to say. Then his wife took over the “conversation”. She told us a story that her husband had a cancer of thyroid. Then the doctors first were trying to get rid of the cancer, they conducted a surgical procedure , which had paralyzed one of his vocal cords ( vocal p...