A Voice Apart

This case is about Michael F from the United Kingdom: He suffered from paralyzed vocal cords due to throat cancer. ____________   Michael was diagnosed with throat cancer and, due to that, he had undergone numerous sessions of chemotherapy and well as radiation treatments. In the end, he ended up with one vocal cord fully paralyzed and the other one completely damaged (fully non-functional). His speaking voice was totally unclear and had a very high soprano tone. Obviously, the condition of his vocal cords was beyond repair; however, by employing the Vocal Science™ technique, his voice got rechannelled to a different set of muscles (facial cavities) which allowed him to speak much louder and much clearer. His voice also acquired some bass on the bottom, which was supporting the actual lift off of his vocal box and off of his vocal cords. Clearly, there was a huge improvement, as Michael was taught to employ his facial muscles (natural amplifier/resonato...

For some people, the loss of their voice is equivalent (God forbid) to a plane crash, and evidently... nonetheless!  Obviously, those people would feel lost and confused, as (in most of the cases) they are not even aware of what exactly happened to them and their voice for that matter, and mainly... why? Therefore, and no wonder, those people are desperately looking for answers. Most singers usually can intuitively and predominantly feel that some voice problems may be "coming their way"; but the regular people who have lost their speaking voice, almost literally experience the “crash of their lives”, as their communication with their inner and (needless to say) outer world, had become significantly compromised.  Obviously, in the case of voice loss, the ultimate goal would be the recovery and restoration of the speaking voice and, when needed, the singing voice as well. However, it is easier said than done... If, on top of everything else, the recovery and re...

Lately, for some mysterious reason , I hear more and more from people who used to be able to sing (or even professional singers with voice issues) contemplating to receive the treatment for their voice problems from speech therapists or speech pathologists…? How logical is that? Honestly, to me, it does not make any sense, as none of the above were ever trained how to become a singer or, nevertheless, knowing how to sing and, furthermore, how to treat singers from vocal diseases. Moreover, some of them actually suffer themselves from MTD ( Muscle tension Dysphonia ) or even SD ( Spasmodic Dysphonia ). So their “claim to fame” is that they had (and majority of them still have) such vocal disorders themselves. They brag about it, trying to convince a potential sufferer that they know all about it, since they have been suffering from the same thing…? My question is: if they have been suffering from such disorders described above, how did they get it in the first place...

By the common opinion, they hardly, if at all, can restore a speaking voice, let alone a singing voice. Usually what brings speakers and, moreover, singers in trouble, is overuse and improper use of the voice which could, no doubt, lead to a mechanical problem within one’s vocal anatomy. And thus, the voice, (speaking and or singing), becomes dysfunctional. The Singers especially need to recover their voice mechanics and none of the registered and non-registered speech therapists had been trained to do so.  However, lately, (must be due to the recession), those troubled singers are having wild fantasies of using their (or their spouses’) insurance, trying to appoint a speech therapist to work on their SINGING VOICE!!! Clearly, their upset minds do not allow them to think straight and the only thing they could think of is how to save money, instead of how to spend money wisely to get what they are after - their new healthy and rejuvenated voice and the knowl...

Lately, I’m dealing with a lot of clients (young and old) with the voice/speech problems. Most of them spent months or even years with speech therapists and speech pathologists. Some of them have gone to the regular check-ups with their ENT specialists and (in the final analysis) had not accomplished anything with respect to a resolution to their voice problem(s). How frustrating could that be?  It is extremely sad for them and their relatives, not to mention that the majority of those poor people, understandably, keep coming in and out of depression. Some of them lost their professions and their hobbies for that matter, like singing, for example, or playing some sports. Sometimes even watching some sport or concert events (in their case) could become a big challenge. It is usually quite noisy in those venues, and those with voice problems feel even more silenced as they cannot compete with the screaming crowd. Some of them have lost hope, some of them are still researc...