A Voice Apart

The first question you have to ask yourself is: How did you end up with such a nasty diagnosis? You may ask yourself: What have I been doing wrong with respect to my speaking or my singing voice for that matter? Analyzing the above while looking for the answer, you may remember that you had a bad cold or virus… At that time, your voice got quite compromised and it became raspy and hoarse. You, meanwhile, were trying to clear your throat quite hard and pushed and pulled your voice (also quite hard) to make it clearer and louder… By doing all of those things, you no doubt strained your vocal cords , and are now have been experiencing the consequences of such actions. In the end, you ended up with pain in your throat, with an even more raspy and hoarse voice and, in some cases, perhaps with breathing difficulties. By the way, the latter may bring you to the next undesirable diagnosis - you may acquire asthma-like symptoms… God forbid. To get to all of the above, you perhaps u...

Recently, we received a very talented (musically and otherwise) student who has been offered a major record deal in the United States. Three years ago, this singer/songwriter/producer felt that he could no longer reach the high notes, which he could easily reach before. He experienced vocal fatigue and thus could sustain any sound only for a short period of time. He acquired fear and emotional distress, knowing that his singing voice is not working in full capacity as before. He decided to withhold embarking onto the record deal; And rightfully so, as he felt that he could've lost his voice altogether if he continued singing (and speaking for that matter) in the same fashion. Within our introductory/exploratory session, we explained to him that if he does not change the application of his speaking and singing voice, he may actually lose his voice to the point of no return. What could be a bigger fear and frustration for a talented up-and-coming singer then to lose the...

In January 2008, I picked up a phone call from a person who called himself "Orlando". Right away, I was curious to know if that was his real name or, perhaps, a stage name...? Nevertheless, this person assured me that it was his real name and also added that his mother was, in fact, very creative - and thus, gave him such a name. Orlando spoke with me with a quite raspy and hoarse voice and he told me that he just visited an ENT (he called me from Mexico, where he usually spends his winter time) and revealed that, while there, he had been told that he had a one-millimetre nodule  on one of his vocal cords. With that diagnosis, he was suggested immediate vocal surgery. On this note, Orlando placed a call to me - during which he was quite inquisitive (reminded me of a KGB interrogation). Surprisingly enough, with all the desperation, he seemed to be not in a hurry to make a commitment to come to Toronto to attend my course and treatment. He, however, placed another c...

Your voice IS a reflection of the state of your being. Case Study: Professional Artist – R.R (The real name of the artist cannot be disclosed due to the confidentiality code)   A few days ago, we got approached by an artist in his mid 20’s, asking us to help him to get rid of his nasal sound in his voice. He was to prepare for his tour in Europe and wanted to sound and to look his best. When we first met him (just a few days ago) for what we call an “Introductory/Exploratory Session”, he was late 45 minutes to start with, walked in looking and acting half asleep, and stood in front of us with a completely out-of-balance posture and body. It took quite a bit of effort, especially from my side, to bring him to the point from where I could actually work with him and make a difference. He, indeed, sounded quite nasal – speaking and singing. We, however, liked his songs, written in the Hip-Hop style. In fact, a very prominent Hip-Hop artist (name cannot be disclosed) actuall...

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...

Case Study: This story is about Vera D of Barrie Ontario, whose vocal cords got damaged during her open heart surgery… Vera came to us in the year 2015 when she hardly could speak, and mostly was whispering. She told us her story whereas before coming for our non-surgical voice repair services, she had undergone open-heart surgery, after the completion of which, she fell in a life-and-death coma. It took over 45 minutes to revive her. Thank God, luckily for her, she survived the ordeal. But when she woke up, she discovered that she had no voice to speak. It clearly was damaged due to intubation and, perhaps, some other internal surgical procedures related to the main cause. She was told that she would never regain her normal speaking voice ever again. She underwent some very painful and useless tests that revealed that her vocal cord damage was permanent. On this note, she was offered not one, but two vocal operations with absolutely no guarantee that her voice will ever return b...

Dear Reader, We would like to share some excerpts from the email that sometime (in the recent past) reached our office. However, due to privacy considerations, we would have to omit some personal details. This person (whose pictures you see above) was suggested and thus, underwent the vocal operation, as her vocal polyp was actually a serious bleeding one...  For those who suffer from a similar, or even the same voice disorder, we would like these sufferers to think twice before they choose invasive vocal surgery, which in the final analysis, could leave some scar tissue(s), whereas, at that point, it may not appear to be possible to be fixed non-surgically.  In fact, there are a lot of consequences that could be experienced during or after surgical interventions.  We had numerous clients with various voice disorders who came to us after the surgery was performed - and some of them hardly could speak, let alone sing… Please see the aforementioned email belo...