Perceived Abilities

Last fall, I wrote a blog highlighting some of the work of the late Professor Stephen Demorest of Northwestern University. In particular, I discussed his research study that compared the singing accuracy of kindergarteners, sixth graders, and college students. The investigators found there was a significant improvement in students' singing skills from kindergarten to sixth grade, which aligns with the time when most students are getting consistent musical instruction in school. 

From sixth grade to college, however, students regressed in their abilities and were only singing as accurately as the kindergarteners in the study. This aligns with the statistic that, by eighth grade, only 34% of children in the United States are participating in elective music instruction—a number that declines even more by the time students reach high school graduation. 

In other words, singing is a "use it or lose it" skill. When you stop doing it, your skills degrade.  

Another noteworthy Demorest study was published in the Journal of Research in Music Education and was summarized in Northwestern Now. In this study, researchers surveyed more than 300 sixth graders, asking them questions about their family background, their peer influences, their attitudes toward music, and their beliefs about themselves as musicians. Then they analyzed what classes those students signed up for when they later went into junior high. 

Using the information from the survey, researchers were able to predict with reliable accuracy which students would sign up for junior high music classes. Surprisingly, the main indicator for whether or not they continued their musical studies was not how much the students liked music. Instead, it was based on their perceived ability level. As Demorest said, “Children who believe themselves to be musically talented are more inclined to continue to participate in music, and subsequently they get better and better. Conversely, children with a poor musical self-concept were inclined to quit, a decision people often grow to regret as adults.” 

In part two of the study, the researchers measured the singing accuracy of those same students: both those who continued in music classes and those who dropped out. Ironically, they found no significant differences in singing accuracy between the two groups. In other words, the students who chose not to continue with music did not actually have lower abilities than the students who chose to continue. They just thought they had lower abilities, and this perception caused them to quit singing. 

Once again, as Demorest said, “The decisions people make as a child could have lifelong consequences for their relationship with music as an adult. ... This decision seems to be rooted in our mistaken belief that musical ability is a talent rather than a skill.” 

This research seems to highlight a self-fulfilling prophecy: We know that the way to get better at singing is to actually SING and, ideally, to take voice lessons or a singing class. But, if you think you're bad at singing, you won't take singing classes and, therefore, won't progress in your ability to sing, seemingly confirming your belief that you're not good at singing. 

In one sense, this research is encouraging. It reinforces the idea that we can all get better at singing if we keep pursuing it! In another sense, it makes me really sad that so many people decide at such a young age that singing is just something they shouldn't do. It's terrifying to me to think that anyone would lock into long-term life decisions based on what they think they're good at or not good at when they're in elementary or middle school. 

At any rate, the more we understand that singing is a skill that can be developed, the more we can get down to the work of developing and enjoying that skill. 

What skills have you been working on this week? How well have you been sticking to your regular practice sessions? 

Now go practice. 

Silent Singing

Like clockwork, this is the time of year when a lot of people start to get sick. Maybe it's partly because the excitement of the new semester has worn off, and the workload (and lack of sleep) over the last few weeks is starting to catch up. It's natural that your immune systems may start to lower their shields long enough for viruses to sneak in. And illness catches all of us eventually. 

Of course, when we acquire upper respiratory infections that impact the throat, our voices just won't work the same way as when we're healthy. Pushing the voice too hard during these times may risk long-term harm, so we have to be judicious about how much we're vocalizing—this obviously includes doing less singing, but it also means less talking, laughing, and any other activity that involves the voice. We can think of this sort of illness as having a temporary vocal injury. Just like you wouldn't put your full body weight on a sprained ankle, you shouldn't sing full out when your voice is compromised due to illness. And, just like you will gradually be able to put more weight on your ankle as it heals, you will gradually be able to add more vocal activities back into your day as your body and voice recover from the illness. 

This situation does not, however, give you a free pass to skip all of your practice sessions. But it does mean you'll have to make some adjustments. As I list on the syllabus for voice lessons, there are a lot of things you can do that count as practice time that don't require vocalizing (or only involve light vocalizing). This includes speaking through the text of your songs as a poem (softly or silently); speaking through the text of your songs in the musical rhythm; listening to multiple versions of your songs for interpretive ideas; listening to sections of your recorded lessons or class to reinforce musical and technical procedures; highlighting your music to take note of dynamics, tempo changes, and other musical/expressive directions; and, of course, memorizing, memorizing, MEMORIZING!!!

There is another way to practice that won't tax your voice. I call it "silent singing." As we know, singing involves many different systems within the body: lungs, larynx, articulators, etc. Silent singing is essentially going through a practice run of a song the same way you normally do, engaging all of those systems except the vocal folds. You breathe in the same way (and in the same places in the song), you shape your vowels and consonants the same way, you make the same interpretive choices to tell the story with your facial expressions and physical gestures. You just do it without the vocal folds ever coming together to make a sound. You can even do this while playing a recording of the accompaniment of one of your songs, which will help keep the pacing of your silent performance aligned with the music. It's like lip-syncing a song, except you are still engaging the whole body, not just the mouth and face. 

Give silent singing a try if you are sick, if your voice is tired, or if you just want to shake up your practice routine a bit.  

How has your practice been these last couple of weeks? What is your plan for staying on task all the way up to (and hopefully even through) fall break? 

Now go practice.