YES, You can sing!

Singer drawing Nerissa Campbell teaches live online voice lessons at Lessonface

Tuesday, February 10th 2015

“I don't sing because I'm happy; I'm happy because I sing.” William James

Hi everyone, and thanks Lessonface for having me over to write a post.

My name is Nerissa Campbell and I am a singer & songwriter and online teacher here at Lessonface. One of the things that inspires me most as a vocalist are my students, who are all at various levels and have a wide array of reasons for why they are learning to sing. Some of them are working on careers as vocalists and songwriters and others come simply because they have always wanted to sing and give themselves an hour each week to learn (and enjoy!).

I wish I could teach the world to sing! (Wait, isn’t that a song?!) ;)

But, I know so many of you really have hang ups about singing – I really wish that it weren’t the case, even though as someone who feels very shy on the inside, I completely understand. It took a lot of courage and telling myself off in the beginning to push away my fears and shyness to get out there and ‘do it’. I hope that more people can overcome their fears and learn to sing, if only to experience the immense joy at being able to use your voice!

I wanted to share my thoughts today on the three things I hear the most when people find out I am a vocal teacher & singer (these usually come in one flurried breath!):

“Do you think anyone can sing?….Because I can’t sing. I wish I could sing, but I can’t, I am always off-key…You have to admit that some people have way more talent than others”

I wanted to break these statements down and give you my honest thoughts on each of them as a vocal coach (and someone who loves singing) in the hopes that you will get these roadblocks out of the way, and start learning!

1. “Do you think anyone can sing?”

Yes.

Wholeheartedly, I do.

Learning to sing is learning to use our voices in a new way. New muscle & vocal coordination takes patience and practice, just the same as learning an instrument or training for a marathon for example (or yoga - after many years of practice I still cannot do a headstand, but one day I will!).

It is sometimes more of a mental hurdle that gets in the way of us thinking we can sing. But, with patience and dedication you can learn the tools to get you singing, and more importantly enjoying your voice!

Singing is the original instrument, the one we all have access to and the one that is often the scariest to learn. We are attached to our voices and it seems a lot of people approach singing much more critically than when learning other new activities. I am not going to lie, it does take time (as with learning anything new), and patience. And understanding that sometimes you are the one getting in the way of yourself! A good teacher should be able to help with all of this, most of us remember what it felt like to ‘start’ and hopefully you can find a teacher who can give you the tools to use your voice in the correct way while also supporting you in any mental hurdles that may come up during your practice.

2. “I wish I could sing, but I can’t. I am always off-key”

The first thing I say to this one is, “Can you hear that you are off-key?”.

If you can (which is probably most of you!), then all you need is a good teacher to work with you to be able to get “on-key”. (I put this in quotes, because I am always pondering what ‘on-key’ is. Learning to sing in India for example is very different to learning to sing in Western tonalities… these are learned things. So I love to approach things more in a way of learning to sing what you hear, to hit the notes YOU are hearing in your head). If you can hear when you are off pitch, then this is a GOOD THING!! It means you are able to recognize pitch, maybe you can’t adjust it just yet, but that can be learned.

We all speak and understand many things in the language of communication that go beyond mere words. The inflections in our voices make us able to understand if someone is asking a question, is angry, loving, sad etc. – a whole myriad of communication is made with sound. If we didn’t have this ability it would be difficult for us to communicate effectively with each other.

I have found that most often the reasons you think you can’t sing boil down to one of the following:

You weren’t accepted into choir/music in school (or were told not to sing as loudly as others)
Someone once told you that you couldn’t sing, or you shouldn’t sing
When you sing, it isn’t as ‘good’ as you think it should be (which is usually in comparison to someone else eg. a professional singer!).

These problems are things you can develop with a vocal coach. As I mentioned before, a good teacher understands both the physical and mental development that goes into being a singer. There are many emotions that are attached to using our voice as our instrument. It is easy to beat yourself up way more over learning to sing than you would learning any other instrument.

3. “You have to admit that people have way more talent than others”

Yes, I admit it. Some people may seem naturally more talented than others. But comparing yourself to others just gets in the way of finding YOUR unique voice.

For some people, singing has always been a part of their lives, be it in school, in church, or within their family of shower singers! Essentially, this is a form of practice that has been developed over many years. Some people may be more ‘naturally’ talented, but singing can definitely be learned.

Others, (I include myself in this group) have worked hard and practiced for many years. I definitely didn’t start with a great voice, but after 20 years of sticking with it (and a good 6 of those saw a lot of struggles) I like my voice. I would still like to be better though, -- I still try to practice on a daily basis and assess my goals as a vocalist regularly.

You can learn to sing, yes, YOU!

And I hope you will take up the challenge! To be able to sing freely is so liberating and therapeutic, whether you want to do it as a profession, or simply to dance around your house, it is the one instrument that will cost you nothing in starting, but give you so much in return!

“In the beginning was the voice. Voice is sounding breath, the audible sign of life.” --Ibid.

Australian-born, New York-based Nerissa Campbell holds a Certificate & Associate Degree of Performing Arts (Jazz Performance & Composition) from the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts. She has released three albums of original music under her own label, Crooked Mouth Music (Paint Me Orange – 2003, Musings of a Telescopic Tree – 2009 & Blue Shadows – 2012). She was recently awarded an Australia Arts Council New Work grant to record her 4th album, Little Little Just, which explores the fusion of jazz & Balinese gamelan. Check out Nerissa's teaching profile, and send her a message or book time with her by clicking here.