Dear Lis,
My registers don’t connect very well. There’s a big break when I pop over from one to the other. What can I do to smooth out the connection between the two.
Greg
Dear Greg,
Here is an exercise called the waterfall.
For women
For men
Starting in your upper register, called head voice, sing the vowel ‘oo’, as in ‘too’, and slide down across your break into your lower voice, called chest voice. Try to make it slow and even, keeping the volume the same all the way down. At first you might feel the break. As you work on it, it will start to smooth out, especially if you go slowly over the range where you’re going to be switching voices. Try to fill in the notes that you might be jumping over. Then try reversing it, going from the bottom of your range in chest voice and crossing into your head voice. Don’t try to push your chest voice as high as you can. The goal is to make the transition into your head voice smooth. That will mean getting a little lighter as you go higher.
Lis Lewis is a voice teacher and performance coach in Los Angeles, CA. She has been training recording artists for over 30 years. Learn more about her private voice lessons. She has also coached celebrities including: Miguel, Rihanna, Iggy Azalea, Bryson Tiller, Demi Lovato, and more. Lis is also the author of the books, “The Singers First Aid Kit” and “The Pop Singers Warm-Up Kit” both published by Hal Leonard.