Are "Good Singers" born or made?

How many times did you heard someone singing with easiness, songs that seems impossible or difficult for you? Why their voice sounds great without so much training? Can you learn to do it? or is it a natural gift?

Natural good singers have the same "physiological equipment" as you do. Although there are various differences that make one voice different from another,  it doesn't mean that one voice is "better" than other. The skill to manage your voice is what makes 99% of the difference between a "natural singer" and other humans beings. 

Think about it in this way: imagine a fantastic piano with the best sound in the world, and you seat different people in it. The people that has spent more time and passion playing and practicing in their lives, will sound obviously better or "natural" than the ones that had barely played a piano in their lives. This last group would make that fantastic piano sound like an unpleasant random arrhythmic noise. It has nothing to do with the piano itself, it's just the way you play it, your skill to manage your fingers on the keys.

So, if everybody has about the same quality in their instrument...then, why some people sounds like stars and others can't hit a pitch?

Well, if you want me to put it as short as possible, I would say: relaxed concentration. If fact, this is the only way to learn anything. Why? because it is the only way to rewire the neurons in your brain, paying attention or "enjoying concentration" while doing anything. And this connections in your brain is what controls the muscles that makes the differences in sounds. That is what manages your singing skills!


The amount of cooperative tension each muscle makes at a determinate pitch, with a determinate sound color, and the spaces you allow to resonate in your body, that is what makes the voice sound "better" for the listener. 


So the natural good singers are just common people that allowed their voices to grow without stress. Most because they were young, with a natural connection with their bodies, and they just let it happen like a game. Maybe this person was 8 years old and repeated a song from the radio, maybe his/her mother said: "very good!". And just the excitement motivated the children to keep on playing this love-rewarded game. If you extend that experience for a couple of years (children learn usually faster!), then you have a "talented children/teenager". These people never thought that singing could be something complicated. They don't understand how it happens, they just do it, they don't understand why others can't sing. The more people tell them "what a great voice", or themselves, the more they get excited about singing more and more. They do it quite relaxed, so their skill is developed automatically by their brains.


Now imagine that the same kid, that tries to imitate something in the radio, is beside someone (like his big brother) that tells him "you sound stupid", or laughs. Maybe he was just singing happy birthday, maybe he was a competitive stressed kid that told himself "I'm doing wrong". An experience like that, can be such impressive in the brain of a kid, that he is scared to sing again. He is afraid of his voice. His brain is blocked, his nervous system is like a drunk man trying to walk. The more he tries, the worst it became. Or in the best case, he don't improve. This kid will grow convinced that he has no talent or "gift" for singing! 

Let's take someone like this kid, that had a wrong starting point. If you believe, after years, that you don't have a good voice, it became a truth in your body. If you believe that "you don't have a good voice", your brain rewires in this way, and this is the experience you will have. 


Now, take this person trying to be a singer. He loves music, and decides to start practicing. If he is practicing from the believe that "his voice is not good", he will try hard, and hard. And 90% of the probabilities is that he will just practice "misaligned singing", recording it deeper and deeper in his neuromuscular system, reinforcing the connection of his neurons for "singing bad". He can get trapped in this vicious circle for a long time. Even for a lifetime, if he doesn't find someone that understand it and helps him.


So let me say it again: YOU CAN SING AS GOOD AS YOU WANT! It is just about rewiring your brain with an effective and effortless way of singing. 


It is not even difficult, you just need to know how, and practice only GOOD FEELING SINGING!


Thanks for your attention, and I wish you more success that you can imagine right now!


Ricard
Vocal Coach