How to scream, high in falsetto!

Extreme high falsetto screaming.

In this month’s article I am going to guide and help you developed your extreme screams for hard rock/metal/black metal/screaming, growls, distortion and squeals.

We will be singing extremely high black metal tones (jet engine or pig squeals) distortion through your whole entire falsetto range and how to do it safely, pain free, with proper technique and to still have a voice left when you finish a show, song or rehearsal.

In last months article we spoke exclusively about distortion in true voice. In this months article we’re going to talk exclusively regarding screaming/singing in higher register of the voice (falsetto).

This is a very popular form of singing in the harder genres of music e.g. Dream on Dreamer, I Killed the Prom Queen, House v hurricane, Airbourne.

1. Body stretching and limbering.

Before you start any singing it is a good idea to stretch and limber your body. But especially extreme forms of singing were you are going to be using your whole body as instrument and you’re going to need a lot more energy and diaphragmatic support to project and get the desired sounds without hurting your voice.

I recommend some light stretching of all of the major muscles in your body then some jumping jacks, jogging on the spot or shadowboxing to get your heart rate and energy level up.

2. Posture when singing.

Your posture is also very important when singing. Keeping your upper  torso and spine relatively straight when singing is important. Singers use different acoustics, resonation chambers and resonance, similar to a piano or guitar. If you bend the spine of a guitar or grand piano it will alter the sound and go out of tune. This is also be similar to you as a singer. So try to keep your spine relaxed but straight.

I know that it is also very common to see hard-core singers bending over to get higher or harder notes. I am not disagreeing with this at all! To be honest with you I actually promote and teach it with one slight variation. The one variation is that when you are going for a huge note or scream, you should bend at the hips so that your diaphragm contracts and supports laterally. You should not be bending at the shoulders or upper torso area.

3.Warm up and cooling down for screamers

I cannot stress highly enough how important it is to warm up and cool down properly in all genres of singing but especially extreme forms of singing as we’re covering here.

For screamers you should be warming up the fall range of your voice. Though especially focus on warming up the registers of your voice that you are using more of in your performance.

So for the extreme higher singers you should be starting off doing some light humming all the way through your range, then a falsetto major fifth scales on the ee vowel sound too warm the higher range. Then I would be doing some light Seagull or Fry in the top range, doing these on single notes or a major 5th descending scale.

When your voice feels properly warmed up, proceed with your normal singing routine.

4.Correct diaphragmatic breathing.

It is vitally important to breath into your diaphragm or stomach area with all the extreme forms of singing. As this is where your power, projection, support, control and stamina will all come from. Not from your throat. Put your hand on the upper part of your stomach in V of your ribs. As you inhale a breath, try to and get your hand and stomach to move out as you fill your diaphragm up with air. If you have mastered this, this is called a diaphragmatic breath. As you are singing higher and louder your stomach needs to tighten up to support all of the notes to insure that you are not going to damage your vocal chords. Always expel air through the vocal chords, do not inhale.

5.Microphone technique and vocal effects

It will greatly aid the distortion of your sound if you can cup the ball of the microphone in the palm of your hand when doing any higher screaming. Always put your lips as close to the microphone as you possibly can and hold the microphone horizontal.

If you are touring for an extensive amount of time or doing a big number of gigs in a row you can also look into vocal effects or a voice processes to help your voice out and get the desired tone night after night. Lexicon and Digitech have some fantastic products.

6. How to do it!

After doing all of the above from 1 to 5 you want to start off trying to sing one single note in you’re clean falsetto voice. I like to start off with the words blah, whah or are.

Now you are going to have to start to use a lot of physical energy (get pumped up) and diaphragmatic support.

We now want to try to lower the falsetto sound onto the vocal chords and raise your volume. This sound is traditionally called a fry. Simply, I want you to try to get an aggressive seagull or an aggressive large cat sound in falsetto. You can also altar your sound by dropping it lower or raising it higher on the vocal chords and also lowering or raising the volume.

Once you have experimented with some different vocal placements and volumes, try different words, mouth placements and pitch. This should not be hurting your voice, though you should be expelling a lot of physical energy. This genre of singing cannot and should not be done with out a lot energy and focus.

Once you have experimented with of the above try to sing complete phrases.

I must warn that this is not an easy genre to do correctly, safely and for a long periods of time with out the right techniques. Though with the right technique and support this genre is actually very safe.

I wish you all much enjoyment with your singing and a fantastic 2014

Peter Vox