My voice - going in the right direction?

[Maja.V]

Hellow everyone,

I've been sort of fiddling with my voice lately, trying to find a range that would be passable. I'd appreciate it if you could leave a critique of it, what I should improve on, etc.

I know it's short - I just had no idea what to say, really. Keep in mind I've just started practicing it (like two weeks ago), so I have yet to fully develop it. I'd just like to know if I'm going in the right direction, because I truly can't tell.

I've also spoken in my male voice for comparison, so don't be alarmed.



Thank you!

P.S. Sorry for the dumb accent.

[MacKenzie]

  Buy a tuner or DL a free web tuner and practice with it. Typical female voice is around 220 Hz so try and get between 170-190 Hz and then once you're comfortable talking in that range try and take it a little further. I think the breaking point between male & female voices is like 165 Hz.

  I highly recommend Kathie Perez for voice lessons, she is worth the money.

[Maja.V]

Thanks for the advice, I thought the average female voice was much lower than that.

As far as Kathe Perez goes, her course is really expensive, so I'll first try getting it on my own and if I fail, I'll do the 2-month (or so) thing she has going.

[luna nyan]

A good start.  The pitch is a fraction on the low side, but that's safe to begin with.  As you get more practice in you should be able to pitch up higher.

One thing to watch for is when you pitch down for inflections in sentences, as you pitch down you are tending to allow the sound to come from the chest.

[Maja.V]

Thank you for the encouraging post, Luna. I'll work on raising my pitch gradually and keeping my chest voice locked out.

[Sybil]

MacKenzie:

Is Kathe Perez an actual trainer you interact with or a set of CDs? I looked over her website and I think I could do with some lessons in the technical aspects of voice. I've managed a very convincing one, but I feel like it's so unstable. I recently lost it for a bit. I need to find a consistent way to control the level I feel comfortable with.

I'd be much more comfortable with CDs. I don't really want to interact with someone.

Edit: After finding the right part of the website, I found it's only CDs/MP3s. I feel so dumb some times, haha! Thank you for mentioning her in this thread, MacKenzie. I'm going to look into this.

Edit #2: Or maybe not? Ugh. I found another source that says it involves one-on-one phone sessions. Do you think you could clarify this for me, please?

Maja.V:

I think your voice is great. I feel most of the people who hear you on the phone, for example, would just peg you as being female. Although, if someone knew about you being transgendered, and was therefore LOOKING for holes in your voice, they might find some here and there.

In other words, if you stopped now and went through life with that voice, I think you'd do well. If you feel you can improve upon it further and would like to do so, I think you should. I don't know technical terms very well so I can't provide you with that sort of information, but to give you my very primitive opinion: I think your voice is a little too muddled. It may help to make it crisper or cleaner, smaller; someone else above mentioned avoiding speaking from your chest. If you try to make your voice very small and try to keep the bulk of it in your mouth, I think it may help you. I hope this was helpful, and I think you're doing a great job - I wish you the best!

[Maja.V]

Thank you very much for your input, Sybil, I appreciate the comments. I've around 5 months before going out en femmé for the first time, so I'll definitely nail it down until then. I'll work on what you pointed out, speaking clearer and control the voice from slipping down to my chest.

Kathe Perez is an actual voice trainer, she has this course thing that runs for 120 days:

http://www.exceptionalvoice.com/120daychallenge.html

I'm not sure if it's worth the money, though, because 750$ is truly a lot.

[Sybil]

Yeah, I really don't have that kind of spare money, either. I'd really like to just find something that explains the technical terms and aspects of voice a bit better. I think I can do the rest on my own.

If her 3 MP3s provide this, then I could manage the money for that. I'd like to know beforehand, though.

[Maja.V]

I ordered her MP3's but I don't know. They didn't help me out at all. I just took CandiFLA's suggestion to heart (reading out loud in the highest pitch you can manage to put out), and it worked for me. I just lowered the pitch of my voice and  it came out as you heard it.

First Candi's clip:

I'd also suggest getting a voice recorder application for your smartphone (if you have one), or getting a cheap microphone and free recording software for your computer. Or even a tape recorder would work, and just try out different voices. Read out random stuff in every voice you can manage, and you're bound to find it eventually. The recording is key, though, because you hear yourself differently than it actually is.

[Sybil]

I do have a microphone and recording software, that's the majority of what I used. I'm actually relatively happy with my voice, but I lose it some times. I just can't get my throat to cooperate for some spells, and it bothers me. The voice I have that I'm happy with passes marvelously on the phone and allows me to be completely natural (laughing, yelling, coughing, etc.)

I think the reason this happens is because I don't know enough about the finer points of voice.

As for CandiFLA, I know about her but I've never really followed her because I don't personally want to aim for the type of voice she has. I find it a bit stiff and unnatural.

[Maja.V]

Ah, alright. Seems like you've far more experience on it.

[Sybil]

I don't know enough. x.x

Since you do have the MP3s, though, could you please tell me: do they really go in depth into the "fundamentals of voice" and how they relate to transwomen? For example, on this webpage: http://www.exceptionalvoice.com/voicefeminization.html

Especially where respiration, phonation, resonance, articulation, and prosody are mentioned. I'd like to know if these are covered in great detail and, again, related to how the voice of transwomen develops. I'm really sorry to bug you about this so much, but money is pretty tight for me too and I'd prefer not to spend blindly.

[Maja.V]

PM'd.

[Tristan]

i did her course. i finished just before my FFS. it really helped out

[A]

I think you have a good start, Maja.V, but as you'd expect after only two weeks, it's not quite there yet. Personally, the trainers' tips and CandiFLA and all didn't help a whole lot; what did was singing. Singing, like, a lot. I truly improved when I started to try imitating singers that I felt sounded very female; their intonations; their little "voice breaks" that sound cute; etc. Hearing and imitating is just so helping. At some point, it "clicked", and I sort of understood more and more key points.

[Stephe]

http://www.exceptionalvoice.com/120daychallenge.html

I'm not sure if it's worth the money, though, because 750$ is truly a lot.

You can spend that on a blood test panel for HRT or barely touch the surface of electrolysis and your voice will get you clocked 100X faster than either of those will help.

Not being hostile but if you think spending $750 to get a serious head start on a passable voice isn't worth it, you likely will never make it to living full time. Being a woman is REALLY expensive. At least being an attractive one is.

I'm still blown away how people refuse to spend money on their voice when it is likely THE most important thing to your self confidence, which in turn = passing. You can look questionable, but if you open your mouth and sound 100% female, you pass.

[Maja.V]

You can spend that on a blood test panel for HRT or barely touch the surface of electrolysis and your voice will get you clocked 100X faster... etc.

Stephe, I know you've a whole advocacy for voice thing going on, but please point out the post where have I written that voice is not important?

I know and am aware of the fact that voice is important, and you could probably understand why if you bothered to read the whole thread, since I was asking for tips and advice on how to, and what to improve. In fact, I think that voice is one of the key aspects to transition.
But you're assuming from my quoted post, that I somehow think it's not important because I'm not willing to hand out $750 (which, again, is not a small amount by any means) for a course which may or may not help finding / improving one's voice. I didn't say the course wasn't worth the money, I said "I'm not sure", which is a big difference, I'd think. Given the lack of reviews, I think it's rational not to just plunge into it.

Because I'm not willing to spend $750 on an unproven / unreviewed course will make me unpassable and unwomanly? I would think that you must be joking.

Anyway, let's not derail this thread further.

Thank you for the comment, A. I actually sing to songs with female singers very often (pretty much daily - especially Adele <3) and I think I may have improved my voice slightly over the course of it. I also noticed that CandiFLA's suggestion (saying / reading stuff in Falsetto) doesn't really help me, or at least I didn't seem to notice any effect except for having a sore throat.

[Stephe]

Because I'm not willing to spend $750 on an unproven / unreviewed course will make me unpassable and unwomanly? I would think that you must be joking.

*sigh* It doesn't appear you looked through the voice therapy posts here before you posted this-Lack of reviews-. And "unproven?"

https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,102416.msg762907.html#msg762907

https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,116502.msg918414.html#msg918414

https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,100261.msg742655.html#msg742655

https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,87471.msg677038.html#msg677038

A google search will pull up more. I have yet to see one bad review of her services. There are countless u-tube video of people who used her and sound great.

No where did I say what's quoted above. I even said "not being hostile" and you jump down my throat twisting what I said.

But again $750 is a tiny drop in the bucket of what transition is going to cost. It seems silly to spend $10,000 on facial hair removal or $25K on FFS but skimp on something that is in reality much more important. I ended up spending 2X what you quoted on voice therapy and it was worth every penny. And I've spent more on laser hair removal than my voice therapy cost.

Plus you can seriously damage your voice doing this wrong. I hope that doesn't happen to you but it can.  Another problem I see with a lot of "self trained" MTF is the first few words don't sound bad but after a minute or two they slide back into a guy sounding voice. That's from using a technique that's too hard to maintain.

I also noticed that CandiFLA's suggestion (saying / reading stuff in Falsetto) doesn't really help me, or at least I didn't seem to notice any effect except for having a sore throat.

http://www.voicemedicine.com/polyp.htm is what you can end up with "practicing" wrong.

[Sybil]

No where did I say what's quoted above. I even said "not being hostile" and you jump down my throat twisting what I said.

I think Maja.V's strongly toned reply to you came from this:

You can spend that on a blood test panel for HRT or barely touch the surface of electrolysis and your voice will get you clocked 100X faster than either of those will help.

Not being hostile but if you think spending $750 to get a serious head start on a passable voice isn't worth it, you likely will never make it to living full time. Being a woman is REALLY expensive. At least being an attractive one is.

I'm still blown away how people refuse to spend money on their voice when it is likely THE most important thing to your self confidence, which in turn = passing. You can look questionable, but if you open your mouth and sound 100% female, you pass.

I personally saw your reply as a bit hostile/aggressive, despite your claim that it was otherwise. While I don't think that, on any level, your reply was meant to be overbearing - in fact, I clearly only get the notion that you're trying to be helpful to her - you did offer advice she didn't really ask for, brought her motives into question, and pre-emptively condescended to her possible feelings (what I highlighted in bold). Her thread was about improving her voice and not as much about her decision making skills. Even if some of her decisions will indirectly influence her voice's quality, those decisions themselves are not the techniques or voice work she's interested in.

I genuinely don't think for a second that you were trying to be anything but helpful, but this is why I think she replied to you the way that she did. I've run into this situation on the forums a few times as well, and it can be very discouraging when trying to express myself. Some times I just want people to talk to me about what I shared, and not try to change my mind on other things that they gather from my questions or experiences. I think Maja.V might be feeling something similar.

[Maja.V]

I personally saw your reply as a bit hostile/aggressive, despite your claim that it was otherwise. While I don't think that, on any level, your reply was meant to be overbearing - in fact, I clearly only get the notion that you're trying to be helpful to her - you did offer advice she didn't really ask for, brought her motives into question, and pre-emptively condescended to her possible feelings (what I highlighted in bold). Her thread was about improving her voice and not as much about her decision making skills. Even if some of her decisions will indirectly influence her voice's quality, those decisions themselves are not the techniques or voice work she's interested in.

I genuinely don't think for a second that you were trying to be anything but helpful, but this is why I think she replied to you the way that she did. I've run into this situation on the forums a few times as well, and it can be very discouraging when trying to express myself. Some times I just want people to talk to me about what I shared, and not try to change my mind on other things that they gather from my questions or experiences. I think Maja.V might be feeling something similar.

Thank you Sybil, I'm just going to quote your post because that's exactly why I  made such a reply. I think nothing more needs to be said, truthfully.