Here are 10 facts about the voice, from its uniqueness to the fact that singing can even improve your health!
1. Your voice: as unique as your fingerprint
No two voices sound the same. Every voice is one of a kind. Our voice is our acoustic fingerprint, our personal trademark. It shapes our identity and is our direct connection to the world. The voice is a highly complex instrument that reveals a great deal about the speaker: attractiveness, age, emotional state, and personality. It is no wonder, then, that the police use voice analysis to help identify suspects.
2. You don’t need any equipment to sing
The voice is the only instrument you always have with you, and singing is completely free. You train your voice all day long simply by speaking, breathing, and moving. Singing or practising is possible anytime and anywhere. And every “vocal instrument” is a limited, exclusive, one of a kind creation. Here are a few more interesting facts in brief:
Origin: around 150,000 years ago
Unique feature: no two people have exactly the same voice
Vocal range: about 2.5 to 3 octaves when trained, up to 4 octaves in total
Voice types: bass, baritone, tenor, countertenor, alto, mezzo soprano, soprano
Overall frequency range: roughly 80 to 16,000 Hz
Family: a truly unique “instrument”
3. The voice, a multi-talented tool for speech and music
The voice can do both: speak and sing. It is both a means of communication and a genuine musical instrument. This is quite logical, as speech and singing are produced in the same place using the same mechanisms. They involve the diaphragm and breathing muscles, the lungs, the larynx and vocal cords, the throat, mouth and nasal cavities, as well as the nervous system and musculature, especially in the upper body.
Singing is essentially nothing more than extended speech. Try it yourself: move gradually from speaking into singing. You will notice that the length of the sounds in words increases, while the pauses between words begin to disappear.
4. The voice never sounds the same
Mood, daily condition and health all affect our voice. That is why people can often sing better in the evening, as the voice and the whole body have already been active throughout the day. Your mood influences how you engage your vocal and speech muscles, more when you are in a good mood, less when you are feeling down, tired or sad. This has a direct impact on the sound of your voice.
5. The voice can be trained like in sport
Singing is like doing sport, and many aspects can be compared. After all, muscles are muscles. The voice needs a warm up, must be trained to maintain full performance or extend its limits, and just as stretching comes at the end of a workout, cool down exercises are important for the voice after a concert.
6. Records of the voice
Untrained people typically have a vocal range of about two octaves. Tim Storms, a classically trained bass singer, holds the world record for vocal range, an astonishing ten octaves. His lowest notes are so deep that we can feel them rather than hear them. Singers Rossana Monti and Georgia Brown can sing the highest note, reaching a G10, the pitch of a piccolo flute.
7. Our voice makes us recognisable
We often recognise loved ones from the very first word and can pick up their mood within a fraction of a second from the sound of their voice. It is quite difficult to hide emotions in your voice. The ear detects the subtlest differences in tone and volume. We all know the situation: a friend calls, and you immediately ask, “What’s wrong?”
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8. Our voice affects others
Our ears do not just detect fine differences when hearing a voice. They pass this vocal information on to the body, and our muscles then imitate what we hear. In this way, we quite literally feel the state of the person speaking to us. That is why a deep, calm voice creates trust, while a high, shrill voice tends to cause stress.
Conversely, you can positively influence how others perceive you and how you handle situations by breathing calmly, speaking from the diaphragm, and letting your voice resonate in your body so that it develops a full and warm tone. Studies have shown that sound matters more than the actual words. We perceive only about 7 percent of what is said through the words themselves, and the rest through the sound of the voice.
9. The voice: a firework of emotions
The voice is often called the window to the soul. Through it, we express every emotion we can feel, such as joy, longing, strength, anger, fear, despair and euphoria. These emotions, and many more, are all contained within our voice. Through the voice, they reach others in the most direct way, whether they are being addressed or simply within earshot. Emotions are the superpower of every singer.
10. Singing affects our health
Singing is extremely beneficial for the whole body. The immune system benefits because endorphins are released. Improved breathing floods the body with oxygen, and deeper breathing reduces stress. The muscles get a proper workout, as we use more than 100 of them when singing. And best of all, singing strengthens memory.
Tip: ‘What our voice reveals about us’ by Quarks on YouTube – take a look:
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Your feedback: Voice – 10 facts
What do you do with your voice? Do you sing? Do you use vocal colours deliberately when speaking? Let us know in a comment!
This article is an adaptation of a piece originally written by Catharina Boutari, who is credited as the author of the original German t.blog article
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