Consonants, Ventriloquism, Darci Lynne and Creep

Vocal pedagogue Dr Gillyanne Kayes challenges vocal coach Jeremy Fisher to show how a ventriloquist can sing words clearly.
Using  @Darci Lynne 's excellent Creep video https://youtu.be/KB-390oClpw, Jeremy breaks down the movements needed to sing all the vowels and consonants in the song without moving your lips.
Judge for yourself how well Jeremy does singing the first four lines of the Radiohead song Creep - does he move his lips? Can you follow the instructions and do the same?

All the exercises are in the chapter on Ventriloquism and Mimicry in our book
This Is A Voice - 99 Exercises to Train, Project and Harness the Power of Your Voice https://amzn.to/3uSw66c 

The Vocal Process Learning Lounge, with 16 years of voice training resources (over 600 videos) for less than the price of one singing lesson. Click and scroll down the page for the free previews https://vocal-process-hub.teachable.com/p/the-vocal-technique-learning-lounge

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Transcript

Jeremy: 0:12

This is a voice. A podcast with Dr. Gillyanne Kayes and Jeremy Fisher. This is a voice. Hello and welcome to. Gillyanne: The thistle Too many tongue twisters in the previous one. Hello, and welcome to this is a voice season six episode six.

Gillyanne: 0:34

The podcast where we get Vocal about things, voice.

Jeremy: 0:38

Okay. What are we doing today? Oh, no. Yeah, no, go I've messed this up completely. You don't don't do things.

Gillyanne: 0:43

There's no things!

Jeremy: 0:43

Don't go changing, changing the line, changing the line, right? Okay. Hello and welcome to this is a voice season six episode six.

Gillyanne: 0:53

The podcast where we get Vocal about voice.

Jeremy: 0:56

I'm Jeremy Fisher.

Gillyanne: 0:57

And I'm Dr. Gillyanne Kayes.

Jeremy: 0:58

What are we doing today?

Gillyanne: 0:59

Well, we're doing something unusual. There's been a lot of, uh, talk on our Singing and the Actor Facebook group, about a video of Darci Lynne singing Radiohead's Creep using ventriloquism.

Jeremy: 1:13

Uh, for those of you who don't know, Darci Lynne was very, very successful in American talent show as a young teenage ventriloquist. Extremely good. And she did ventriloquism and singing.

Gillyanne: 1:24

So, of course the conversation has been mind absolutely blown. How is she doing it? And also something very interesting, which is about resonance, which we'll come to later.

Jeremy: 1:35

Yeah. I mean, the reason that we're interested is in 2016, I wrote the chapter of the book, This Is A Voice, on ventriloquism and mimicry. And in fact, um, the, the chapter that you're seeing in the book at the moment is in fact only half what I wrote, because I wrote two entirely separate chapters, one on ventriloquism and one on mimicry. And because we wanted the book to be a certain length, uh, we put both of those chapters together and cut them both in half. So's many more things that I could tell you about ventriloquism, but not today.

Gillyanne: 2:03

And this was one of the chapters, um, those of you who heard one of our earlier podcasts will remember, about Jeremy sort of discussing the contract with the, Wellcome Foundation coming home and saying we're doing the lot. And I went, what? Beatboxing? Ventriloquism? You're off your head!

Jeremy: 2:21

No, I've been, I've been dabbling in ventriloquism since I was about eight.

Gillyanne: 2:25

And do you think that's because of the kind of material that you've often sung because you've sung a lot of patter songs and you really think about how you form words?

Jeremy: 2:35

Um, it was, it was, I think it was the other way around. It was because I got to be moderately good at ventriloquism, moderately good, um, it really helps patter song singing. It really helps strings of words and really fast lyrics where you have to get the sense across. Because in a way, the more you move your articulators, the less fast you can sing. So the more accurate the movements that you can get really small, the quicker you can sing. It's great. It's a really brilliant byproduct. Anyway.

Gillyanne: 3:04

So where can they find these exercises in the book?

Jeremy: 3:07

Is we are gonna start with, um. The whole chapter starts on page 92, Ventriloquism and Mimicry. And in fact, What we're gonna do is to play a little excerpt from Darci Lynne's video. She's sitting in the car, she's singing Creep by Radiohead, and she's trying it out because people don't believe that she can sing without moving her lips. So she sings it once with um, mouth movements and then she sings it again with no mouth movements.

Gillyanne: 3:33

And then she mixes and matches at the end.

Jeremy: 3:35

And then she mixes and matches

Gillyanne: 3:36

very impressive

Jeremy: 3:37

by the syllable, which is really good. And people on the Facebook group were saying, well, what's she doing? What's she doing? And I'm thinking, well, she's doing actually exercises 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36. That, I mean, she's doing pretty much everything that's in the book and it's so, well, frankly, it's so gratifying to see somebody at that level, with that skill, doing exactly what I'm talking about in the book.

Gillyanne: 4:02

So we're using it as an exemplar of how to put it into practice. And I'm gonna challenge Jeremy to try one or two phrases.

Jeremy: 4:09

It's gonna be really interesting. This is one of the, the few episodes that we say it's really good to watch it on YouTube, because you will be able to see whether my lips move or not. Mm-hmm um, we're just gonna play a little bit of Darci's singing. When she's singing the, the opening lines of Creep without moving her lips, just so that we have something to, to go with.

Gillyanne: 4:29

And this is a car video. So you're going to hear background noise. Yes. It's not us.

Jeremy: 4:34

And obviously we'll drop the link to the video, into the show notes so you can see it yourself.

Darci: 4:38

When you were here before, couldn't look you in the eyes. You're just like an angel, your skin makes me cry.

Jeremy: 5:04

That'll do nicely.

Gillyanne: 5:05

So Jeremy, the first thing I want to ask you is which mouth position is Darci using?

Jeremy: 5:12

Okay, this is exercise 31 and it's almost the most important thing to start with as a ventriloquist is, you're not allowed to move your lips. You can't be seen to move your lips. But you can put your mouth into three separate shapes. And basically the first one is very neutral, not open very much, but very relaxed. The second one is the same thing, but smiling lips. And the third one is called the shock view. Which is when you are horrified by what your puppet has just said. And so the mouth is, the jaw's more open the mouth's a bit more open. Um, and the thing that I do say in the exercise is if you're gonna do the shock view, which is. Then you can't do it face onto the audience because the audience, because your jaw is more open, the audience will see your tongue movements. So the shock look, watch this in the ventriloquists that you watch on television, the shock look tends to be done to the side, to, to your puppet so that the, the audience never sees a face-on shock movement. So, so she's doing relaxed.

Gillyanne: 6:12

She's doing relaxed. Yes. It's a sort of, for me, it's like, if I'm I'm looking at myself doing it.

Jeremy: 6:21

It's almost the gormless look, but it's a very, it's quite a narrow gormless look, it's just this sort of, uh,

Gillyanne: 6:28

it's thinking face with my mouth open

Jeremy: 6:30

thinking face with your mouth open.

Gillyanne: 6:31

Is how I'd describe it.

Jeremy: 6:32

I like it. Yes. Yeah. Um, so the lyrics are when you were here before couldn't look you in the eye, you're just like an angel. Your skin makes me cry. And just listening to her, there are a couple of places where she makes a face and I can tell you exactly why she makes the face because she has Bs and Ms. Um, and I think that's in that's it.

Gillyanne: 6:58

Which are bilabial.

Jeremy: 6:59

Well, the M is both of them are bilabial so you use both lips and your lips are supposed to close, and that's how you create the consonant.

Gillyanne: 7:05

Mm-hmm.

Jeremy: 7:06

Now obviously as a ventriloquist, you can't close your lips, so you have to replace it with a completely different consonant. And in fact, with, uh, before. There is a bilabial, which is the B stopped voiced consonant. And then there's an F, which is an unvoiced labiodental. So you've got bottom lip, top teeth. And again, you can't do that because in order to do it, you would have to move your lip up to your teeth or your teeth down to your lip and we, the audience, would see it. So you have to replace the Bs, the Fs, and the Ms with different consonants. Yeah, essentially, you have to fake it. So we're gonna tell you what it is that you do. Um, okay.

Gillyanne: 7:48

Are you up for having a go and then I'll ask you what you did.

Jeremy: 7:52

Sure.

Gillyanne: 7:52

And I think that might be quite interesting for the listeners. Lemme, remember viewing this is gonna be the best experience.

Jeremy: 7:58

Let me sing it without, uh, without doing the ventriloquism lip thing. Uh, and then with. When you were here before. couldn't look you in the eye, you're just like an angel. Your skin makes me cry. Okay. So that was without, I'm not moving that much, but you can see the movements. Mm-hmm right. When you were here before. Oh, Couldn't look you in the eye. You're just like an angel. Your skin makes me cry. I was trying actually, actually, weirdly I was trying to move my head just to demonstrate that I hadn't actually frozen the video.

Gillyanne: 9:01

I was very impressed, very impressed.

Jeremy: 9:04

So there are really only four words that are tricky in those four lines. Um, that is three words. Isn't it? Right. So opening line when you were here before, before is the hard word, everything else, when you, when you are here, when you are here, the w of when.

Gillyanne: 9:23

Yeah. We usually lip round a bit for the when.

Jeremy: 9:25

Absolutely. We usually lip round, it is a, again, it's a bilabial consonant, but the lips stay open. So you have to replace the w with a double O inside. Oh. Or, or a dark ear. Yeah. An

Gillyanne: 9:39

UR, an ur-ish or.

Jeremy: 9:41

oo-en, oo-en, oo-en, oo-en, oo-en, ooo-en. So you can do that easily. You can do that without moving the lip at all, lips or jaw in fact, When you were here before. So before the B is replaced with it's a T sound, but it's closer to an Italian D so if you do a th the, the, the, the. You don't want your tongue to come between your teeth, because again, it'll be seen, so you press the tongue tip very, very slightly against the upper teeth. The, the, the,

Gillyanne: 10:24

so it's like it's in the position of a D yeah, but it's fricated.

Jeremy: 10:29

Yes. The the, the, and there is a stop if you put the stop in the, the, it is sort of closer to a D, but I still think of it as a th if he or you and the F is a blast of air. On a th again, this is an unvoiced th but it's a very, very loose th. Do it again. In context, when you, when you, when you were here before. I am actually doing th without the tongue coming through the teeth. When you were here before. and just about get away with it. Couldn't couldn't look you in the eye. You can do, that's all done inside.

Gillyanne: 11:27

That's all happens inside.

Jeremy: 11:28

Really, really easy. You're just, you are just like an angel. Weirdly, there's a difficulty on just.

Gillyanne: 11:40

You're just saying just.

Jeremy: 11:41

I'm just saying no, I'm actually doing just.

Gillyanne: 11:44

Okay.

Jeremy: 11:44

But because you go from the J to the U, there is a temptation to open the jaw and you see it. And oddly enough, the blast of air on the St also encourages you to open very slightly. You really have to control the jaw. You are just like an angel, uh, And you can hear, I can make the rest of the consonants really clearly.

Gillyanne: 12:10

And can I just say how impressed I am with the amount of resonance you are producing?

Jeremy: 12:15

Yes. Nice. I like it.

Gillyanne: 12:16

It's phenomenal, which was another thing that was discussed in the group. Yeah. And you know, we're always saying to people that all of the work of, um, singing voice and speaking voice in fact is done inside. Yes, we do far too much work outside.

Jeremy: 12:32

Yes. Okay, final line. Your skin, your, your skin makes me cry. Your skin makes me cry, makes me cry, makes me. Now, if you really listen carefully, I'm doing nakes ne, but it isn't a proper N it's not an N as I would normally do it. Tongue is slightly further forward. There's slightly looser pressure. So the stop, if you like, is closer to the lips, even though it's still behind the teeth.

Gillyanne: 13:05

Do you know what I think this is very interesting. Um, and it's one of the ways that, um, ventriloquism, it's one of the reasons why vent rilikism.

Jeremy: 13:15

Morning!

Gillyanne: 13:16

Ventriloquism works, which is that we hear words in context. Yes. Now, when I listen to you do line by line, I'm kind of much more critical and I nitpick a bit more. Yeah. But when I hear you sing the whole phrase, You know, um, the four lines I'm completely convinced. Yeah. So I would like you to, um, sing the first four lines again.

Jeremy: 13:43

Yep. Okay. When you were here before couldn't look you in the eye you're just like an angel your skin makes me cry.

Gillyanne: 14:14

That was fun. And Darci Lynne, you are a master.

Jeremy: 14:23

Oh, Darci Lynne is

Gillyanne: 14:24

of the art.

Jeremy: 14:24

Amazing. So, I mean, if you are at, I always say to people, I bet when you buy the book, uh, This Is A Voice, you don't read the ventriloquism and mimicry chapter because you think it's an absolutely not relevant for me. It is,

Gillyanne: 14:38

I'm a singer!

Jeremy: 14:38

It is a phenomenal use of consonants, phenomenal use of consonants.

Gillyanne: 14:44

And vowels.

Jeremy: 14:44

And vowels as well. The fact that you have to create all of those vowels without moving your jaw or lips at all is phenomenal. It tells me that all vowels and consonants can be, bar a handful, can be made just with the tongue. Uh, obviously there are the bilabials you can't do. Um, there's an, there is one vowel that is slightly harder than the others because you feel like you need a bit more space. But everything. I mean, you just heard me do four lines of text. Mm. Um, and obviously the other thing is the last time I did it, I took a lot of the volume away because I don't wanna work that hard. You know, I have a microphone up my nostril, so why would I bother?

Gillyanne: 15:27

And also, um, I noticed that there's a kind of a cue isn't there, if, um, in other words, a listening cue, which is if you get to the end of a phrase and there's a sort of, um, a release of breath, even if we don't see anything move as Watchers, we will map that as a cue that somebody was using their voice.

Jeremy: 15:49

I'm gonna encourage people to just stare into the mirror at their mouths and sing those four lines. It is so revealing. Okay. I'm off to practice. Yeah. Good. That's it. Um, more next time. Bye.

Gillyanne: 16:02

Bye bye.

Jeremy: 16:15

This is a voice, a podcast with Dr. Gillyanne Kayes and Jeremy