Deanna Hoak

My very first project back from LaunchPad, I got to query whether the effects of precession were missing from a discussion of the causes of interstadial periods, which made me very happy. Picking up knowledge like that is the reason I went!

The group they’d chosen for LaunchPad this year, though, was the best thing about the entire experience, to my mind. Mike Brotherton and Jim Verley did a fantastic job of pulling together a variety of skills and personalities–instructors and attendees–in that workshop. I enjoyed the company of the others enormously and learned things from them I didn’t expect to.

One of my favorite conversations during the workshop, for instance, was with Mary Robinette Kowal and Andrea Hairston. I mentioned that although I love to sing and do so all the time, without even meaning to, I am a bit self-conscious because I know I have a very “pretty” voice that doesn’t fit all musical styles well. I mean…listen: [audio:mountainmp3.mp3]
I was telling JJA at WorldCon that I won’t listen to heavy metal at all because I’ll sing even to it, and it comes out as silly as that cover Jonathan Coulton did of “Baby Got Back” (which is awesome, but mine’s not intentional ;-)).

My voice is all well and good for folk music, but I really do sing habitually, to absolutely everything playing. One of my very favorite songs in the world, for instance, is Hinder’s “Lips of an Angel.” Since I know I walk around singing it all the time, I’d tried recording a snippet of it a few months ago just to see what I sounded like. It’s…well…[audio:hindermp3.mp3].
It isn’t that it’s bad (I hope, as I’m posting it!), but it certainly doesn’t sound anything like them.

I asked Andrea and Mary whether it was possible to train oneself to sing in a different way, for different styles of music, and they told me that the folk music voice is a “head” voice, while the kind of singing I often want is a “chest” voice. (We talked about throat voices, too, but that sounds painful–don’t think I’ll go there.) I’ve been trying that type of singing since I got back from LaunchPad (just around the house, I mean–I haven’t ever tried being in a group or even doing karaoke or anything), and I think I’m making progress! I tried seeing how I sounded on an oldie I’ve been singing a lot lately, and while it doesn’t come out as “pretty” as the head voice, it doesn’t sound quite like folk music, either, so I think I must be making headway: timetoflymp3[audio:timetoflymp3.mp3] (It’s a capella, I don’t have the patience to record it a jillion times, and I don’t know how to edit audio files, so be tolerant. ;-))

This new skill should be a relief to the folks who have to listen to me sing to the radio all the time, though. ;-)

So while this certainly wasn’t something I expected to learn at LaunchPad, it is something that the group composition allowed me to pick up and that I’m very happy about.