Blog 5 – The sounds of laughter and music
In class, we discussed how monkeys and other primates laugh.
Unlike the way humans laugh, speak, and sing, monkeys produce sound on the
inhale rather than the exhale. That is hard to do. The closest I could get to sounding
like a monkey sounded more like I was creating sound effects for an under-budget
children’s cartoon.
As a singer, the human voice has fascinated me for a long time,
and while most people sing and speak while exhaling there are weird techniques
that alter your voice and use muscles in a different way. Turban throat singing
allows you to create two pitches at the same time, but only at the lowest
ranges. Yodeling emphasizes the natural break in one’s voice to create unique
sounds. Freddy Mercury used the muscles around his throat for his sound in
Queen.
If we could speak on the inhale and the exhale in our voice,
we would never have to take a breath while speaking or singing unless we wanted
to. Beyoncé could belt out notes for minutes straight. A dull professor would
never even pause in the middle of a lecture. Your younger sibling might never
shut up at the dinner table. Maybe the breath is necessary, but how interesting
if it wasn’t?
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