We just received another cool review for our Ken Tamplin Vocal Academy singing lessons, check it out:

“There are many ways to skin a cat.  If you actually really want to skin a cat, however, a logical person would find someone who KNOWS HOW TO SKIN A CAT!

Other than Ken Tamplin, I have been unable to find a REAL professional vocal instructor who has a voice that is capable of powerful rock/hard-rock/metal singing.  Beware of anyone who doesn’t SHOW YOU that he or she can sing well.

For what I do, the “speech level method” has proven to be horsesh*t.  Ken’s techniques really work!”

Matt Aub/TimeLord (Shrapnel Records)
www.myspace.com/timelordband
www.youtube.com/user/TimeLordGuitar

Ken Tamplin:

Much like learning another language, you will need to “re-learn” various vowel sounds etc.  I have many clients from other countries like China, Germany, Greece, Argentina, Sweden, Finland and even Russia where I coach them via web cam lessons to overcome this.

I purchased the Divas Bundle but was blessed when Ken graced my husband out with the Dudes Bundle, as well.  I am so very pleased with the results thus far.

My vocal cords were injured a year ago so I have been faithful everyday to spend at least two hours working on the exercises.  I have much to learn about my “new voice” though and must say I have to stay disciplined in my mentality to not get overwhelmed, disappointed or saddened by so many vocal losses.   What use to be very natural must be learned now.  Anyways, I wanted to know if the Licks and Tricks would teach me to “learn vocal runs” (not quite sure how to say it?).   Not just prefabricated runs that Ken has heard and likes to include into his songs, but the actual mechanics of it.  It used to be natural for me to mimic them, however it seems as though what my ear hears my vocal cords can’t freely do now. Needless to say, it is like starting from scratch vocally. I hope my question made sense.

Thanks for your time. Christina (Kiki ~)

KTVA:

Hi Kiki,

That is precisely what Ken has done with Lick & Tricks, it’s both.

It’s to give the nuts and bolts of how to construct your own personalized soulful (runs).

However, when learning any free form or ad lib improvisation, you also need a foundation of a stable of chops; or “vocabulary” of licks with which to start from.

Licks & Tricks is both. A stable of licks you can connect, and ones you will probably want to learn to include in your stable.

Kinda like painting. Ken teaches you about the colors, the shading, the lighting the dimension. Walks you through a few paitnings and then turns you loose!

I hope that answers your question.

Rob

fairump2003

I really felt the desire to stop by and shout a quick hello to you and thank you for such great and powerful lessons. I ordered the entire course back in August. There were a few ups and downs the first couple of months. But I am AMAZED at what has happened in the last month. I am a high bari like yourself. But my chest is finally
crawling into the upper register. WOW. I am doing things I never though possible using just Stage 2! Stage 3 awaits me in the next week. You are the real deal!

jnote37

Before I do that, there’s a few questions I wanted to ask:

1. I know that you teach vowel modification as part of your
technique, but what about the closed vowels (uuu and eee). How do you
teach those? It’s important because I would not want to modify eee to
ehh, for example.

2. What is your view on bridging? I know that some advocate for
low head tones and bridging early, yet, by the sound of it, you’re
carrying chest up quite high.

Thanks in advance,
Vlad”

Ken Tamplin:

Hi Vlad,

1) Closed vowels (uuu and eee) are part of the modifications.  On (uuu) you must first start with an open thoat oo (like the word look) and close that sound to uuu keeping an open ball sensation in the back of the throat but not compromising the vowel sound to uuu othwrewise, you lock the larynx down and over stress the thoat (especially if you are singing heavy). EEE, is a different animal.  It still is open throat but does not rely on the “(ah)” vowel (like law) in the same way. The A vowel becomes your platform for this. This does not mean that phony weird sound people make when they sing oo (like look) when people want to hear a real oo (like who) or when people sing eh on a word like “feel” and instead sing “fail”. People want to hear the real vowel. There is a way to do both, but safely. To sing a spot on ee vowel is a killer and must have an eh platform but be quickly transformed back ino the “real” ee while holding the eh feeling in the throat but using mask technique. This is how it is accomplished Again, not a phony eh sound when people want to hear ee.

What is your view on bridging? I know that some advocate for low head tones and bridging early, yet, by the sound of it, you’re carrying chest up quite high.

2) I have been singing professionally since I was 17 (now 30 years) and I have never sung better. It’s my life long experience (and yes I know the arguments but the proof is in the singing) that in order to stretch the chest voice you MUST bridge later. ESPECIALLY for belting wailing. (there is a safe way to do this) What people aren’t being told about early connection is this: The whole concept of bridging early (and they may not even know this) was an old Bel Canto trick of getting sopranos to have little or no identifiable register break in their lower registers. But they also had no power in their lower register either. A Maestero’s only concern was keeping them singing high and ignoring their lower register because he could care less about the low notes. (this happens in choirs all the time to poor
contraltos. They shove them in the soprano section and KILL their strong mid sections) So now people are teaching Tenors to do this as well, completely wimping out their upper mid registers in the name of the “high high notes.” What’s my point? It means you CAN’T build a heavy belting voice like this. Early bridging was designed to do the exact opposite. Ironically, what people are also not aware of is this: If you train the upper mid voice to connect powerfully (instead of bringing down the head register) it will grow the upper mid voice bridge like mad AND you then can still learn early bridging once this is strenghthened correcly. The irony is that you CAN’T do it the other way around because the upper chest voice won’t sustain it. This is a LOT of information and there is a LOT more to it than that, but that is the very condensed version. I do this by consultation.

I hope that helps with your questions.

KTVA:

My program starts with the basics of great singing and then goes all the way to very advanced. Depending on how much you want to put into it is how much you will get out opf it. and God Bless You Too!

KTVA:

The Gold Bundle includes 3 1 hour web cam lessons, all 3 stages and a certificate of completion of KTVA when you complete the web cams.

Hey ken, your riff blew my mind! considering to ask this for christmas but i have a question, i have been singing since i was about 8, not trained classically or proper techniques but i have been given many lead rolls when it comes to singing in plays etc, do you have to do the stages back to back or can you skip certain stages?

Ken Tamplin:

I wouldn’t recommend skipping any of the stages if you want to understand how the technique works…