An Actually Simple Trans MTF Voice Tutorial: The Soft Palate — Transcript

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1. 0:00Are you tired of trans voice tutorials
2. 0:02that require your linguistics degree or
3. 0:04a sound engineering degree to even
4. 0:06understand it? Do you want a trans voice
5. 0:08tutorial that can be comprehended by
6. 0:10literal five-year-olds? Well, here it
7. 0:12is. Learn to change the voice from this
8. 0:15to this. How to trans voice the soft
9. 0:18palate. Let's set sail. Random YouTuber
10. 0:21dressed like a pirate, what is a soft
11. 0:23palate? All right, so you know how like
12. 0:26there's the roof of your mouth, right?
13. 0:28Well, that's your hard palate because
14. 0:30it's well, hard.
15. 0:32But, the soft palate is a little further
16. 0:34in the mouth. It's the part where you
17. 0:35can't feel bone anymore. It's well, you
18. 0:37know, soft. Think of the soft palate as
19. 0:40a door that controls how much air goes
20. 0:42into our nose versus our mouth. Allowing
21. 0:44more air into our nose, generally
22. 0:46speaking, will make us sound [music] a
23. 0:47bit more fem. But, if we use too much
24. 0:52Have I heard a voice kind of like this?
25. 0:54This would be hypernasality, as it's
26. 0:57called, which just means it's too
27. 0:59nasally.
28. 1:00We need to hit that sweet spot between
29. 1:02too nasally and not nasally enough.
30. 1:04Right in the middle.
31. 1:06Have you heard Elmo's voice from Sesame
32. 1:08Street? That kind of Elmo sound. [music]
33. 1:11Think of it like an exaggerated soft
34. 1:13palate movement mixed with falsetto. So,
35. 1:16if you can already do an Elmo voice, you
36. 1:17can actually jump into that, remove the
37. 1:19falsetto, and you'll have roughly the
38. 1:21ballpark of doing this technique. So,
39. 1:23you could go like Elmo, Elmo. Yeah,
40. 1:26here. That kind of spot. So, you'll get
41. 1:28roughly in the position that you need to
42. 1:30be.
43. 1:30>> Why does she fall asleep like this every
44. 1:32time we make a video? Where did she even
45. 1:35go?
46. 1:36>> Now, let's try [music] a different
47. 1:37technique. You know that kind of ng
48. 1:39sound at the end of words like sing,
49. 1:41doing, like our mm.
50. 1:43Do that, but imagine your tongue going a
51. 1:45little bit higher, like almost touching
52. 1:47the middle of your mouth, basically,
53. 1:48with the middle of your tongue. That
54. 1:49kind of mm
55. 1:51kind of sound. Right, after that mm
56. 1:54sound, we're going to pair it with a
57. 1:55vowel like e. [music] Think of this like
58. 1:57opening the door to the soft palate,
59. 1:59right? The mmm sound is more like the
60. 2:02key that prepares us to open the door,
61. 2:04similar to how we broke into this house.
62. 2:06So, once we have that kind of
63. 2:10sound, it's opening up and allowing more
64. 2:13air into our nose and thus doing the
65. 2:16technique. If you feel your tongue going
66. 2:17up a little bit, that's perfectly fine.
67. 2:19You're just kind of creating a smaller
68. 2:20pathway for your air to go through
69. 2:22[music] and thus creating a smaller
70. 2:23size, so to speak, and thus creating a
71. 2:25more feminine sound, generally speaking.
72. 2:28You know, like the tuba versus the
73. 2:29trumpet kind of thing, right? Around
74. 2:31your little dangly thing at the back of
75. 2:32the mouth, you're going to feel a little
76. 2:33bit of movement. That's kind of
77. 2:36You're going to feel something kind of
78. 2:37go whoop. Like that. That is the velar
79. 2:41port, which is a [music] thing that's
80. 2:42attached to your soft palate, but all
81. 2:44you need to know is this is the door. We
82. 2:47have a mystery to solve. Is our voice
83. 2:49too nasally when we do this technique?
84. 2:51Well, luckily for you, there's actually
85. 2:53a really easy way to find out.
86. 2:55Basically, when you get to the
87. 2:58part, literally pinch your nose in the e
88. 3:01part and see if the sound changes. It
89. 3:04should sound exactly the same as it does
90. 3:06when it's not pinched. [music] For
91. 3:07example,
92. 3:13that was me pinching my nose
93. 3:15repetitively, [music] yet you couldn't
94. 3:17hear any of the sound change. Also, when
95. 3:20you speak full sentences, you should be
96. 3:21able to block your nose and roughly
97. 3:23sound about the same. Now, if your voice
98. 3:26is too nasally and you pinch your nose,
99. 3:28it's going to sound like this. If you
100. 3:30want to get rid of that, kind of imagine
101. 3:33your voice is positioned inside your
102. 3:35human body going down a floor of an
103. 3:37elevator. Literally imagine the position
104. 3:40of the voice. This isn't your pitch, the
105. 3:42position, I guess. This will trick you
106. 3:45into avoiding that sound. I still have
107. 3:48my nose pinched, but you generally can't
108. 3:51hear it other than ends and Ms. Let's
109. 3:54try this technique with a bunch of
110. 3:55vowels. Feel free to jump back to this
111. 3:57part of the video when you're
112. 3:57practicing. So, this would be
113. 4:14Before anyone asks, no, you don't have
114. 4:16to replicate my accent when doing this
115. 4:17technique or other techniques. Also, I'm
116. 4:20not British. I don't know why I get
117. 4:22comments asking if I'm British specific
118. 4:24I'm Australian, okay? Good day, upside
119. 4:26down country, kangaroo, Freddo frogs,
120. 4:30and handball on the court, okay? Please
121. 4:33believe me. I am in fact from Australia.
122. 4:36I know my accent's been Americanized to
123. 4:38all heck. That's why these voice
124. 4:39tutorials exist, okay? So, you don't
125. 4:41become like me.
126. 4:43A lot of voice training is basically
127. 4:45making a silly sound, slapping it in
128. 4:47front of a sentence, then getting rid of
129. 4:48the initial silly sound, and then bam,
130. 4:50you have trans voice in a sentence. What
131. 4:53this looks like is going like
132. 4:56apple, apple. It's just apple. We just
133. 4:58we did an A, slap it on an apple, you
134. 5:00know? Try going
135. 5:03apples, apples are tasty. Like that,
136. 5:06basically. And then you can check for
137. 5:07nasality. So, going
138. 5:10apples, apples are tasty. It sounded
139. 5:13about the same, right? But if you did a
140. 5:14sentence like oranges are epic, right?
141. 5:18We'd end up with orange,
142. 5:22oranges are epic.
143. 5:24You'll notice the N
144. 5:26really nasally.
145. 5:28That's because there's an N there. Words
146. 5:30that have ends in it will just sound
147. 5:31different by default. Just in case you
148. 5:34go out and practice and think you're
149. 5:35doing it wrong, no, just try to do
150. 5:37sentences that don't have ends in it.
151. 5:39When doing these sentences, think of
152. 5:40your target as like a little nasally,
153. 5:43but not too nasally. That exact point
154. 5:45right before it becomes too nasally.
155. 5:47That sweet spot is what we want to go
156. 5:48for. Once you get the hang of doing
157. 5:50that, you won't need the [music] silly
158. 5:51sound anymore. You can just do the sound
159. 5:53on command and it'll sound pretty good.
160. 5:55You just got to keep practicing.
161. 5:57>> [gasps]
162. 5:57>> What gives? Only I get injured in these
163. 5:59tutorials.
164. 6:01And pitch.
165. 6:03>> At least you found [snorts and music]
166. 6:03treasure.
167. 6:08>> [music]
168. 6:10>> Sorry guys, chest empty.
169. 6:12>> But we used all our money bailing you
170. 6:13out of Inaba.
171. 6:15>> Oh.
172. 6:17Hm.
173. 6:20Good point.
174. 6:23If you want to learn more trans voice
175. 6:25via one-on-one lessons on Patreon, I
176. 6:27offer those. Feel free to check those
177. 6:29out. Slots can be a little hard to get.
178. 6:31I'm really sorry about that. I'm just a
179. 6:33one person. I'm not a company, but I'll
180. 6:35do my best to fulfill as many slots as I
181. 6:37can without it impacting my health. Um I
182. 6:41have a bad habit of doing too [music]
183. 6:42many lessons and then my health kind of
184. 6:45deteriorates. My bad. Um I'm going to do
185. 6:47my best to do as many lessons as I can
186. 6:50healthily. So um if that interests you,
187. 6:53feel free to check out my Patreon. Um
188. 6:55but there's also the free video tutorial
189. 6:57series if you want guidance on pretty
190. 7:00much everything trans voice. We're
191. 7:02getting fairly close to having a video
192. 7:04about every major topic. So once I
193. 7:07complete those major topics, I'll
194. 7:09probably cycle back and remake a bunch
195. 7:10of stuff or just general tips or answer
196. 7:12your questions, that kind of thing. All
197. 7:13right? I hope sincerely that the voice
198. 7:16tutorials have been able to help as when
199. 7:18I was starting the voice journey. Um I
200. 7:20found uh the lack of resources kind of
201. 7:22frustrating and the resources that were
202. 7:24there, I found a little too verbose.
203. 7:26Right? Hence the format of these
204. 7:28tutorials. So I hope these tutorials
205. 7:29help you in your journey and uh
206. 7:32yeah.
207. 7:33Um if you're doing voice training and it
208. 7:34doesn't work straight away, that's
209. 7:36unfortunately really common. Right?
210. 7:37Voice training is a very slow-moving
211. 7:39process. So be kind to yourself during
212. 7:41the process. When you see these little
213. 7:43videos, you're watching people that like
214. 7:44have done this for a couple of years.
215. 7:46I've done voice exercises for trans
216. 7:48voice for like nearly 5 years now. You
217. 7:49know what I mean? So, just bear in mind
218. 7:52it takes a while,
219. 7:53but you got this. [music] If you're also
220. 7:55interested in other aspects of
221. 7:56transition, I also do weekly videos
222. 7:58about those. So, feel free to subscribe,
223. 8:00hit the bell, all that cliche YouTuber
224. 8:03things so that I can keep doing this as
225. 8:05a really blessed career. So,
226. 8:07>> [gasps]
227. 8:08>> thank you for watching this video. As
228. 8:10always, stay hydrated and know that you
229. 8:13are valid. I'll see you next week.