October 5, 2023 • 23 mins
There are few things more vulnerable than singing, unless you’re Leontyne Price, of course. For the rest of us, though, it can be fraught. Laverne shares with us her journey through developing her voice as a transgender woman and as a lover of singing. And while the road, she says, has had some traumatic moments, she knows she will never stop. In fact, she has recently released her own version of the operatic classic “Summertime” from the opera Porgy and Bess - pop diva style! In this diary, Laverne talks about the study of voice, what makes a voice beautiful, and always being in process.
Please rate, review, subscribe and share The Laverne Cox Show with everyone you know. You can find Laverne on Instagram and Twitter @LaverneCox and on Facebook at @LaverneCoxForReal.
As always, stay in the love.
***
Links of Interest:
Summertime: A TripHopera (Official Video)
Shequida Hall (Instagram)
The 5 Countertenors (YouTube)
Farinelli Movie Trailer (YouTube)
Derek Lee Ragin for Farinelli (YouTube)
Jessye Norman (YouTube)
Sarah Vaughn (YouTube)
Leontyne Price (NEA Opera Honors Interview, YouTube)
Kennedy Center Honors Leontyne Price (YouTube)
Marian Anderson Sings at Lincoln Memorial, 1939 (YouTube)
Marian Anderson "Ave Maria" on The Ed Sullivan Show, 1952 (YouTube)
Other Episodes Mentioned:
Opera & Diva Worship with Ira Siff
CREDITS:
Executive Producers: Sandie Bailey, Alex Alcheh, Lauren Hohman, Tyler Klang & Gabrielle Collins
Producer & Editor: Brooke Peterson-Bell
Associate Producer: Akiya McKnight
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to The Laverne Cox Show, a production of Shondaland
Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio. Welcome to the Laverne Cox Show.
My name is Laverne Cox. My voice, my voge.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
There are so many things that come to mind when
I think about my voice and finding my voice. I mean,
there's the idea of sort of finding my voice in
terms of being able to speak up for myself and
to own my story and to find a way to
sort of tell my story.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
That part of finding my voice.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
But today what I want to talk about is my
actual voice, my singing voice and my speaking voice.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
And my voice for me has been.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
A frock subject, a contested space, particularly as a trans
woman who has a very deep voice. I'm a trans
woman who started my medical transition at the age of
twenty six, and so my voice had already changed as
a result of puberty and the testosterone dump that happens.
(01:16):
Do people assign mail at birth during puberty if they
have not had some sort of intervention, And I had
no idea. I didn't even know the term transgender when
I was going through puberty back in the day, and
so sort of blocking that puberty was not really an option.
And there are certain women who go through a puberty
that you know, causes all the effects of testosterone that
(01:38):
are unfortunate, and they have you know, high feminine voices nevertheless,
and then there's some of us who have very deep voices.
And because I'm an actress and because I've studied singing
and have a very wide singing range, I can change
my voice. I can make it sound a little softer
and more feminine. And for many years I would kind
(01:59):
of try to just you know, speak about sometimes you know,
a fifth higher than my natural inclination to speak. And
as an actress, I need to have that flexibility anyway
to kind of maybe switch the pitch of my voice
or the resonance of my voice. Sometimes it's not about pitch,
it's about resonance. And like there's all of this, you know,
(02:21):
sort of literature out there for trans women and around
speech pathology and finding your female voice and all that stuff, right,
and then there's just me needing to make a point.
What I have to say is more important than like,
you know, the sound of my voice, and so I
have to just communicate it. And some so sometimes there's
going to be a bit more bass in my voice,
and I, for the most part, am okay with that.
(02:45):
I definitely have moments still when I hear my speaking
voice and I have a podcast, so I hear my
speaking voice a lot where I'm like, oh my god,
you sound so masculine. And then I have to remind
myself that trans is beautiful. I started the hashtag trans
is beautiful know now eight years ago.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
God it is really for me.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
He is a reminder that I'm not beautiful despite all
the things that make me noticeably trans. My voice is
one of those things that makes me noticeably trans. But
I'm beautiful because of those things. And so when I
hear my voice and I have the impulse just say, oh,
you sound too masculine. Oh that's too deep, I have
to say, trans is beautiful. And this is the voice
(03:23):
that I have because of, you know, the puberty I
went through, and that is okay, It's okay. And so
that is something I still, you know, kind of work
with and struggle with. And there are days when I
resonate my voice better. And I wouldn't say my voice
is necessarily more feminine, but it's more resonant, and I.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
Have to just accept that.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
I have to accept that, and then there's a piece
of me singing. So there is the issue of my
speaking voice and there's the issue of my singing voice.
So when I started voice lessons for the first time,
I was in college. I was at Indiana University, and
it was determined at the time that I was a
bass baritone based on my range at the time. And
(04:11):
you know, I sang in that range and that register
for a number of years until I moved to New
York and discovered a drag queen named Shaquida who sang
opera in a soprano voice. And there was also the
movie Peter Nelli that featured the counter tenor Derek Lee Reagan,
so I learned about countertenors. And then there was also
(04:31):
another drag queen named Barladuine Morman who sang in soprano.
And so I was like, Oh, my goodness, is possible
to be assigned male at birth and to sing soprano?
And I was just kind of obsessed with the possibility
of being able to do that. And I started experimenting
with falsetto with various results, and then found Irisif in
(04:52):
nineteen ninety six, who I interviewed on the first season
of this podcast, and he is a male soprano himself
and has just you know, years of experience as a
singer himself and also as a teacher training voices of
people who all voice types, really, but it knows a
lot about voices that were assigned male at birth, that
(05:13):
went through a puberty that released testosterone. I'm trying to
be very intention with my language. So note on the
language that I'm using. I'm avoiding terms like male puberty
because I think that that feels biologically essentialist, and I
don't think I went through a male puberty. I went
through a puberty that caused a release of testosterone because
(05:33):
of the sort of reproductive organs that I was born with.
It's not I'm that I'm in denial. I'm very comfortably trans.
But it's just like I'm trying to be more exacting
and more accurate, and I'm really trying to disrupt the
normative assumptions that we have around biology and the gender
binary and all of that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
So just a note on that language anyway.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
So there is the piece of my singing voice and
singing Oh my god, there's so much such a history
of trauma with me with singing. And I've just released
music Summertime a Trip Opera available wherever you get your music,
and there's a video available on YouTube. And I'm happy
that I've released this music. I've released music before where
(06:19):
I don't really sing. I am sort of talk sing.
And I've been studying opera on and off for the
past about twenty seven years with Ira And yeah, I mean,
there's the thing of like my voice as a trans woman,
but then there's also the thing about sort of being
an artificial soprano, right, and the there I mean, there's
(06:44):
a new movement of countertenor as an opera. A countertenor,
just by definition, is the considered the highest male voice.
It's basically when male singers, people who identify as male
sing in a treble voice, and that trouble voice could
be alto, mezzo, soprano or soprano. There are countertenors who
sing soprano, and there are counter of tunos who sing alto.
(07:08):
It just depends on your range and your you know,
facility and whatnot, and so often the counter ten of
voice can be strident, can be shril and not the
most beautiful.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Sound in the world.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
And then when they're and when there was a really
good countertenor for me, I think it could be one
of the most glorious sounds in the world. I think
of Shaquita, and Shaquita in her prime just has one
of the most beautiful sort of soprano male quote unquote
male soprano counter tenor voices that I've ever heard. It's
(07:44):
a beautiful, gorgeous sound. It's a new singer named Kiman
Murrah who is sort of lighting up the opera world
right now. Who's a young singer counter tenor who happens
to also be a soprano, who has a luscious sound.
And so, anyway, as I've experimented with my own voice
and my own sort of singing, you know, transitioning to
(08:06):
a troubled voice and sort of being met so for
a while and then sort of finding soprano notes and
fluctuating between a soprano and a mezzo, and I'm in
an interesting place right now vocally where some things have shifted,
and you know, the voice is always changing. See that's
the thing. It's like my voice is changing all over again.
At fifty. It's like I'm going through another puberty at fifty.
(08:29):
My voice is cracking and it's changing all over again.
It's one of the things like I have as an artist.
So I'm insanely critical, and I think that can serve
me really well and in so many different areas. I
think critically about the world around me. But sometimes when
that criticism turns inward, it can be it can be
very dangerous. I know what good singing is, and I
(08:51):
have a very high standard for what good singing is,
and I know when it's not I'm not doing it.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
But it's actually really hard to sing really well.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
And I think the things that really make good singing
first and foremost pitch, and I don't have a great ear.
It's gotten better, but it is not a good ear,
and that is one of the best, the most fundamental
thing that you sing in tune. And so you know
what is wonderful is that if you train, and if
you work really really hard, your ear.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Can get better with training and practice.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
In mind has it was a disaster for many years
and I still have bad days, but it has gotten better.
So pitch dynamics, and when I say dynamics, I mean
the ability to sing softly loudly, to go from soft
to loud sometimes in a phrase. Mesodvouce is an operatic
(09:39):
term that we use to sort of denote starting a
note really quietly, quscendoing that note or getting louder, and
then decrescendoing that note or getting softer. Many people think
it's that, you know, if you can do a mesa
devotion on every note throughout your range, then you've mastered
your technique because the breath control, you know, breath control
is so is another essential element and breathing of good singing.
(10:02):
How you control the emission of the air so many things.
I mean an open throat. I mean, it's so technical
and ideally you want to be at a certain point
where you don't have to think about all these things
that it just comes out naturally. And I'm almost always
thinking about all these things. It's like, you know, it always.
It's rare that it comes out naturally for me. And
this is why acting is my first day and this
(10:25):
is why I'm an actress and not a singer. But
even though I'm an actress and not a singer, I
still sing for fun. It's something that is often frustrating
and difficult for me every day as I practice, and
the voice is different every day. But it is also
something that brings me a lot of joy sometimes, like
sometimes when I'm on set and I don't care and
i just start singing and I'm not in this perfectionistic thing.
(10:48):
It's just fun. And that's where I want to always
sort of be with my singing. Ideally, it's just a
it's an ongoing kind of process, and it is incredibly
vulnerable when you've been told that you can't sing most
of your life. I've been told this and that I
shouldn't sing and I should shut up.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
So that is.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
When you've had that told to you your entire life,
you know, there's a you know, it's hard not to internalize.
And so to continue to sing despite that feels like
either I'm delusional or crazy or I'm just like, fuck
the world, I'm going to do what I want. I
think it's probably maybe a little combination of both. And
so it's just I guess what I want to say
(11:36):
for trans folks out there who want to sing and
are sort of figuring out like their voices and there,
you know, and it's maybe not a fem if you
want it to be.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Maybe that's just not what it's going to be for you,
and that's okay.
Speaker 2 (11:52):
You know, what is feminine and masculine is such a
they are social constructs. One of my favorite singers is Saravant.
She's a jazz singer. There's some wonderful videos on YouTube
of her vocal range, and she has some low notes.
She's a contralto, and she has low notes that sound
full on baritone like baritonal kind of sounds that she
(12:14):
makes that are just stunning. But they're still feminine. They're
still beautifully feminine. And so the voices are. I think
that's one of the wonderful things about voices that it
can be androgens, it can be genderless, it could be anything,
you know, and sometimes you never know.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
What someone's gender is based on their voice.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
We can make assumptions, but we don't always know, and
that's kind of an awesome and cool thing.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
This is a good time to take a little break. Okay,
we're back.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
So much of me on learning my internalized transphobia to
accept my speaking voice and then with my singing voice,
to understand that like I don't have that warm, gorgeous
sound that like Shaquita has, or that Kumon Morale has,
or those one of those voice like Lanting Prize are
just a normal voices that are just warm and smoky
(13:22):
and dark. And whenever I overdarken my voice, it just
doesn't really, it doesn't really work.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
It's not what my sound is.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
And so just trying to be true to my sound
like that, my voice sounds a certain way. When I
sing in chest's voice, it can be darker. Actually, when
I sing in chest, I can how get some tones
and some sounds that have a so I can have
(14:00):
that some very sort of covered dark smoky sounds in
my chest voice. And then and when I ascend into
my head voice, I can sometimes write in the mix
of that I can maybe have a little bit more
of that quality maybe around the mix.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
All.
Speaker 2 (14:27):
Oh, but eventually you have to let go of that weight.
If you want to keep going up, you just can't do.
There's weight on that and that's fine, But if you
want to keep ascending the scale, you have to let
go of the waves.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
Oh yeah, hmmm, that was fun.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
That was fun. I mean, was it perfect now?
Speaker 2 (15:36):
I mean it's just me going through my range a
little bit, glissando ing, glissandoing, I think it just made
up a word, gleisandoing portamentoing throughout my range, notssly doing scales,
which is kind of sliding up and.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
Down the scale.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
Yeah, it's fun and it's fun just saying those thing
in my chest voice now too, which is new for me.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
And as I the.
Speaker 2 (15:57):
Lower there's a theory that the lower you're seeing, the
high you can sing. And I definitely find and I
allow myself to sing at the very bottom of my
chest voice some of those almost vocal fry kind of
sounds that like, I can go higher.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
I've been topping out around the.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
F F sharp above high c lately or F sharp
six lately, and it hasn't been going higher than that
a case in the past. I've had a G you know,
and then that happens to be, you know, an F
(16:36):
above high sea, which is fun to sing. For me,
it's a dream and I never honestly thought I'd be
able to sing this high. And it's always about having
everything be connected from the bottom to the top of
the voice. So yeah, and so as I get into
it pedagogically and technically, it's really interesting and fascinating and fun,
and you know, I could talk about it all day,
(16:58):
and so that part kind of gets me excited. There's
the piece of like releasing music and people criticizing and
saying I should shut up. And then there's just like
the fascination that I have with how to do all
this and the production of it that I'm endlessly fascinated with,
And like when I allow myself to be in the
space of being a student and being in a space
of the fascination and the curiosity and the kind of
(17:20):
joy of it all, I don't know, it supersedes the
sort of insecurity that I have around my voice and
it not being you know.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
A voice that can bring worlds together.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Some something, and saying like that, it's it's my voice.
It's my voice, and accepting my voice in all of
its imperfections is just a daily process self acceptance on
every single level. There is a YouTuber named Herbie Rivalis
(17:53):
who ends their YouTube videos I'm forever in a state
of practice, and I love that. I love that, so
I too, am forever in a state of practice. And
when you're an artist, when your body is your instrument,
when my emotional life is an actor is my instrument,
My voice is my instrument, my body is my instrument.
The levels of self acceptance required are really on a
(18:15):
whole other level, and it is so incredibly vulnerable, but
it is also wonderful. And there's so many lessons from
my artistic work and my artistic training as an actor,
as a dancer, as a singer that inform my psychological
and emotional healing.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
That is really a gift. It's really a gift.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
And in the parlance of the community resiliency model, if
you recall the six the six components of the community
resiliency model from Season one, resourcing is one of them.
And singing is a wonderful resource for me. Is something
I do in life that sues me, and it's a
resource when I'm not all sort of actionistic about it
(19:01):
and all hard on myself about it. And does that
mean I need to, like, you know, record and release music. No,
but I've done that anyway, because I love this trip
Hopera project. I think it's really interesting and cool and
so if I can ever get the second video edit it,
it'll be out when it's out. And I don't know,
it's just, you know, being an artist and being creative
(19:22):
is it's who I am. And contending with my voice
in the world is a part of that. But owning
it and cultivating it and training it. Finding my voice
feels right, that it's not just an uncultivated voice that
(19:44):
you hear speaking before you, that you hear when I'm singing.
It is a voice that has been honed through pain
and sorrow and training and critical interventions, all sorts.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
And that's me, that's me, That's Leverne.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
What else is true? What else is true for me today?
As I talk about my voice and saying that I
have a voice, that I have a voice, that I
have the resources to train, that I've had the fortitude
to train and to get better, and to not allow
(20:34):
not being good at something to keep me from doing
something that I love.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
Creative expression is.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
Not always about a product or something that one can
sell or something that is like marketable. Sometimes creative expression
is just that it's creative expression that one needs for oneself,
for one's mental health and psychological well being. And that
is what creativity is for me. Ultimately, I'm a student
(21:01):
who for whatever reason, needs to sing. There's moments when
it feels really good in your body, when things line
up and it feels really good, that it just like
it's awesome, and it could be a moment you know
that like no one hears, is not recorded. I'm in
the shower or I'm in my apartment by myself and
(21:22):
just something beautiful comes out or it feels beautiful.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
I magnet. It might not sound so beautiful.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
But it feels good in my body, and God, that's
a really great thing. Somehow the joy and that that
feeling a release can overcome sometimes that critical voice, which
is really awesome when that can happen. So yeah, some
random thoughts about me and my voice, my vote check.
(22:25):
Thank you for listening to The Laverne Cox Show. Please like, subscribe,
and share this podcast with everybody you know. You can
find me on Twitter, slash x, Instagram and TikTok at
Laverne Cox and on Facebook at Laverne Cox for Real.
Until next time, stay in the love. The Laverne Cox
(22:50):
Show is a production of Shondaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio.
For more podcasts from Shondaland Audio, visit the iHeartRadio app
Apple Podcast wherever you listen to your favorite chews
Welcome to The Laverne Cox Show, a production of Shondaland
Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio. Welcome to the Laverne Cox Show.
My name is Laverne Cox. My voice, my voge.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
There are so many things that come to mind when
I think about my voice and finding my voice. I mean,
there's the idea of sort of finding my voice in
terms of being able to speak up for myself and
to own my story and to find a way to
sort of tell my story.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
That part of finding my voice.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
But today what I want to talk about is my
actual voice, my singing voice and my speaking voice.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
And my voice for me has been.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
A frock subject, a contested space, particularly as a trans
woman who has a very deep voice. I'm a trans
woman who started my medical transition at the age of
twenty six, and so my voice had already changed as
a result of puberty and the testosterone dump that happens.
(01:16):
Do people assign mail at birth during puberty if they
have not had some sort of intervention, And I had
no idea. I didn't even know the term transgender when
I was going through puberty back in the day, and
so sort of blocking that puberty was not really an option.
And there are certain women who go through a puberty
that you know, causes all the effects of testosterone that
(01:38):
are unfortunate, and they have you know, high feminine voices nevertheless,
and then there's some of us who have very deep voices.
And because I'm an actress and because I've studied singing
and have a very wide singing range, I can change
my voice. I can make it sound a little softer
and more feminine. And for many years I would kind
(01:59):
of try to just you know, speak about sometimes you know,
a fifth higher than my natural inclination to speak. And
as an actress, I need to have that flexibility anyway
to kind of maybe switch the pitch of my voice
or the resonance of my voice. Sometimes it's not about pitch,
it's about resonance. And like there's all of this, you know,
(02:21):
sort of literature out there for trans women and around
speech pathology and finding your female voice and all that stuff, right,
and then there's just me needing to make a point.
What I have to say is more important than like,
you know, the sound of my voice, and so I
have to just communicate it. And some so sometimes there's
going to be a bit more bass in my voice,
and I, for the most part, am okay with that.
(02:45):
I definitely have moments still when I hear my speaking
voice and I have a podcast, so I hear my
speaking voice a lot where I'm like, oh my god,
you sound so masculine. And then I have to remind
myself that trans is beautiful. I started the hashtag trans
is beautiful know now eight years ago.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
God it is really for me.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
He is a reminder that I'm not beautiful despite all
the things that make me noticeably trans. My voice is
one of those things that makes me noticeably trans. But
I'm beautiful because of those things. And so when I
hear my voice and I have the impulse just say, oh,
you sound too masculine. Oh that's too deep, I have
to say, trans is beautiful. And this is the voice
(03:23):
that I have because of, you know, the puberty I
went through, and that is okay, It's okay. And so
that is something I still, you know, kind of work
with and struggle with. And there are days when I
resonate my voice better. And I wouldn't say my voice
is necessarily more feminine, but it's more resonant, and I.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
Have to just accept that.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
I have to accept that, and then there's a piece
of me singing. So there is the issue of my
speaking voice and there's the issue of my singing voice.
So when I started voice lessons for the first time,
I was in college. I was at Indiana University, and
it was determined at the time that I was a
bass baritone based on my range at the time. And
(04:11):
you know, I sang in that range and that register
for a number of years until I moved to New
York and discovered a drag queen named Shaquida who sang
opera in a soprano voice. And there was also the
movie Peter Nelli that featured the counter tenor Derek Lee Reagan,
so I learned about countertenors. And then there was also
(04:31):
another drag queen named Barladuine Morman who sang in soprano.
And so I was like, Oh, my goodness, is possible
to be assigned male at birth and to sing soprano?
And I was just kind of obsessed with the possibility
of being able to do that. And I started experimenting
with falsetto with various results, and then found Irisif in
(04:52):
nineteen ninety six, who I interviewed on the first season
of this podcast, and he is a male soprano himself
and has just you know, years of experience as a
singer himself and also as a teacher training voices of
people who all voice types, really, but it knows a
lot about voices that were assigned male at birth, that
(05:13):
went through a puberty that released testosterone. I'm trying to
be very intention with my language. So note on the
language that I'm using. I'm avoiding terms like male puberty
because I think that that feels biologically essentialist, and I
don't think I went through a male puberty. I went
through a puberty that caused a release of testosterone because
(05:33):
of the sort of reproductive organs that I was born with.
It's not I'm that I'm in denial. I'm very comfortably trans.
But it's just like I'm trying to be more exacting
and more accurate, and I'm really trying to disrupt the
normative assumptions that we have around biology and the gender
binary and all of that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
So just a note on that language anyway.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
So there is the piece of my singing voice and
singing Oh my god, there's so much such a history
of trauma with me with singing. And I've just released
music Summertime a Trip Opera available wherever you get your music,
and there's a video available on YouTube. And I'm happy
that I've released this music. I've released music before where
(06:19):
I don't really sing. I am sort of talk sing.
And I've been studying opera on and off for the
past about twenty seven years with Ira And yeah, I mean,
there's the thing of like my voice as a trans woman,
but then there's also the thing about sort of being
an artificial soprano, right, and the there I mean, there's
(06:44):
a new movement of countertenor as an opera. A countertenor,
just by definition, is the considered the highest male voice.
It's basically when male singers, people who identify as male
sing in a treble voice, and that trouble voice could
be alto, mezzo, soprano or soprano. There are countertenors who
sing soprano, and there are counter of tunos who sing alto.
(07:08):
It just depends on your range and your you know,
facility and whatnot, and so often the counter ten of
voice can be strident, can be shril and not the
most beautiful.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Sound in the world.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
And then when they're and when there was a really
good countertenor for me, I think it could be one
of the most glorious sounds in the world. I think
of Shaquita, and Shaquita in her prime just has one
of the most beautiful sort of soprano male quote unquote
male soprano counter tenor voices that I've ever heard. It's
(07:44):
a beautiful, gorgeous sound. It's a new singer named Kiman
Murrah who is sort of lighting up the opera world
right now. Who's a young singer counter tenor who happens
to also be a soprano, who has a luscious sound.
And so, anyway, as I've experimented with my own voice
and my own sort of singing, you know, transitioning to
(08:06):
a troubled voice and sort of being met so for
a while and then sort of finding soprano notes and
fluctuating between a soprano and a mezzo, and I'm in
an interesting place right now vocally where some things have shifted,
and you know, the voice is always changing. See that's
the thing. It's like my voice is changing all over again.
At fifty. It's like I'm going through another puberty at fifty.
(08:29):
My voice is cracking and it's changing all over again.
It's one of the things like I have as an artist.
So I'm insanely critical, and I think that can serve
me really well and in so many different areas. I
think critically about the world around me. But sometimes when
that criticism turns inward, it can be it can be
very dangerous. I know what good singing is, and I
(08:51):
have a very high standard for what good singing is,
and I know when it's not I'm not doing it.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
But it's actually really hard to sing really well.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
And I think the things that really make good singing
first and foremost pitch, and I don't have a great ear.
It's gotten better, but it is not a good ear,
and that is one of the best, the most fundamental
thing that you sing in tune. And so you know
what is wonderful is that if you train, and if
you work really really hard, your ear.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Can get better with training and practice.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
In mind has it was a disaster for many years
and I still have bad days, but it has gotten better.
So pitch dynamics, and when I say dynamics, I mean
the ability to sing softly loudly, to go from soft
to loud sometimes in a phrase. Mesodvouce is an operatic
(09:39):
term that we use to sort of denote starting a
note really quietly, quscendoing that note or getting louder, and
then decrescendoing that note or getting softer. Many people think
it's that, you know, if you can do a mesa
devotion on every note throughout your range, then you've mastered
your technique because the breath control, you know, breath control
is so is another essential element and breathing of good singing.
(10:02):
How you control the emission of the air so many things.
I mean an open throat. I mean, it's so technical
and ideally you want to be at a certain point
where you don't have to think about all these things
that it just comes out naturally. And I'm almost always
thinking about all these things. It's like, you know, it always.
It's rare that it comes out naturally for me. And
this is why acting is my first day and this
(10:25):
is why I'm an actress and not a singer. But
even though I'm an actress and not a singer, I
still sing for fun. It's something that is often frustrating
and difficult for me every day as I practice, and
the voice is different every day. But it is also
something that brings me a lot of joy sometimes, like
sometimes when I'm on set and I don't care and
i just start singing and I'm not in this perfectionistic thing.
(10:48):
It's just fun. And that's where I want to always
sort of be with my singing. Ideally, it's just a
it's an ongoing kind of process, and it is incredibly
vulnerable when you've been told that you can't sing most
of your life. I've been told this and that I
shouldn't sing and I should shut up.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
So that is.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
When you've had that told to you your entire life,
you know, there's a you know, it's hard not to internalize.
And so to continue to sing despite that feels like
either I'm delusional or crazy or I'm just like, fuck
the world, I'm going to do what I want. I
think it's probably maybe a little combination of both. And
so it's just I guess what I want to say
(11:36):
for trans folks out there who want to sing and
are sort of figuring out like their voices and there,
you know, and it's maybe not a fem if you
want it to be.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Maybe that's just not what it's going to be for you,
and that's okay.
Speaker 2 (11:52):
You know, what is feminine and masculine is such a
they are social constructs. One of my favorite singers is Saravant.
She's a jazz singer. There's some wonderful videos on YouTube
of her vocal range, and she has some low notes.
She's a contralto, and she has low notes that sound
full on baritone like baritonal kind of sounds that she
(12:14):
makes that are just stunning. But they're still feminine. They're
still beautifully feminine. And so the voices are. I think
that's one of the wonderful things about voices that it
can be androgens, it can be genderless, it could be anything,
you know, and sometimes you never know.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
What someone's gender is based on their voice.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
We can make assumptions, but we don't always know, and
that's kind of an awesome and cool thing.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
This is a good time to take a little break. Okay,
we're back.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
So much of me on learning my internalized transphobia to
accept my speaking voice and then with my singing voice,
to understand that like I don't have that warm, gorgeous
sound that like Shaquita has, or that Kumon Morale has,
or those one of those voice like Lanting Prize are
just a normal voices that are just warm and smoky
(13:22):
and dark. And whenever I overdarken my voice, it just
doesn't really, it doesn't really work.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
It's not what my sound is.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
And so just trying to be true to my sound
like that, my voice sounds a certain way. When I
sing in chest's voice, it can be darker. Actually, when
I sing in chest, I can how get some tones
and some sounds that have a so I can have
(14:00):
that some very sort of covered dark smoky sounds in
my chest voice. And then and when I ascend into
my head voice, I can sometimes write in the mix
of that I can maybe have a little bit more
of that quality maybe around the mix.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
All.
Speaker 2 (14:27):
Oh, but eventually you have to let go of that weight.
If you want to keep going up, you just can't do.
There's weight on that and that's fine, But if you
want to keep ascending the scale, you have to let
go of the waves.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
Oh yeah, hmmm, that was fun.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
That was fun. I mean, was it perfect now?
Speaker 2 (15:36):
I mean it's just me going through my range a
little bit, glissando ing, glissandoing, I think it just made
up a word, gleisandoing portamentoing throughout my range, notssly doing scales,
which is kind of sliding up and.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
Down the scale.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
Yeah, it's fun and it's fun just saying those thing
in my chest voice now too, which is new for me.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
And as I the.
Speaker 2 (15:57):
Lower there's a theory that the lower you're seeing, the
high you can sing. And I definitely find and I
allow myself to sing at the very bottom of my
chest voice some of those almost vocal fry kind of
sounds that like, I can go higher.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
I've been topping out around the.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
F F sharp above high c lately or F sharp
six lately, and it hasn't been going higher than that
a case in the past. I've had a G you know,
and then that happens to be, you know, an F
(16:36):
above high sea, which is fun to sing. For me,
it's a dream and I never honestly thought I'd be
able to sing this high. And it's always about having
everything be connected from the bottom to the top of
the voice. So yeah, and so as I get into
it pedagogically and technically, it's really interesting and fascinating and fun,
and you know, I could talk about it all day,
(16:58):
and so that part kind of gets me excited. There's
the piece of like releasing music and people criticizing and
saying I should shut up. And then there's just like
the fascination that I have with how to do all
this and the production of it that I'm endlessly fascinated with,
And like when I allow myself to be in the
space of being a student and being in a space
of the fascination and the curiosity and the kind of
(17:20):
joy of it all, I don't know, it supersedes the
sort of insecurity that I have around my voice and
it not being you know.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
A voice that can bring worlds together.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Some something, and saying like that, it's it's my voice.
It's my voice, and accepting my voice in all of
its imperfections is just a daily process self acceptance on
every single level. There is a YouTuber named Herbie Rivalis
(17:53):
who ends their YouTube videos I'm forever in a state
of practice, and I love that. I love that, so
I too, am forever in a state of practice. And
when you're an artist, when your body is your instrument,
when my emotional life is an actor is my instrument,
My voice is my instrument, my body is my instrument.
The levels of self acceptance required are really on a
(18:15):
whole other level, and it is so incredibly vulnerable, but
it is also wonderful. And there's so many lessons from
my artistic work and my artistic training as an actor,
as a dancer, as a singer that inform my psychological
and emotional healing.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
That is really a gift. It's really a gift.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
And in the parlance of the community resiliency model, if
you recall the six the six components of the community
resiliency model from Season one, resourcing is one of them.
And singing is a wonderful resource for me. Is something
I do in life that sues me, and it's a
resource when I'm not all sort of actionistic about it
(19:01):
and all hard on myself about it. And does that
mean I need to, like, you know, record and release music. No,
but I've done that anyway, because I love this trip
Hopera project. I think it's really interesting and cool and
so if I can ever get the second video edit it,
it'll be out when it's out. And I don't know,
it's just, you know, being an artist and being creative
(19:22):
is it's who I am. And contending with my voice
in the world is a part of that. But owning
it and cultivating it and training it. Finding my voice
feels right, that it's not just an uncultivated voice that
(19:44):
you hear speaking before you, that you hear when I'm singing.
It is a voice that has been honed through pain
and sorrow and training and critical interventions, all sorts.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
And that's me, that's me, That's Leverne.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
What else is true? What else is true for me today?
As I talk about my voice and saying that I
have a voice, that I have a voice, that I
have the resources to train, that I've had the fortitude
to train and to get better, and to not allow
(20:34):
not being good at something to keep me from doing
something that I love.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
Creative expression is.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
Not always about a product or something that one can
sell or something that is like marketable. Sometimes creative expression
is just that it's creative expression that one needs for oneself,
for one's mental health and psychological well being. And that
is what creativity is for me. Ultimately, I'm a student
(21:01):
who for whatever reason, needs to sing. There's moments when
it feels really good in your body, when things line
up and it feels really good, that it just like
it's awesome, and it could be a moment you know
that like no one hears, is not recorded. I'm in
the shower or I'm in my apartment by myself and
(21:22):
just something beautiful comes out or it feels beautiful.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
I magnet. It might not sound so beautiful.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
But it feels good in my body, and God, that's
a really great thing. Somehow the joy and that that
feeling a release can overcome sometimes that critical voice, which
is really awesome when that can happen. So yeah, some
random thoughts about me and my voice, my vote check.
(22:25):
Thank you for listening to The Laverne Cox Show. Please like, subscribe,
and share this podcast with everybody you know. You can
find me on Twitter, slash x, Instagram and TikTok at
Laverne Cox and on Facebook at Laverne Cox for Real.
Until next time, stay in the love. The Laverne Cox
(22:50):
Show is a production of Shondaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio.
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Host
Laverne Cox
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