Saturday, 08 March 2008 | Out and in

My voice teacher lives in a small apartment in Park Slope, Brooklyn, high above 7th Avenue. Her apartment is always radiator-hot, and she cracks a window (the way one unfortunately must in New York) at the beginning of our lesson, letting some cool air and faint traffic noise seep in. She assures me that her apartment has thick walls and that the neighbors can't hear me. I don't believe her, but I pretend, and I tell my subconscious to follow suit, so that I don't get too shy and sing in a whisper. (I'm a quiet talker by nature, and I hate being overheard by people I'm not talking to. Singing, of course, is worse.)

Her cat (she has two, but one's in hiding) is fat and friendly, and my teacher has told me he sometimes sings along. I'm not sure if I should take offense that he hasn't done a duet with me yet. In any case, I like that he permanently hangs out beside us, sprawled on his side and blinking in a satisfied, lazy way.

At first we warm up our voices, doing silly voice arcs and staccato scales (ha-ha-hee-hee-ho-ho), and making certain I'm breathing from my diaphragm rather than higher up in my lungs. (She pays attention.) From there, we move onto the keyboard -- she plays, and I match the notes. I sing along with it for two octaves (strained at both ends), oh-ee-oh-ee-oh-ee-oh-ee-oh, sung in a mountain-shape -- low at the ends, and peaked in the middle.

Not surprisingly, singing actual songs is the more satisfying part. We choose the material together -- her, selecting material at my level, and me, picking out songs I like the sound of. Initially I gave her a list of suggestions (to help her know what types of music I was interested in singing), with little idea how difficult they actually were to master. We've abandoned all of them except for 'Crazy' by Patsy Cline. I've wanted to abandon that one too, believe me, but she thinks it's a good way to mark my progress, as I slowly start to conquer it. ('Stormy Weather' is my favorite one that she's introduced. She seems to think my voice goes well with jazz.)

As a kid I loved singing in choirs (and occasionally I sang solos, despite that I wasn't really cut out for it, voice- or personality-wise). As an adult, though, I don't have a lot of faith in my voice. It's almost as if I have no idea what will come out of my mouth; my singing voice is about as predictable as my pool game, and the variables that determine how it'll go are mysterious to me.

Which is the reason behind the lessons, really. I want to know my voice a little better, and to like it, trust it, and control it more, and to be able to feel okay about being overheard. So far, that seems to be starting to happen. And the lessons are actually really, really fun.

When I get home, I ramble to Todd about all the things we sang and what my teacher said about this or that, like it was my first day of kindergarten, and then I try out my latest material on him, a cappella, while he grins at me. Just as I sing the last note, I instantly become shy and I duck out of the room.