AIRS 2nd Annual Conference: Seattle 2010
Title: How do singers manage vowels in relation to the laryngeal mechanism? An acoustic and linguistic
inquiry
Authors: Sylvain Lamesch, Michèle Castellengo, Boris Doval, & Luiza Maxim (LAM-IJLRA, Paris)
Introduction
Classical singers are trained to use all the vowels regardless of their predominant tessitura and laryngeal
vibratory mechanism. Comparatively, Yodellers generally choose a given set of vowels depending on the
mechanism they use: M1 (chest voice) or M2 (falsetto). In order to explore the possible relations between
the laryngeal source and the resonance cavities, we have undertaken an acoustical study of Voice Range
Profiles (VRP) - using different mechanisms (M1 and M2) and vowels - as well as a linguistic investigation
of the singers’ verbal productions.
21 male and female singers produced crescendos and decrescendos on /a/, /i/ and /o/, from C3 to C5, in
mechanisms M1 and M2. We recorded the sound signal in order to compute the vocal dynamics. VRPs
were obtained for each singer and for each vowel, in M1 and M2 separately. At the end, the subjects filled a
questionnaire concerning the vowels they prefer to sing in M1 and in M2, respectively. The questionnaire
prompted individual evaluations and comfort or technique related comments from singers.
The analysis of the questionnaire showed that singers prefer singing /a/ rather than /i/ in M1, and inversely
in M2. The study of the VRPs showed that the upper limit is 10 dB louder for /i/ than for /a/ in M1, but not
in M2. Consequently the vocal dynamic range is larger for /a/ than for /i/ in M1, and it is larger on /i/ in M2
than in M1, if compared with the dynamic range for /a/. In M1, producing a given level on /i/ could require
a higher subglottal pressure.
The processed acoustical data provided us with elements, which in turn allowed us to interpret more
accurately the singers’ verbal descriptions
After earning an engineering degree and a master degree (MSc) in musical acoustics, Sylvain Lamesch
completed his doctorate in January 2010 in the field of singing voice acoustics. His goal was to study the
relationship between a singer's perception of his or her voice and various aspects of the lyrical vocal
technique, reinforcing these observations with acoustic correlates. More generally, Sylvain is interested in
studying the relationship between the practice of singing and the acoustic descriptions of this art form. He
himself is a musician (a classical guitar player and a tenor). He has presented papers at different
international conferences as well as at summer-schools about the voice, acoustics, and interdisciplinarity.
He is a member of the French society of acoustics. Since 2008, he has organized interdisciplinary half-day
workshops on the singing voice. Website: http://www.lam.jussieu.fr/Membres/Lamesch/index.html
Bios
Michèle Castellengo (Websites: http://www.lam.jussieu.fr/Membres/Castellengo/index.html
http://www.med.rug.nl/pas/Conf_contrib/Castellengo/Castellengo_bio_touch)
Education and professional experience: Music Teacher (secondary school); High degree in musicology
(Sorbonne,1963). Doctor in Acoustics (1976, University Paris VI). Researcher at the CNRS (1982 - 2003).
Professor of Musical Acoustics at the National Conservatory of Music in Paris. Head of the « Laboratoire
d’ Acoustique Musicale (1983-2003).Presently Emeritus Director of research at the CNRS

Research: Flutes and organ acoustics (thesis). Perception of musical sounds; musical cognition. Speech

 synthesis (1967-1973) and acoustics of singing voice: intelligibility and efficiency of singing voice,
perception of short vibrated notes, vocal trill, diplophonic voice; vocal techniques related to laryngeal
mechanisms (voix mixte, Iranian tahrir).
Musical experience: Harpsichordist and organist
Papers 2009 - Roubeau B., Henrich N., Castellengo M., Laryngeal vibratory Mechanisms: the notion of
vocal register revisited; Journal of voice, 23 (4) p.425-438 2005 - Castellengo M. - Manuel Garcia jr, a
clear-sighted observer of human voice production. Logopedics Phoniatrics Vocology, 30, p.163-170 2004 Castellengo M., Chuberre., Henrich N., - Is Voix Mixte, the Vocal Technique Use to Smoothe the
Transition across the two Main Laryngeal Mechanism, en Independent Mechanism ?; Proc. of the
International Symposium on Musical Acoustics, Nara, Japan.
Luiza Maxim is a Ph.D. candidate in linguistics (http://www.lam.jussieu.fr/Membres/Maxim/index.html)
Areas of interest: Sensorial lexical descriptors, Linguistic resources and strategies used to express
sensations, analysis of expert and common sense discourse concerning sensorial knowledge, epistemic
sources related to sensations (senses, expert knowledge, common sense), social cognition, sensori-motor
grounding of cognition.
Thesis Topic: My research consists of a linguistic analysis of data selected from interviews given by
singing teachers around the notion of vocal quality and it focuses on the linguistic strategies used by
subjects to construct their knowledge in situ. The analysis is carried out at multiple linguistic levels:
semantic, epistemic, lexical, discursive, enunciative and prosodic. I also focus on the relation between the
speaker and his/her object of expertise constructed discursively. While grounding my research in a
linguistic framework, I refer to theories from epistemology and social cognition which deal with the
collective, socially distributed character of different types of knowledge (scientific and sensorial, among
them).
Grants and teaching experience: 2010 -Temporary teaching position (ATER) at Paris 3 Spring 2008
Visiting scholar at the University of Massachusetts Amherst 2006-2009 Recipient of a PH.