Singing Lesson - The Larynx

Vocal Knowledge - What is the Larynx?

The larynx , or voice box, is an organ in the neck of mammals involved in protection of the trachea and sound production. The larynx houses the vocal chords, and is situated just below where the tract of the pharynx splits into the trachea and the esophagus. During singing lessons with a good singing teacher, and through your own voice training, you discover how your larynx works thereby gaining more knowledge about what your voice can do . The more singing lessons and voice training you have, the more you will become aware off the different muscular postures your larynx has. All the different postures produce a different voice qualitie. All singers should know how their instruments work (same way as a guitarist does) and this means learning a bit of applied physiology. I like to call it yoga for the throat.

Function of The Voice Box

Sound is generated in the larynx, and that is where pitch and volume are manipulated. The strength of expiration from the lungs also contributes to loudness, and is necessary for the vocal cords to produce speech.

Fine manipulation of the larynx is used in a great way to generate a source sound with a particular fundamental frequency, or pitch. This source sound is altered as it travels through the vocal tract, configured differently based on the position of the tongue, lips, mouth, and pharynx. The process of altering a source sound as it passes through the filter of the vocal tract creates the many different vowel and consonant sounds of the world's languages.

During swallowing, the larynx (at the epiglottis and at the glottis) closes to prevent swallowed material from entering the lungs; the larynx is also pulled upwards to assist this process. Stimulation of the larynx by ingested matter produces a strong cough reflex to protect the lungs.

The vocal chords can be held close together (by adducting the arytenoid cartilages), so that they vibrate. The muscles attached to the arytenoid cartilages control the degree of opening. Vocal fold length and tension can be controlled by rocking the thyroid cartilage forward and backward on the cricoid cartilage (crying and winging), and by manipulating the tension of the muscles within the vocal folds. This causes the pitch produced during phonation to rise or fall.

The larynx also acts as an air pressure value and closes off when we need to push things out of the body or lift something heavy.