Introduction

This is a love song.

Most of my songs are love songs. I am in love with the inner sounds, sometimes referred to as the sound of silence or the silence between the notes. A singing note is never clear, there is whole range of frequencies swinging along on the basic frequency, the fundamental note. It's often not noticed. Speaking and singing is usually done by quickly skipping from note to note not noticing the complexity of the soundscape of the voice. Overtone singing is all about slowing down, listening. Listen.

Throattickler

I have no idea how you, reader and listener, perceive this song. I have been singing overtones for many years and I am well versed in hearing a lot of the subtleties. And even so, it happens that I get surprised when listening back to my own recordings. The difficulty that one has to overcome is that we usually only hear the louder frequencies. For me as an overtone singer it is a challenge to make the overtones audible also for the unsuspecting music lover with a history of expectations about music. 

So what is going on?

For starters, this is one voice, no instruments. It is not recorded in a cathedral, this reverberating effect is added by me in post-production. My vocal chords produce an ongoing low drone (at 80Hz). This is called the fundamental note and all the other notes, audible and inaudible, are a reflection of this note. When you look in the spectrograph in the film, it is hard to make out the fundamenal, impossible even. The loudest parts are yellow, then red and finally dark blue, which is not audible. The fundamental is most of the time only red here, not even the loudest pitch. Above this 80Hz there is whole range of overtones swinging along but most people just hear this as one sound, closely connected to the fundamental. However, higher up, there is a bright yellow line and that is the high overtone melody.

That's not all....

In the hopes that I'm not overfeeding you with information right away.... it's more complicated, even when discounting all the frequencies just above the fundamental. I will show you.

four overtones

At about 10:30 into the song, the spectrum shows 5 yellow lines on top of each other. The fundamental and four overtones. Can one hear it? To be honest it is not all that clear. One tends to hear what stands out. One really has to make an effort to hear it. However this technique does present a richer overall  sound.

Singing several overtone melodies/drones at the same time has become my trade mark so to speak. I may dedicate another post to the inspiration to sing overtones in this style. It's a story in itself.

It was very hard to learn to sing this way, even harder than learning "normal" overtone singing. I had to keep track of several overtones in my head, control the formants separately (throat-tension, lips, tongue, soft palate), but at some point it became much easier and meanwhile it comes naturally and I can make actual songs in this uniquely personal style. Which is all I ever wanted.

Link to my Bandcamp site https://harrylieben.bandcamp.com/

Link to my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoowXeC7NjdZ0LQZKwHOzgw?