Hi, my name is Sam Johnson and I'm a voice teacher Go to my website vocalease.net if you'd like to sign up for
lessons with me over video chat. Today I'm going to be reacting to Ariana Grande doing Carpool Karaoke.
What I'm gonna be listening for is how I would evaluate a voice in my own lessons,
not because I hate any of it or,
some of it I might dislike and some of it I might really love, but my main goal is just to help you understand how
the voice is working through some of this,
what choices they're making, and maybe if there are some parts where they don't make the best choices.
James Corden(JC) : Do you mind if we listen to some music? Ariana Grande (AG): I don't mind. JC: Would that be OK? AG: Oh I love music.
JC: Yeah? Let's see what's on the radio.
So kind of what she's doing there is when she's singing her lower notes
her vocal cords are together and they're resisting some of the airflow. That's a very connected sound. It's not very breathy
and then she goes up to a higher note and rather than keeping her vocal folds resisting at the same amount,
she's letting them blow apart, which is why it's becoming a breathy sound.
It's a great style choice.
Work it, James!
What I love about Ariana is she's not afraid to sing high on her records.
Sometimes people seem like they're kind of scared to sing high because a lot of their
listeners won't be able to sing along as well. She doesn't really care. She is singing in a beautiful mix.
It's not getting very heavy,
which is letting her have a connected sound up to a G and all of the microphones are doing the work of letting
us hear her sound rather than having to push in order to get any sound up there.
Also just because something is higher, it's gonna be louder, so she doesn't need to push to sing a high note.
He's not yelling, he's not pushing to get any of these high notes, and that's up at like a c-sharp 5.
It's a very high note for guys.
It's a pretty high note for anyone. So, why is he able to do that? Well, what he's doing is keeping his
resistance of his vocal folds even across his whole range. So at the top, they're only resisting a little bit. It's not completely apart,
it's not falsetto.
They're barely together, but they're still together.
And then that one, it's the same note that he was doing before, but he's singing it a little bit heavier.
He's taking that same little "Ah"
Then leaning into it, "AAhhh."
But it's still the same amount of resistance. As you increase the volume,
you have to increase the airflow and the muscle together, which he does, and it's keeping the same resistance all the way through.
It's the same coordination.
She kind of moves her jaw with all of these runs. Which, I mean the jaws not a quick-moving
muscle.The jaw is not a muscle, but the muscles that move the jaw are not really the fastest ever.
They're very strong. And so sometimes engaging the jaw when you do runs like she does,
isn't the best idea. She's doing it without adding any extra tension, so it's fine.
And they're they're keeping the same resistance all the way through. It's just they've chosen a very low resistance. It's like 70%
air to only 30% muscle, which is why it's a little breathy all the way through, but it's consistently breathy all the way through.
It's not like when she they go to the higher part of these things, it's getting more breathy.
It's the exact same all the way through, and that's a very good strategy.
I love what James did for this video. He isn't trying to over sing anything. It's just
one low volume all the way through. He's not trying to sing over Ariana, and it's doing amazing things for his voice.
See and now even though he's not singing along with a girl, he's singing along with something that is being sung by a man,
he's not making it heavier.
He's not trying to be a different person based on different types of music that he's singing. He's just himself.
He knows what feels good and he stays right in there.
She's saying that whole riff on "uh" which is a very nice vowel.
What also helps with this riff is keeping the vowel the same through every note of it.
They're too good.
Basically the only thing that I would work on with either of them is jaw tension.
There are some times where Ari's jaw gets just a little bit tight or a little bit pushed out as she's singing.
But I mean everything else is so balanced,
there's not a ton to work with. It's...
They're very, very good singers and they're singing very well.
Thanks for watching!
Please like and subscribe and don't forget to leave a comment of any song that you'd like me to react to.
If you want personal lessons for you.
Go head over to my website vocalease.net and I would be happy to give you those lessons.
