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As a voice specialist, I recently had the opportunity to conduct research at NIDA (National Institute of Dramatic Art) looking at vocal creak in student actors. I'll admit, I went into this study with plenty of questions: Would their voice training affect their everyday speaking patterns? Does creak show up more in casual conversation than formal speech? Here's what I discovered... What's Vocal Creak, Anyway? If you're not familiar with the term, vocal creak (or vocal fry, cr

Even for professional singers, up to 85% of their day is vocalizing for speech rather than for singing (Chapman, 2022). How we use our speaking voice can have quite an impact on our singing. Those with professional speaking jobs such as school teachers, doctors, and lawyers, who are also singers or sing as a hobby, can experience challenges, particularly with negotiating the singing registers. Speech vocal habits that can be problematic: Pressed phonation Glottal attacks To