Reinaldo Kazuo Yazaki 1 , Paulo Pontes 2

1 UNIFESP-EPM, Otolaryngology- Head and Neck Surgery, Division of Laryngology and Voice, Sao Paulo, Brazil

2 UNIFESP-EPM, Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, Sao Paulo

Introduction: Laryngeal respiratory posture is not a well understood event and glottic behaviour during breathing in singing is not known. It is stablished that both thyroarytenoid and cricothyroid muscles are electromyographically associated to glottal abduction, during more complex phonatory tasks as in speech. In singing, during low sustained emissions, there is a predominance of thyroarytenoid muscles action, with shorter glottal membranous portion and, in high emissions, there is predominance of crycothyroid muscles action, with longer membranous portion, as evidenced by electromyography. Will the glottal length change during breathing just after these distinct emissions?

Objective: Analize comparatively glottal configuration during inspiration after low and high vocal emissions in singers, considering glottal proportion and glottal opening angle.

Method: Choral singers from our university were submitted to telelaryngoscopy. Laryngeal images were captured during inspiration, after a sung sustained emission of the vowel /E/ as in "bed", in a high and low manner. In each of them, lengths of phonatory and respiratory portions of the glottis were measured. From the mathematical relationship of them, glottal proportion was calculated for the high and low emissions, which was compared between singers and between the two groups of emission. Glottal opening angles were also measured.

Results: Glottal proportion was signifficantly smaller during inspiration after the low emissions (p=0.01). The opening angle was smaller after high-pitched emissions (p=0.02).

Conclusions: There is difference in glottal behaviour during inspiration after low and high emissions in singers. After high vocal emissions, phonatory portion is proportionally longer than after low ones, with less abduction.

 

Key-words: Proportion, Larynx, Voice, Music, Laryngeal muscles, Stroboscopy

Sylvain Lamesch 1 , Boris Doval 1 , Michèle Castellengo 1

1 LAM-IJLRA, , Paris

Christian Herbst 1 , Jan Svec 1 , Qingjun Qiu 2 , Harm Schutte 2

1 Palacký University Olomouc, Laboratory of Biophysics, Dept. Experimental Physics, Olomouc

2 Cymo B.V., , Groningen, The Netherlands

Hanny van Lankeren 1 , Donald Miller 2

1 Zingen Zien en Horen, Voice Research, Wageningen

2 Cymo, B.V., Voice Research, Groningen

Gillyanne Kayes 1 , Johan Sundberg 2 , Graham F. Welch 3

1 Vocal Process & Institute of Education, Culture and Pedagogy, London

2 Royal Institute of Technology, Music Speech and Hearing, Stockholm

3 Institute of Education, University of London, Arts and Humanities, London

Johan Sundberg 1 , Lide Gu 2 , Jiang Huang 2 , Ping Huang 2

1 KTH, Speech Music Hearing, Stockholm

2 Singing Voice Research Institute of China Conservatory, , Beijing