"The human voice is the organ of the soul."

- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

 Few things inspire and impress as powerfully as a beautiful, resonant human voice. It's remarkable how different a single world or sentence can seem, depending on who spoke it and how they uttered it. The great poverty of all written words lies in their lack of this wondrous nuance. We can impart some of it with proper punctuation, and the use of emojis can facilitate a more appropriate reading. Even so, there's always a certain magic that is lacking, a soulfulness that only the human voice can impart.

 I have no doubt that a person's voice, whether in speaking or singing, is intimately related to their general character and their present state of mind. Reductionist thinking would have us believe that a person's voice is a byproduct only of genetically determined anatomical proportions in the chest, throat and face. That these are important and play a central role cannot be denied, but they are far from the whole story, and to neglect how radically they can be altered by developmental processes (which occur throughout our lifetime) is simply ignorant. As a general principle, whenever someone says "That's just genetics" rest assured that what they really mean is "I have no idea what I'm talking about." A profoundly exagerrated role has been ascribed to genetics in our culture, while the power and ominpresence of developmental processes receives far too little attention. Resist pseudo-scientific fatalism in all its guises if you ever wish to fulfill your potential. After all, a person's voice can change quite dramatically with time, as any halfway observant person will have noticed. This routinely occurs absent any conscious effort to cultivate change. We ought to expect, therefore, that deliberate training and practice could effect change of an even more dramatic sort.

 I speak from experience. My own voice never concerned me much as a child or a young man, but eventually I got around to recording myself in my early twenties, both speaking and singing. It was a rude awakening. My voice sounded shockingly flat, nasally and hurried, whether speaking or singing. Our voices always seem more resonant to us than they do to others, as the vibrations we create in our own body when vocalizing color our perception of the sounds, while others only receive what we outwardly project. I would sporadically try exercises or sing certain music in the years following this realization, in a bid to slowly improve the quality of my voice, but it didn't have much of an impact until I bought a nice microphone and began to use it on a regular basis, comparing my own perceptions of how I sounded to the objective recordings. I found some exercises to try on YouTube and experimented with those as well. Slowly but surely my singing voice in particular became more resonant, clear and deep.

 While I'm not a great singer I'm far better than I used to be. I expect with time I will become better still. I present you now with a few samples of my singing, which I recorded earlier today. First up is The Rains of Castamere, a song from George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire that I've enjoyed listening to and singing for years:

 It's fun to sing music that has a medieval spirit about it, as it makes me feel like an old-world minstrel of sorts. Tolkien also wrote many wonderful songs in this vein, which I also like to sing. This performance lacks a certain artistry and coherence, in my estimation. The sound at several points goes a bit askew, and it could flow more smoothly between the changes in pitch and volume. Even so, it's not too bad. One day I'll be able to sing this properly.

 Now consider a more modern example, Elvis Presley's I Can't Help Falling In Love. I really like this one, because it doesn't strain my limited vocal range too terribly and it's a great one to learn for serenading the ladies 😉:

 Hardly as smooth and smoldering as Elvis, but not bad either. Once more, I feel there's a disconnect between how I sing one portion of the song and another, it lacks a certain flow and coherence. Some parts seem a bit strained or forced, whereas great singers project and resonate in a way that sounds effortless and natural. I won't be filling up arenas any time soon, but I hope you'll believe me when I tell you this is a great improvement from where I was a few years ago. I used to rush through the song too quickly, had a very nasally sound on many notes, lacked any real resonance and projected poorly. Overall it sounded timid, disjointed and strained. Alas I didn't save any recordings from back then, I was so disgusted with them I couldn't bring myself to do it!

 Our voice is in many ways a reflection of who we are and what we've done with our time and energy. Deliberate practice and training can alter it with consistent effort, but there are more subtle and natural ways a person's voice will change. As we become more self-assured and assertive in our daily life our voice will reflect this. It will become resonant, it will project more powerfully and effortlessly. We will begin to speak a bit more slowly and soothingly when we ourselves become more present and grounded. As we learn to take on more and greater responsibilites and communicate ourselves articulately our words will be increasingly tinged with a gravitas and solemnity that was absent before.

 As our general state of mind becomes more wholesome, less harried, more benevolent and less self-obsessed our every utterance will hum with a discernible warmth and radiant good will. You've surely met people like this in your life, who seem to exude wisdom, strength, forebearance and intellect just in the way they speak. It's not a frivolous thing to consider or appreciate. Our voice is always infused with the quality of our unique spirit, it broadcasts the peculiar qualities of our body and mind, it is, as Longfellow said, the organ of our soul, through which we can express all the glories and sorrows possible to us.

 Do not fret if you feel your voice is lacking. To have a feeble or discordant voice does not mean that you're somehow broken or irredeemable. It only implies that you've not yet learned how to utilize it properly. Many kind-hearted, loving, intelligent people have feeble and quiet voices because they're too self-conscious and afraid of judgment to ever develop their voice to its full potential. I was like this myself for many years. Even when I was completely alone I somehow couldn't bring myself to really project out my voice, I was embarrassed by it even then. Don't persist in this mentality. It's not healthy to leave your gifts undeveloped. You'll never know how celestial and sonorous your voice could be if you neglect stretching your boundaries, if you refuse to forge on through uncertainty and discomfort.

 I've noticed that the relationship between our voice and our character is not merely one way. As our character changes so does our voice, but the converse is also true: As our voice changes, as we learn to command it more masterfully, as we learn to express ourselves more artfully and pleasantly, our character is also changed for the better. People begin to respond to us differently than before. You will notice this if you persist in your efforts, I promise you. It is through your voice that you communicate most powerfully. It is the herald and banner-bearer of your spirit, through it the inimitable music of your soul can fan out into the world, can make itself known. Treat it with the love and respect that it deserves and you will be richly rewarded.