Why do I not like the sound of my own voice?
Question of the day:
“Is there a way to get used to hearing my “real” voice, or is it something that will always sound a little strange to me? Do other artists and singers go through this as well?”
Answer:
These are great questions and honestly ones that I get asked a lot. The short answer is that you will grow to like your voice more over time, but that self doubt might be a push and pull on your confidence at times.
Singers who find that their voice sounds "weird" can be largely due to what's called "bone conduction". When our vocal folds create sound that sound also reverberates inside our skull which we pick up in our inner ear. When sound resonates through bone it tends to boost the bass tones in our voice. This is why we might think our voice sounds lower to ourselves, but sounds higher when hearing it played back to us on a recording device of some kind. The voice you hear when listening back to it is how your voice ACTUALLY sounds. But before you start feeling self conscious about that thought keep in mind that this has always been how everyone perceives your voice. So it doesn't sound weird or different to other people at all. It just sounds different to you because you're use to perceiving your voice as a much lower sounding tone. It takes some time getting used to, but you do get used to it after a while.
Try to keep in mind that the concept of "liking your voice" is a combination of one part improving your singing skills over time, one part learning to be ok with making less than ideal sounds when learning how to sing, and one part building confidence in the originality of your own sound.
There are a few things that you can do build towards this.
Short Exposure
Short exposure
The more you hear your voice the more you'll get used to hearing it. Having the confidence to listen back to your voice without critically hating it is a skill in itself. And being critical about your own voice becomes more difficult when you've been along for the whole ride. This includes how your voice sounds now and how your voice used to sound when you started singing for the first time. Every single singer, no matter how famous they are, started at the beginning. And every one of those singers had a time when they sounded...less than ideal.
To provide some proof to back that claim up here is Ed Sheeran showing us that singing is more of a "skill" that we learn instead of a natural gift that we are just born with:
Now, that's not to say that there are not some people who are born with certain innate skills that come more naturally to them. But that doesn't mean that other people can't develop those skills as well with practice and time.
As an example, I remember working with a student a few years ago. This singer was particularly self conscious about his body and how he looked when he danced to the music on stage (a concern that I knew oh too well myself). I told him that it's a combination of trying out different moves that you've seen your other favorite bands do and just getting used to moving to the music in front of an audience over time. That band now tours internationally, performs to hundreds/thousands of people, and recently just had one of their songs published to a video game. It took him time, but he found his style of movement on stage and now rocks out with the best of them.
Needless to say, this is a concern that is not only common, but is a natural part of the growth for every artist.
Improving Vocal Skills
One of the biggest issues people feel self conscious about is the lack of vocal skill they feel in certain areas of their singing. This is also a natural part of progression. No body likes the sound of their voice cracking, breaking, squeaking, going off pitch, sounding too screechy, etc. But in order to improve these skills you have to be willing to make these unideal sounds because that's the key to working through them. If I wanted to improve my strength, but I hated how it felt to lift weights or do any kind of strength training then it's going to be tough for me to improve my ability to lift anything heavy.
I've been singing now for...12345...25 years...wait that can't be right!?...oh man I'm old lol. Apparently I've been singing for 25 years now. When I first started I certainly had my issues. I belted too loudly, I strained, my voice would crack, and, to know surprise, I felt very awkward on stage. But over time, with practice, with patients I went on to have 4 songs played on radio, tour North America, share the stage with many of my idols. And it was not because I was naturally gifted. It was because I was stubborn enough to want it more than how bad I thought I was at all points in time.
Raw vs Processed Vocal Recordings
I'm pretty sure that almost every singer will tell you that one thing they hate the most is the sound of their raw unprocessed vocal recording. What this means is that the recording has no effects on it. No reverb, no compression, no processing, no auto tune, nothing. It's just the "raw" vocal take. This is why most of your favorite singers sound so good when you listen to them on their recordings. Their vocals have been processed. That's not their raw sound. My advice here would be to learn how to process your vocal recordings a bit. Learn how to add the right amount of reverb (which you do well in this recording). Learn how to add "compression" onto your voice (and learn what "compression" is lol). Find a way to process your voice so it sounds the way you like it to. And if you ever need to listen back to it to make sure your technique is correct you can always turn those effects off for a moment to listen to your raw vocal and then turn them back on again.
Now, that being said, there are some singers who have amazing sounding "raw" vocals. Hailey Williams would be one of those singers. However, she did not get there because she was naturally gifted. She worked to constantly improve her voice and still uses a singing coach to this day to ensure that her voice is remaining healthy and functioning properly. The last thing she wants to have to think about when she's on stage performing for thousands of people is whether or not her voice is going to hold up properly.
My advice here would be to learn how to process your vocal recordings a bit. Learn how to add the right amount of reverb (which you do well in this recording). Learn how to add "compression" onto your voice (and learn what "compression" is lol). Find a way to process your voice so it sounds the way you like it to. And if you ever need to listen back to it to make sure your technique is correct you can always turn those effects off for a moment to listen to your raw vocal and then turn them back on again.
The main point here is that art is a skill that is built more than a skill that is just "given" to someone. But truthfully the "fun" is in the journey trying to better these skills (I put "fun" in quotations because sometimes it's not always fun lol). When I started learning how to do stand up comedy, one of the most valuable lessons I learned early on was to be ok with the silence when a joke does not work. That's part of developing a joke. If you get a laugh the next time you tell that joke you take note of how you said that joke this time around and try doing it that same exact way the next time. If it gets a laugh again the next time you tell it then you've landed on something that works.
I learned all of this from taking improv comedy classes. Improv taught me, not how to be funny, but what to do and how to deal with the times when I'm not funny. When I try something that doesn't work. It taught me how to not be in my head so much and to trust myself and trust the process. I think that's part of this whole rant as well. Learning to trust yourself. Trust yourself that someone will like the sound of your voice. Trust in yourself that you will get better over time. Just trust yourself. And it helps to love what you're doing as well 😄