The Passaggio - Understanding Your Vocal Break

The Passaggio (an Italian word meaning passage) is a popular term that denotes the mid-point between what is commonly referred to as the chest voice and head voice.

Commonly referred by untrained singers as the “vocal break”, the Passaggio is probably the biggest nemesis to singers. The inability to sing through the Passaggio without constricting or breaking the sound column is probably the #1 problem for all singers. Indeed, the entire industry of voice teaching and voice technique would not even exist were it not for the “Passaggio” and all the challenges it can give us as we try to navigate around it in our singing. Singing technique is a lot about, how do we win the battle of bridging the Passaggio successfully. The process of phonating from one vocal register to the other is referred to as “bridging the Passaggio”.

Bridging the Passaggio without constricting or experiencing a break in your singing is very difficult. It requires very excessive practice, namely, training your TVS sirens over and over again. Practicing your TVS sirens and other vocal workouts will train your muscle memory to develop great physiology and acoustics for bridging, which care the two most important components to understand and appreciate when it comes to the business of bridging from your chest voice to your head voice.

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