SINGING OFF-KEY WHILE WEARING HEADPHONES

On Mon, 7 Jul 2008 09:30:58 -0400, [email protected] wrote
(in article
<[email protected]>):

> I am very curious as to why I sing off-key when I am listening to
> music through headphones. I can hear my own voice and it sounds on-key
> when I sing along. I've noticed the same thing when others are singing
> while wearing headphones. There must be a scientific reason for this.
> If anyone out there can explain I'd sure appreciate it.

Hi Kate,

Great to hear from someone else on this. I have the same problem. Fascinating
and IRRITATING. My take on it is MAYBE the volume level of the headphones is
too high and is actually pushing the eardrum slightly out of place. I have
taken the headphones off while listening to playback and have heard the pitch
change as I remove the phones.

I don't think I'm moving the phones quickly enough or far enough to create a
Doppler effect.

I have resulted to half covering my ears so I can hear the sound of my voice
in the room as well as the sound in the headphones.

I have heard from others that wearing one earpiece works for them and it's a
specific one. I don't remember which, but one side only was good, the other
side only was not good.

I thought, then, it might have something to do with right brain/left brain,
but I'm not sure.

Regards,

Ty Ford



--Audio Equipment Reviews Audio Production Services
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"Ty Ford" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:oNOdnZyYYZpcuO_VnZ2dnUVZ_trinZ2d@comcast.com...
| On Mon, 7 Jul 2008 09:30:58 -0400, [email protected] wrote
| (in article
| <[email protected]>):
|
| > I am very curious as to why I sing off-key when I am listening to
| > music through headphones. I can hear my own voice and it sounds on-key
| > when I sing along. I've noticed the same thing when others are singing
| > while wearing headphones. There must be a scientific reason for this.
| > If anyone out there can explain I'd sure appreciate it.
|
| Hi Kate,
|
| Great to hear from someone else on this. I have the same problem.
Fascinating
| and IRRITATING. My take on it is MAYBE the volume level of the headphones
is
| too high and is actually pushing the eardrum slightly out of place. I have
| taken the headphones off while listening to playback and have heard the
pitch
| change as I remove the phones.
|
| I don't think I'm moving the phones quickly enough or far enough to create
a
| Doppler effect.
|
| I have resulted to half covering my ears so I can hear the sound of my
voice
| in the room as well as the sound in the headphones.
|
| I have heard from others that wearing one earpiece works for them and it's
a
| specific one. I don't remember which, but one side only was good, the
other
| side only was not good.
|
| I thought, then, it might have something to do with right brain/left
brain,
| but I'm not sure.
|
| Regards,
|
| Ty Ford

When I was recording the members of Singers Unlimited, the very busy jingle
group in Chicago in the 70s & 80s, most preferred a single earphone for cue,
but several used double phones. Pitch was simply not an issue for any of
these great singers, whichever approach they preferred. I've had many
performers ask for speaker cue vs. headphones, claiming pitch difficulties.
The bleed from the speaker (typically a small cube speaker on a mic stand)
was far less of a problem than one might think.

Steve KIng

On Jul 7, 9:30 am, [email protected] wrote:
> I am very curious as to why I sing off-key when I am listening to
> music through headphones. I can hear my own voice and it sounds on-key
> when I sing along. I've noticed the same thing when others are singing
> while wearing headphones. There must be a scientific reason for this.
> If anyone out there can explain I'd sure appreciate it.

I think it's the Doppler effect. Press the headphone close to the ear,
you get one pitch. Start to move it away, you get a slightly different
pitch. Move it back and forth, you also get slight pitch change.
Somebody with tech background might explain it better, but I think it
has to do with the way the ear perceives low frequencies.

Another issue is that, when we sing, we HEAR OURSELVES through the
air, and that helps us keep on pitch. Through phones, we hear
ourselves THROUGH THE PHONES, not the air, so it changes the way we
are used to hearing ourselves.

My solution: Use the phones with one cup on the ear, the other cup not
on the ear. Now you can hear yourself through the air, AND hear the
backing track. Ever see pictures of famous singers holding just one
cup to the ear?

On Mon, 07 Jul 2008 06:30:58 -0700, kate38ca wrote:

> I am very curious as to why I sing off-key when I am listening to music
> through headphones. I can hear my own voice and it sounds on-key when I
> sing along. I've noticed the same thing when others are singing while
> wearing headphones. There must be a scientific reason for this. If
> anyone out there can explain I'd sure appreciate it.

Other than just not using heaphones, or one ear off....

Have you tried experimenting with different reverbs on your voice in the
headphones?

I think it's easier to pitch when there is delayed sound coming back to
judge against. Perhaps it's harder to tell how pitch is *changing*
without hearing it beat against the pitch from a few ms before. Even in a
fairly dead room there will still be some reflections, and wearing
headphones masks them.

The reverb only has to be the right kind and length for the monitoring,
get it right just for that and worry about the final reverb when you mix.

Hi,

Many years ago I had a class in which we were taught that a person's
ability to distinguish pitch gets worse as volume increases. Seems to
be true, from my experience. So at loud volume, your singing may sound
on key. Turn the volume down and you can hear pitch discrepancies you
couldn't hear when it was loud.

This is a pretty common phenomenon. Notice how often that singers
(even some very good ones) lose pitch when playing a loud live
concert. Which also explains why there are so many awful sounding live
recordings.

Dean

On Jul 7, 8:30 am, [email protected] wrote:
> I am very curious as to why I sing off-key when I am listening to
> music through headphones. I can hear my own voice and it sounds on-key
> when I sing along. I've noticed the same thing when others are singing
> while wearing headphones. There must be a scientific reason for this.
> If anyone out there can explain I'd sure appreciate it.

"drichard" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:b5fe4f2b-c0e5-43fa-afa9-1b26ea958db5@x41g2000hsb.googlegroups.com...
Hi,

Many years ago I had a class in which we were taught that a person's
ability to distinguish pitch gets worse as volume increases. Seems to
be true, from my experience. So at loud volume, your singing may sound
on key. Turn the volume down and you can hear pitch discrepancies you
couldn't hear when it was loud.

This is a pretty common phenomenon. Notice how often that singers
(even some very good ones) lose pitch when playing a loud live
concert. Which also explains why there are so many awful sounding live
recordings.

Dean

On Jul 7, 8:30 am, [email protected] wrote:
> I am very curious as to why I sing off-key when I am listening to
> music through headphones. I can hear my own voice and it sounds on-key
> when I sing along. I've noticed the same thing when others are singing
> while wearing headphones. There must be a scientific reason for this.
> If anyone out there can explain I'd sure appreciate it.


This is the one. It's volume. It's easy to underestimate volume with headphones (I've read
of radio people losing hearing because of loud headphones). The volume/pitch phenomenon is
very real. Try a low-pitched sine from a sig gen (or an audio editor or test CD or
whatever), around 150 Hz. Speakers or phones. Turn up the volume -- the pitch will rise.
Try a high frequency, and it will drop. It's quite striking.

Singers, especially amateur ones, like to hear themselves bathed in their own sound, making
it easier to lose the reference from the music, as well as the volume/pitch phenomenon. If
they can train themselves to do with less of their own voice, they will do much better.

--
Earl