My signature project for STEP was singing lessons. I wanted to join men’s Glee Club at OSU and learn to sing in general for a while, so I decided that getting a voice teacher was the best way to go about it. I took these lessons in Columbus for six months with a nearby music school called Musicology.
This project has been transformational for me in many ways. I always assumed that the journey to being a good singer would not take super long and that many people who were good at it just had a talent for singing but I have realized that that is certainly not the case. After six months taking lessons, I am much better than I was before but nowhere near a pro like I thought that I would be. In fact, those that do sing professionally have often been singing and taking lessons for years and years on end, putting in the hard work, and talent hardly has to do with it for the best ones. Not only has this changed how I see singing in general but also how I view myself. I have noticed that I am a lot more confident now. I never had the opportunity to sing in high school and now, not only do I get to do it all the time, but I get to feel like I am singing well too. I was always very insecure about my singing voice, being it so low, but my voice teacher has made me feel as if it is a gift rather than a curse to have a low voice, and I enjoy singing songs that are more in my range now. It has come even so far that I am able to sing in front of other people now too, so this has been a very positive experience in terms of raising my confidence.
A big part of the project was training enough to make the auditions for men’s glee club at OSU. I always wanted to join a reputable choir, or a choir at all, but I figured that I wouldn’t have the talent to do so, let alone the confidence. In August of 2021, after about 4 months of lessons I was able to try out and join the club, which has been life changing for me. As someone who loves to sing every day of their life, join the Men’s glee club has allowed me to do so, and getting lessons is what ultimately let me do that. I have made a lot of friends in the club, who have all had very similar experiences, and that in itself had done a tremendous amount to help me to be more comfortable and more confident with my own singing voice and be more confident in general. I wasn’t used to people being impressed by a lower voice, so it was a shock and a large boost to my overall confidence since singing is such a large part of my life now.
My relationship with my vocal teacher also played a massive part in my singing confidence, and in turn with that my confidence overall. She was super nice all the time and always appraised my singing even when I thought that it was bad. I was always trying to sing songs that were too high for the voice type that I have, and it was very discouraging to not be able to sing the things that I wanted. She showed me not only how to sing better but how better to find songs that fit my voice so that it could be appreciated for what it really was. I was able to go to her to ask questions whenever I needed on how to go about singing a song or anything like that, so I never felt lost while I was unsuccessfully attempting to sing a song.
Taking lessons at this school has also allowed me to meet many other people other than my vocal teacher who are extremely talented and good at what they do who work at a music school. Talking to these people is what changed a lot of my outlooks on singing in general in terms of talent. Hearing them I always figured they were doing everything correctly, but they’d always complain to me about tons of things they did wrong after their performances that no one could hear, even though they’d been singing for decades. I then noticed that was similar to how I saw my own singing, and that most of the time what might sound bad to you is actually a good sound, but I could only ever focus on the mistakes. Making this comparison to such great singers and performers alike made me much less anxious to perform, and made me realize that the road to being a great singer is long and never quite ends. Being around people of similar interest to me has also been life changing. I always thought that there were no other people who shared my same interests of musical theatre and singing but speaking to the teachers as well as the men in Men’s Glee has made me much happier since I feel like I can talk to likeminded people about the things that I love.
This has been an extremely important milestone in my life. I have always wanted to sing ever since I graduated high school, especially well and with other people and I was afraid I was never going to have the opportunity to do so. I always lack confidence when trying new things, and the thing the scared me from trying to join choirs and such was the fact that I thought I wasn’t very good. Not only has this allowed me to join a choir, but I also think that I am good at singing now, which is something that I never thought would happen. Additionally, later in life this will give me the confidence to join choirs after college where I may have less options or opportunities in terms of singing around me. I am currently an engineering major in my third year, so there likely wouldn’t have been to many options after college since I am not a music major. Most of the time, when I am not working on engineering, I am thinking about singing or working on it at OSU now or with my vocal teacher. Singing is such a big part of my life and what makes me happy and knowing that I am good at the thing that I love to do and am able to do it for the rest of my life has had an indescribable effect on my outlook of my future.
Below is a picture of me singing with Men’s Glee at our tailgate singing for the football games, as well as a picture of one of our rehearsals, I don’t have any direct pictures of my lessons, but auditioning for Glee was a massive part and I believe it pertains to the project tremendously!
