Resonant Voice: Perceptual and Acoustic Analysis After an Intensive Lessac Kinesensic Training Workshop

Abstract

Objective: To investigate whether actors' and actresses' voices post an Intensive Lessac Kinesensic Training Workshop - ILKTW can be perceptually identified as more resonant, and to assess if the Acoustic Voice Quality Index (AVQI), the Acoustic Breathing Index (ABI), and their acoustic measures are able to indicate the classified voices as more resonant.

Methods: Eight vocally healthy English first-language actors and actresses, participants of the same ILKTW, were asked to sustain the vowel /a/ and to read a piece of the Rainbow Passage, pre and postworkshop, at a self-selected habitual frequency and intensity. The readings were divided into initial and final parts, both with 34 syllables, and combined with the vowel /a/ (3s). The pre and postworkshop recordings (pairs of the initial and final parts followed by the /a/ vowel) of each participant were randomly presented to a voice expert who rated the samples as more resonant or similar. The same samples were analyzed using the AVQI and ABI scripts.

Results: 87,5% of the initial parts and 100% of the final in postworkshop were rated by the voice expert as more resonant. Tilt was higher for the postworkshop initial parts (P = 0.036), but a correlation with the perceptual rating wasn't found. HNR was higher (P = 0.018) and jitter was lower (P = 0.017) for the postworkshop final parts. The statistical analysis comparing the perceptive and acoustic data for the final samples couldn't be applied.

Conclusion: It seems that the ILKTW has a positive impact on the development of a resonant voice and that the perceptual auditory rating was more effective to describe resonant voices than the AVQI, ABI, and its acoustic measures.

Keywords: Resonant voice— Perceptual analysis— Acoustic analysis— Actors— AVQI— ABI.