hi everyone-
I've been having a problem recently. I'm a 17 year old male baritone who sings mostly musical theatre. But lately it's been brought to my attention that my adam's apple/larynx moves to create my vibrato. It doesn't happen all of the time, and mostly when it does, it's not overly pronounced? Is this a problem? How can I fix it easily without re-doing three years of vocal training? Thanks!

Hi, and don't worry! Your larynx is supposed to move when you produce vibrato.

Vibrato is a condition where the voice is oscillating around the basic pitch, up or down about a semitone or so, and our ears like to hear about 6 - 8 oscillations per second.

Vibrato is associated with a kind of 'crying' sound which the larynx produces by tilting its top half forwards (if you have been crying sometimes you get a lump in the throat feeling, which is the feeling of the tilted thyroid cartilage). This sound is intense and emotional, and some psychologists think that is why the human ear relates to the sound.

If you 'cry' very quietly, the vocal folds thin, the thyroid tilts forward and you may find you can get your vibrato to work on very quiet sounds. This can be very effective.

If you produce a vibrato-like sound by pulsing your abdomen, you are creating a bleat by varying the air pressure. That's not vibrato.