Like Ursula for Good: Vocal Health and Karaoke Singing Tips with Vocal Coach Katherine Werbiansky from Voice Revolution

Like Ursula for Good

adam wainwright: Hello and welcome back to "The Greatest Song Ever Sung (Poorly)," the podcast that takes karaoke exactly as seriously as it should be taken. I'm your golden voiced Romeo, Adam Wainwright.

ed cunard: I drink whiskey and gargle with razor blades. I'm Ed Cunard.

adam wainwright: Ah, the razor blades and whiskey never fails and never fails.

ed cunard: It's how I get this beautiful tone that I've been working on for decades.

adam wainwright: It is a beautiful tone and it really is. Top of the show, not doing anything with karaoke, but can I tell you what has captured my attention recently?

. Do you know the Fritos barbecue chip?

ed cunard: I'm aware of their existence. Yes.

adam wainwright: You should be aware of their existence. They are the best tasting corn ship ever.

Okay. And the thing is, they've been so regionally locked and they keep discontinuing them and bringing 'em back seasonally. So I'll think about them and just not be able to find them anywhere. Like High, Low, couldn't find them anywhere. And recently, the most exciting thing I learned the other day is that they're not bringing 'em back on a limited time basis.

Right now everybody, you can go buy Fritos barbecue chips in stores on your shelves right now and they're staying permanently. Ed, you need to go out and find, I was so excited to hear this, like, it's so silly cuz it's a chip, but god damn, I was so pumped. That was it. I just wanted to get that off my chest.

ed cunard: I'm glad you found something that brings you joy.

adam wainwright: I, It really does. It brings me so much joy. So much joy. You know what else would bring me joy?

ed cunard: No, Adam. What's that?

adam wainwright: If our listeners would leave reviews on Apple Podcasts Podchaser, or Goodpods, I think that would bring me joy, even if it's a bad review. We love a good, we had our fa, our favorite reviews, the three star review that we've gotten.

ed cunard: You want a happy Adam, right? You want a happy Adam? Leave us a review. Make an Adam happy.

adam wainwright: It makes me as happy as Fris barbecue chips. Oh yeah. You know what else makes me happy Ed?

ed cunard: I'm guessing it's when we quiz each other with trivia and, and play obnoxious music.

adam wainwright: You are goddamn right. Ed Trivia brings me joy. So here's what you're gonna get today. Five trivia questions based on the episode's topic with the varying degrees of difficulty. Today's episode topic is sounding better at karaoke, so keep that in mind. Each question is worth one point. So the top score for any round is five points. If you get stuck, you can ask for one hint per game. Even if you get all the questions wrong, you can still win by answering the impossible question. Get that one right in into get all five points. But remember, even if you save your hint, there are no hints for the impossible bonus.

Got all that. Ed,

ed cunard: Yeah, I think I'm familiar with the format.

adam wainwright: I'm glad to hear it. And speaking of things you're gonna be glad to hear, it's probably not this.

Asking you, asking me, asking you.

Singing real.

So, um,

ed cunard: We are an audio podcast. I just wanna say that, Adam just got to watch me spasm with laughter at that. That well done that. That was so beautifully awful.

adam wainwright: I need, I need to practice my false set up. I'm gonna get better Ed, so we'll just consider that practice in the name of the podcast. So here's what I was thinking today, Ed, and I, I, I, you know what? Taking care of your voice, I, I went a lot of different ways and I think there's just so many beautiful voices out there, and the one demographic I feel like we're missing.

So we're missing all the young people, Ed, where, where, where are the young people? Our trivia today is courtesy of Teen Vogue, where they gave us by category the top karaoke songs for this generation. So I'm gonna play you a ten second clip of a song, and you need to give you the name of the song and the artist.

ed cunard: I am terrified, but I'm looking forward to it.

adam wainwright: Even the impossible bonus today ties into the same format. I didn't stray. So I'm gonna play you 10 seconds and just let you guess a song. And if you get it, you get the impossible bonus side. It seems like a pretty sweet deal to me,

ed cunard: yeah, let's give it a shot.

adam wainwright: I'm gonna give you the category. You're even gonna get a little clue. So this is the best karaoke song, one of the best karaoke songs according to Teen Vogue for a group. I'm gonna give you 10 seconds and then you have toguess.

So here's the first clip.

ed cunard: Okay.

adam wainwright: Yeah.

That is 10 your ten second clip. Ed, what do you got?

ed cunard: For a group. Is that

Destiny's Child?

adam wainwright: It is not Destiny's Child. No Ed. That is "Don't Let Go Love" by En Vogue.

ed cunard: Oh, geez.

adam wainwright: I was not kind today, just so you

know.

ed cunard: good

adam wainwright: The category for this one is best duets. According to Teen Vogue, this is one of the best duets that you can sing.

Yes.

Oh.

ed cunard: Yeah. No, no, no. You know, actually, let me ask the hint on this one cuz maybe

adam wainwright: Oh, the hints just another 10 seconds of the song yet.

ed cunard: great.

adam wainwright: That's because if the, the intro didn't get you with anything, I'll, I'll add something to it.

oh.

It's just the cruel that things like it's not helping.

All right. I gave you 20 seconds right there,

Ed, and

ed cunard: help in

adam wainwright: One of the, one of, Okay, here's, here's the clue. I will say that one half of the duet, the song is from 50 Shades of Gray and one of the halfs of Duet is one of the biggest female pop stars in the world.

ed cunard: Taylor Swift.

adam wainwright: That is one half of the duet. Yes. Do you know the, do you wanna take a guess at the name of the song?

ed cunard: Oh God, no. No,

adam wainwright: The song's name is, I Don't Wanna Live Forever by ZAYN and Taylor Swift.

ed cunard: Okay. Yeah. Great.

adam wainwright: All right, number three. This is your contemporary hot track ad for those karaoke nights.

ed cunard: Oh, is Lizzo.

adam wainwright: This is what's name of song.

They gotta be great.

ed cunard: It's "Truth Hurts," right?

adam wainwright: "Truth Hurts." It's ding, ding, ding. There you go. You got, wanna add, See your hip. You got the contemporary one. You didn't get the duet of the group, but you know your contemporary stuff. The top three. Didn't think you'd get, Or maybe the third one. This, it got progressively easier, I think today.

Cause I'm, I'm like super positive that you're gonna get this one. This is your throwback song according to Teen Vogue.

When an irresistible force.

ed cunard: That's Sammy Davis Jr's version of Something's Gotta Give.

adam wainwright: Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. That is 100%

ed cunard: Of course I got the old people one.

adam wainwright: I knew you were gonna get the old people one. I have pretty, I have a lot of faith. You're gonna get the hip hop and r and B one, which is also next, and here it is.

ed cunard: That would be, "Drop It Like It's Hot." And that's Snoop Dogg.

adam wainwright: Snoop Dog and Pharrell Williams, 100%. Ding, ding, ding. Congratulations. Edge. You got three outta five. See, you're down your hip according to Teen Vogue, and

ed cunard: I got the, I got the throwback once. , let's be fair.

adam wainwright: well. I mean, you got Lizzo,

you got truth hurts. Yeah. Okay. You got a little bit of everything. There's still the impossible bonus.

You can get five out of five. What I will say about this week's impossible bonus is a little preamble, is the thing I love about the impossible bonus is that. It's not impossible for everybody, including our listeners. There's gonna be some listeners for our impossible bonus that are gonna get it right away, but we really get to play on each other's weaknesses when we do the impossible bonus.

 So, just as a clue, what I did for the impossible bonus today in the spirit of this, and I went and made sure there was a karaoke track that exists for this, is I looked up the number one country song in America right now,

And that is what this ten second clip is from is, and as of October, 2022, this is the number one country song in America. I name that song, that's the impossible bonus.

ed cunard: That would be. " She thinks my tractor is a solid six, but the personality of my tractor and the fact that my tractor has a timeshare in Aruba brings it to an eight." I don't, I don't know Adam.

adam wainwright: I would listen to that song, Ed. The, the personality of my tractor, She thinks my tractor's a six. But the personality and the fact that my tractor has a timeshare in Aruba makes it an eight. That's hell of a country song Ed. Like I said, for the, I, I figure it was impossible. Cause you're, you don't listen to a ton of country music.

I knew you weren't listening to Modern Country. So I'm like, this is a great, impossible question, but I guarantee you somebody at home for that first note knew that that was "Wait in the Truck" by Hardy and Laney Wilson

ed cunard: Yeah,

I mean, I mean, it had a, it had a truck, so I mean that's, That's good.

adam wainwright: two outta three ain't bad and neither is three outta five Ed.

Good work today. I think you're well ahead in the scoreboard, but I'm still gonna try to make up some ground next week.

ed cunard: I have faith in you

adam wainwright: You shouldn't. It's foolish.

All right, Lead us in. I just talked a lot. Lead us into this topic. What are we talking about today?

ed cunard: Today we are talking about. Improving your singing for karaoke and taking care of your vocal health is part of that because today we're talking to Katherine Werbiansky, who's a vocal coach out of the Chicago area, who also loves karaoke.

She had some great advice for us, and we are going to pass some of our own advice onto you right now. So this is actually an episode with things you can do to take care of your vocal health and to perform better at karaoke.

adam wainwright: That's something I'm interested in. Ed, how do I start? What's the first thing? , listen, I do a lot of things. I have some pretty severe allergies. I, I used to smoke, like I, I have constant tension from my workplace. , I talk just a lot and sing a lot, uh, and including just screaming for no reason are these things, good things for me.

ed cunard: My God, Adam, those are all the things that you do not want to do to take care of your vocal health that. Literally the worst thing you can do. And that explains that trivia intro so much.

adam wainwright: Yeah, I, I, Oh God. I did. And I didn't know. I didn't know.

ed cunard: Yeah. Things like smoking, being around allergies that affect your vocal chords, meaning like for some people that would be like cats or pollen, anything that can trigger one of those allergies that involves the coughing, the sore throat, all of that stuff we're not talking about like the, you eat it, you go into anaphylaxis, you die. Allergies, those are also

bad for your voice because you're, You know, then deceased. But things like that, screaming can be very bad for it. Really anything that can damage. Those fragile cords

adam wainwright: It, it happens too, because I have played roles in different shows on stage where it required me to scream or yell or something along those lines, and there's an art to it. I've, I've had seen people that had to scream on stage and because they weren't screaming properly the way that they were abusing their vocal chords, just screaming once.

Can, can ruin your voice. Like it'll shut, your vocal chords will shut down.

ed cunard: how do you scream properly?

adam wainwright: It's from your chest, Ed., it's breath. It's not, it's not pushing. When you're pushing that air through your, neck, if you, you're bringing it from your chest then down low, you're reducing the amount of stress that's happening on your vocal chords cause of the way you're producing air.

But a lot of people, when they're screaming, they wanna do it from like their neck. They wanna push all that air out and like they're stressing their vocal chords to get the sound. And that's, that's where damaging comes from. So there's actually a way to yell and scream properly when you're on stage.

ed cunard: I mean, that's actually just good singing advice in general. sing from your core, not from your throat. Learn where that chess voice is and go from there. Speaking of good singing practices to keep your singing for karaoke better and your throat healthy is warming up a little bit.

Like some people will, I'm gonna save it. I'm gonna save it all for the bar and for the crowd. If you're driving there, sing along in the car.

adam wainwright: that's what happened to me today. Then when I was recording that Stinger, I was like, I'm gonna save it all for later. I'm saving it all for the episode. I knew I was gonna record this episode later, and I needed this beautiful timbre to come through, and so I didn't wanna throw out my voice by singing too pretty for the intro.

ed cunard: That is a good save. I, uh, I, I like that. I like your swagger. I like the way that you have, just owned that performance and I love your timbre. It's

adam wainwright: yeah, it would've, I consider it my warm up for recording this episode, so you're welcome everybody after I meet? Nope. Okay. Mm-hmm.

ed cunard: But yeah, but work up and down your range too. for someone like Adam and I, that's gonna be not just singing Johnny Cash in the car, but you know, work up a little bit. You know, Sing some, sing some REM, Sing some Better than Ezra. Sing some Pearl Jam, sing some.

adam wainwright: Okay, now name would be on the stuff for the nineties.

ed cunard: A band that's not from the nineties. Uh, yeah, Sing some Beatles, Adam. That's the

adam wainwright: There we go. We

went. We, Yeah. Why not Listen, your vocal cords are just like any other muscle in your body. for those of you that run, , you stretch before you run, you stretch before you're gonna do any kind of physical activity. to get your body ready for the physical activity, you're gonna perform singing's the same way.

You don't wanna go crazy when you're warming up. You don't need to be trying to shriek the darkness, as your warm up, but, you know, get it ready. Karaoke evenings a workout, so you want your vocal chords ready before the workout. What else do you normally do when you're working out Ed?

ed cunard: I listen to podcast while I'm working out.

adam wainwright: We know you listen to podcasts. We get it. Podcast. Okay, We, we understand, but I'm talking about working out. What else goes into it? You stretch, you go work out. Is there any other important element that may apply to taking care of your vocal chords associated with it?

ed cunard: Yeah, Adam, there is you, you need to hydrate. And by hydrate I don't just mean drinking something. I mean it, it should be water. So karaoke obviously happens in bars and alcohol is served in bars, but. Throughout the day and maybe even throughout the night, you want to drink water to make sure that you're hydrated and that your vocal cords are lubricated enough because you can't directly impact the moisture in your vocal cords by drinking something on the spot.

It has to be something that's in your system. just to let you know right now, I'm to take care of my voice. I am drinking water while we're recording.

adam wainwright: Yes, A as am Ed, we're both drinking water. We're we're responsible podcast hosts by hydrating with water.

ed cunard: Water by Miller Light

adam wainwright: Water by Miller Light. It's, it's, it's a special kind of water, that's for sure. The next topic, I guess we're kind of moving out of the season, but in the summer it can be, it can be pretty awful because humidity can really get you at.

Huh?

ed cunard: Well, actually no, humidity is better for your vocal cord

adam wainwright: Uh, we want the

humidity.

ed cunard: We, so if you really want to take care of it, don't let your house or apartment be super dry all the time. Run a humidifier.

adam wainwright: By humidifier, you wanna sink karaoke? You heard it here first.

ed cunard: what else can somebody do, Adam, that you, that you rarely do

adam wainwright: First off, at Rude. Rude. you can rest your voice. no talking, singing, whispering. Just get comfortable with silence. Get comfortable listening to our voices so you don't have to speak so you can listen to the greatest song ever ung poorly. And just give your voice of rest. And don't try to whisper sweet nothings cuz whisperings actually really rough on your vocal cords.

ed cunard: was the thing that surprised me the most. I, I do not know why, but it's bad for them. And I would've thought that like talking, screaming, all that stuff. But whispering is actually, Really bad when you're trying to do vocal rest versus just staying silent.

adam wainwright: So no whispering sweet. Nothings to this, like while listening to the greatest song ever song. Poorly. That's all right.

ed cunard: And we already covered it, that like alcohol smoking, two things that are often found in bars or just outside them. They're actually kind of bad for your voice, but we're not gonna tell you not to engage in your vices. We love our vices. Karaoke is functionally a vice of ours, but just know that it's not the best thing for your vocal health and if you want to fucking do it anyway.

adam wainwright: Yeah, that's what I mean. You're an adult. Like make a decision. We're giving you tips to take care of your vocal chords. If you're gonna karaoke like shit, I wanna smoke and drink, then smoke and drink, do some karaoke. We love it. At either way, we're just giving you tips. If you wanna improve your vocal.

ed cunard: I mean, Frank Sinatra smoke and drank through his entire singing career, but then again, if you listen to his early stuff on Columbia and then his later stuff on capital, you can hear the difference that that had made.

adam wainwright: Yeah, 100%. And the, the number one rule is if your voice hurts, if your vocal chords, or if you're in any kind of distress, if you have a sore throat, just don't, don't sing that night. Be a spectator clap, drink. Just, just don't push your vocal chords any further.

ed cunard: Because if you do that, there's a good chance that you're gonna end up sounding less like Adam and more like me. But, we mentioned last episode that I found a song that I could do at karaoke that I couldn't find anywhere else. And this was at, , Mixwell's in Cincinnati.

And I got a little clip of me and my friend Ari doing Jim Carroll Band, "People Who Died," which crosses something off my karaoke bucket list. But follow that advice, and you will not sound like this.

Beat the rat by on some, I know which D, but shopping for the next day got.

God.

And the thing I love about Ari is, she made that stage into a mosh pit while we did that,

adam wainwright: Hell

yeah,

ed cunard: I, think Ari can make a mosh pit anywhere,

adam wainwright: That's a unique talent to have, but a valuable one.

ed cunard: So you don't wanna sound like that, but there are things that you can do to improve your singing. So, going back to taking care of your vocal health, Adam, what's one way that you can improve how you sing over?

adam wainwright: just take care of your voice. If you have your vices that you engage in a karaoke night every now and then, that's great. Practice good vocal health when you're not there, take some of 'em so quiet. Don't push your voice too hard. warm up if you are going to karaoke night.

So it's a lot of really simple steps that can really improve it. you can find vocal exercises online actually, that will strengthen your voice and kind of help with your syncing. It's pretty amazing.

ed cunard: It's weird how, if you like exercise and practice something. How you just get better at it

naturally.

adam wainwright: you really

ed cunard: It's weird. It's weird how that works. You put time in and you get better at things. It's, it's so odd. going back to also what we talked about in the taking care of your vocal health thing. , work up and down your range, play in your different registers.

Uh, That's going to strengthen all parts of your vocal chords, not just the part that you typically sing in. So don't always go deep. Sometimes bring it up a notch or, or, or vice versa. If you or somebody who usually sings in your upper register, bring it down a notch.

adam wainwright: Bring it down a notch. Oh, yeah. It ties to registers, it ties to the exercises. Shows that I've done before, we go out and speak in front of a group of people. Cuz a lot of times, we'll have microphones on for an auditorium, but you're also taught that if microphones go out, there's an audio problem the show must go on.

So you need to learn to project and push your voice. Normally the cas gets together and they, we do some vocal exercises. One of the ones that really comes to mind as far as register goes and just warming up the voice is, somebody will make a noise, like literally any noise, and they'll direct it at somebody and that person needs to repeat the noise and send a different noise to someone else.

 So it increases dynamics and it also really pushes your voice, cuz you can get a zip or you can get a, you know, and that's what it is. So you never know what you're gonna get, you know, really explores the like, peaks and valleys of your voice and get you ready to perform.

ed cunard: And, , when you guys are doing that, are you standing or certain way or are you

adam wainwright: We're, I mean, we're always standing and. There's some tips you can do, you want your feet shoulder with a part. Make sure your shoulders are in line with your hips and your hips are in line with your feet. So stand up straight and tall. Make sure your chest is comfortably lifted, and make sure you're not leading backwards or forwards and so you don't pass the fuck out.

Allow your knees to bend slightly.

ed cunard: That's actually a thing that surprises me, like I did not know that. If you lock your knees, you're more likely to pass out.

adam wainwright: I didn't learn that until I was in the military and watched a lot of people do it.

ed cunard: I wonder why that is. science pals let us know. tell us why we shouldn't lock our knees.

adam wainwright: Yeah. Tell us why we shouldn't lock our knees. Come on the show. Actually explain it to us. We'd love to hear from you

 Just another quick tip that I picked up on, because my, my range just isn't high. Like, I don't know if you could tell from the stingers that I do and stuff like that are listening to me, but my voice isn't high ed.

ed cunard: I did not know that after all these years. I did. I did not know that until just now.

adam wainwright: your ears are broken and that's not something we can fix today. Then we're not gonna, we don't have no tips for that one. But we learned that. Sing in your range, and if it's not in your range, fuck it, put it in your range. we found out that it's easier for me to sing a song by Carrie Underwood and lower the key in a Carrie Underwood song than it is for me to try to lower the key in a Sam Smith song, for example.

Or, uh, John Legend song. I mean love John Legend as Sam Smith. The way, I don't know what it is. I'm sure somebody with way more music knowledge can explain it to me, but I can't adjust that range as easy as I can adjust, Carrie Underwood or Adele or somebody like that. Ed, do you have similar experiences?

ed cunard: yeah, I, I, I know I've mentioned it before, but for me it's Al Green, drunk me very much thinks he can sing al green songs and he certainly can't. But drunk me can sing J

adam wainwright: Ooh.

ed cunard: drunk me's not trying to sing like Jewel. And going back to, John Legend, man, I. Love John Legend, but when you sing some of his songs in our range, it gets really boring.

It's a boring song in our range, but, "All of Me" does not work very well in our range.

adam wainwright: Well, Ed, well, we can have a completely different discussion about why that doesn't work yet. It's because of the, the range you have to do there. It's that climb like during the course with the Oh yeah. That song starts so comfortably in our range that it's really deceiving.

Then you get into the chorus where he's climbing and falling and it's just a nightmare.

ed cunard: Yeah. I, I, I think that's what I, that's a problem when I do it, is I, I don't have as big of a range, so I already adjust it down in the beginning and I'd never leave , I never leave that range.

 So it ends up being pretty monotone. Yeah.

adam wainwright: Oh man, I'm so curious. I wanna hear you sing this now, but it ed, so let's just say, I wanna really be able to sing "All of Me" by John Legend. This is now the new thing that is, is on my mind. I wanna sing "All of Me", John Legend, but I, I've gotta, I gotta start or I don't know where to start. What's, what's the best advice you can give me?

ed cunard: Don't listen to two chuckle heads with a karaoke podcast. That's the best advice I can give you. We know a little bit through research. We know a little bit through practice, but we are not experts. We stress this all the time. Go see an expert. Honestly, if you're in the Chicago area, go see Catherine voice revolution.com.

See a professional. Not us. We're fun. We'll have a lot of fun if we all go out together, but we're not gonna make you any better at the actual notes and breath control and singing. We'll just make sure you have a good time.

adam wainwright: Hell. Yeah. We'll make sure you have a good time. so I wanna wrap this up, Ed, I think because it's, it's about that time, but I wanna wrap it up with the story real quick just to show the value a professional can give to you. Okay. Listen, there's restrictions to budgets.

We get it. But here's what a vocal coach can do to you. And this is around Andrew Garfield and "Tick, Tick, Boom." Okay, so Andrew Garfield played Jonathan Larson in "Tick, Tick, Boom." And when Andrew Garfield found out that Lynn man, while Miranda was gonna direct this, he had his agent reach out to Lynn and say, Hey, you know, Andrew's really in interested in playing Jonathan Larson. What do you think? What are you interested? And Lynn Manwell Miranda's response to this was, I love Andrew. Can he sing? And the agent said, Let me get back to you. When I talked to Andrew, got back to Lynn and said, "when are you recording?"

Six months from now. Yeah, Andrew can sing. Andrew couldn't sing a lick before taking on Jonathan Larson in "Tick Tick Boom" and in six months he went from that to what you hear in that musical. So with vocal coach, with vocal training, anybody can go out there and they can learn to sing either like Jonathan Larson or John Legend.

And I think a great person to really introduce you to all of that and starts talking specifics and really get you started is gonna be our next guest. So I'm gonna suggest we cue the guitar and get onto the interview

 Katherine Werbiansky interview

Adam Wainwright: While Ed and I are qualified to make your karaoke nights more fun and to help get you up on stage, one thing we're absolutely not qualified to do is help you sing better while you're up there. while some people will go to a vocal coach to get better at karaoke, not a lot of vocal coaches are interested in karaoke themselves.

 but our guest today is different. She. Loves it. Her practice covers a wide variety of vocal coaching, from singing to gender affirming voice care, stress relief, and more. Katherine Werbiansky,. Welcome to the greatest song ever sung Poorly.

Katherine Werbiansky: Thank you for having me. Glad to be here.

Adam Wainwright: We're so excited to finally crack this nut right now and talk to a vocal coach. Aren't we Ed?

Ed Cunard: It's been one of our dream topics, since we started this.

Adam Wainwright: So we're living in a dream world right now, and part of any dream, I feel like there's a beginning to any dream. Just like a dream, a karaoke journey has a beginning. Katherine, what's your karaoke origin story? How did you get started? What's your earliest memory?

Katherine Werbiansky: Of karaoke Specifically, I would say it is a Girl Scout dance. It's third grade, it's tlc. It's probably waterfall. Don't go chase waterfalls. And I'm just feeling myself, you know? And like, yeah, this is it.

Adam Wainwright: that is, that's a great intro for sure. That's one of my favorite origin stories. I think Ed.

Ed Cunard: It also makes me feel old. Cause I was like third grade waterfalls. Oh no. Oh no.

Adam Wainwright: , as we alluded to in the introduction, you're a vocal coach. so you're feeling yourself in waterfalls. Is that the beginning of how you decide you were gonna get into vocal coaching? Or how did the vocal coaching side of it start?

Katherine Werbiansky: vocal coaching side. I mean, music has been a huge, huge part of my life and my family. It's always been, everybody in my family plays an instrument. We grew up in a, uh, You Ukranian Orthodox Church, which is kicking it pretty old school, so it's like me and a bunch of old Babas and choir singing

So that I think that kind of brought me and into the musical realm and really trained my ear. It was always like my go to therapy for me. First therapeutic tool I think was voice, and then karaoke was like, All right, here's this communal outlet of music. That's outside of church and outside of that kind of realm.

So to have community and singing together in one realm was always really powerful to me. the vocal coaching side of it, then, Came after a bit of a career in opera and trying that hat on for a bit, and that was a fun, fun ride. But hard to sustain, it was tough on my mental health. So switching over to more of a vocal coaching thing has been my, , passion for about the past seven, eight years and teaching voice and bringing these kinds of tools.

Your everyday artist is my favorite thing to do, so everyone can feel like a fucking rock star at karaoke.

Ed Cunard: We love that we, we all want to feel like rock stars. One thing that I love about, you coming on the show in particular is a lot of vocal coaches will, charge people to make them better singers for karaoke, but still have a lot of disdain for karaoke as a practice. What is it that you love about karaoke and why do you think other people.

Look down on it.

Katherine Werbiansky: It's a nitty gritty answer. I think we live in a society, particularly in America, that makes singing something that has to be deeply specialized versus something that is an inherent part of the human experience, right? Like our voice is our oldest friend. It's the oldest way that we have healed.

In every ancient civilization. Sound and movement is a huge part of it, and doing it communally is a huge part of it. So just to see, voice teachers get down on karaoke kind of, you know, gets under me a little bit because I think that's the exact opposite of what the message should be. It should be empowering students to use their voices in any way that uplifts their sense of artistry and self expression.

So I think that just means they should take that shit to their own therapist, . Figure out what they're projecting.

Adam Wainwright: I actually love that a whole lot. So as a vocal coach and a teacher, once people find that out, they must immediately have questions, right? I'm, I like they have to have questions. So when people approach you and they find out you're a vocal coach or teacher, what's the number one question you get asked with in terms of becoming a better singer?

Because I'm guessing you get asked a question, How can I become a better singer? What specifically do people think they need help with and what do you often see? What's the most common trend?

Katherine Werbiansky: A lot of people come to me because they relate to the story that I share with them, that when I was growing up, I was, selectively mute until the, about the age seven or eight. It's cuz I'm on the autism spectrum now, knowing now later in life. And I think they relate to that sense of being silenced or not being sure how to use their voice in public.

And so a lot of folks come see me cuz they're like, how do I. Not want to absolutely pee my pants when I wanna get on stage and sing. And so a lot of it is feeling good and safe in our nervous system and in our bodies. And then when it comes to singing, a lot of the number one question is how do I find that confidence?

And then how do I find power? Power is like a big theme for people. I wanna feel powerful in my voice. So that's kind of the first. First foray into technical world is finding out what vocal power means to them, and then kind of backtracking and making a plan to get them there.

Adam Wainwright: does vocal power mean to.

Katherine Werbiansky: Ooh, it means autonomy, agency ability to express what you need in an artistic and uplifting way.

Ed Cunard: That actually rolls into something I wanted to ask. A big focus of your practice is on, healing and mental health. How does singing translate to that?

Katherine Werbiansky: we can think about the fact that trauma from what we know lives, not just in this swirl of thoughts and emotions and things in our mind, but it lives in the body and in Western society. We've been so. From and disassociated from our bodies through forces of late stage capitalism, , white supremacy, all kinds of things that separates us from our sense of self and body.

so I think stepping back in to. Being embodied and being in a place where you feel like you can make choices. Like, Oh, I'm gonna pick this song. I'm gonna attempt to use my voice in a little bit of a louder way. Even just making these kinds of decisions in a vocal coaching session gives people a small dose of reclaiming their voice and their power and their agency to make choices for themself, and that's the very thing that trauma.

Takes away from us is agency and is choice. So through music and your artistic spirit, trusting and building that relationship, that as you sing, as you make these choices of how you wanna express, you're building a relationship to your body and to yourself, and you're slowly learning. How to take up your space again after something traumatic, once a big trauma or a bunch of little tea traumas have built up in you, in your experience over time.

 I kind of like imagine it like Ariel, right? Voice trauma. She's lost it and I'm like, and I'm like, Come here, we'll help you find it again. Yeah, like a reverse evil. See witch like earn will love for good

Adam Wainwright: Ursula Love for Good is not gonna be my costume. My, that, that is, I was looking for a Halloween costume. It's gonna be Ursula Love for Good Now. Like I love that so much.

Ed Cunard: That might be the title of the episode,

Adam Wainwright: right there. Ursula for good? Yes. Oh man. You travel and when you, when you go and travel, whether it be under the, the sea or otherwise, Let's see what I did there under the, No.

Okay. It's fine. So when you're doing karaoke, when traveling, what does hearing the locals in a place jam out tell you about the area you're in and, what kind of things can you learn from doing karaoke while traveling?

Katherine Werbiansky: Oh yeah. I think just by hearing like the song choices in an evening, you get a feel for like what folks are going through, what's in the general zeitgeist for that, that place, what the flavor of the town is like if you're somewhere and you're getting just tons of nostalgic nineties country. You know, just kind of getting a little fla, little flavor of like, Oh, that's what this little small place is about and this is what's helping them relate and get through.

And it just kind of paints a picture for me of what it might be like to to live there.

Adam Wainwright: I don't know if I've ever looked at it that way before. Like it just that like kind of flipped a perspective. I'm gonna be more aware of that the next time I go to a karaoke night.

Ed Cunard: I think you should be. I mean, I usually look at the vibe of a night, but I never thought about. It as the vibe of a locale before. So thank you for bringing that in. I just wanna follow up with that. You're based in Chicago. What's the vibe of Chicago and karaoke? What's the story that that city is telling?

Katherine Werbiansky: Oh my gosh, it's great. . It's loud and bawdy. There's a lot of healthy rage there, and Chicagoans are trying to figure out how to not just like, beat the shit out of each other and figure out how to be like, No, we're gonna sing about it instead. , I think there's, uh, I think there's a nostalgic, There's definitely like you can feel the age range in karaoke bars right now being, you know, definitely between this like 25, 35 vibe and it's just like nineties and early two thousands.

You feel like you're at like a sleepover all the time. Again, you know, Except this time everyone's super wasted,

Ed Cunard: Yeah, the, the one time I was in Chicago looking for karaoke, I failed so hard and, karaoke was canceled due to some like sporting event, and my friends introduced me to Malort.

that's, I was like, I, you know what I need? I need the quintessential like Chicago thing. And my friend Tabby looks at my friend Sam and says, Don't. And he goes, Do you wanna shot of Malort? And I'm like, Of course I do. And I, I didn't, I didn't want that shot. In retrospect, that was awful. How, how do you feel about Malort as a Chicago person? Just outta curiosity.

Katherine Werbiansky: Everyone should do it once just to be like, I did it. I did the Chicago thing. We'll respect you more for it. , you'll get a little hair on. Get a little hair on your chest and you know, it'll just make your bartender Happy to see you. Try.

Adam Wainwright: what? What is Malort?

Ed Cunard: Okay. I will describe this as, as I, I feel this is an accurate description of Malort and we're gonna lose all of our Chicago listeners. But imagine, right, that somebody's like, You have to take this shot, but you have to take it in the way I tell you, like, are you gonna do it? And you say, Yes, of course, cuz that's what

Adam Wainwright: of course. Yeah.

Ed Cunard: So they brush their teeth and then they spit it into a shot glass and they add some other herbs and spices. And then they dump it into the mouth of a corpse and you have to like do the shot from the corpse's mouth. That's Malort

Katherine Werbiansky: yeah, you're not wrong, . It's uh, it's rough.

Ed Cunard: And I say this to somebody who will do a shot of Fernet and be happy, but I will do a shot of Malort and be sad.

Adam Wainwright: Oh yeah. I'm gonna be visiting Chicago at some point in the next couple months, so I'm gonna keep that in mind to either stay away from, or just lean right into and

Ed Cunard: No, you lean into it,

Adam Wainwright: that I land. Okay. I'm leaning, I will lean into it at, let's get, let's get back on track now.

Cause I feel like I'm, I'm losing the threat a little bit. Thinking about Malort in Chicago and Healthy Rage in nineties sleepovers, so,

Katherine Werbiansky: It all goes together, doesn't it?

Adam Wainwright: I feel like, I feel like I need to bring, bring it back in. So, Katherine, how can karaoke help me when I lose the thread, like this channel my emotions and energy in a creative way.

So if I wanna go to karaoke and I'm a little bit all over the place, how does singing, how does karaoke help? How could it help me channel my emotions and energy to be creative?

Katherine Werbiansky: Say you're feeling scattered all over the place, you know, there's just something to express, but you don't know quite what it is. Listen, and to kind of tap back into your body and ask your body, what kind of rhythm am I feeling right now?

And just kind of feel into and tap instinctually what rhythm wants to pick up?

Is it slow? Is it fast ?Build off of that? Is it something that needs to be energetic and pumped up? And a lot of sympathetic cortisol, adrenaline pumping through? Are you feeling more kind of like sluggish, slow, a little more freeze response, a little more downgraded, and you need something that's gonna be like chicken noodle soup and slow. Kind of warm for you. So it depends, I think, on what your energy is needing at the time.

Adam Wainwright: Do you think when you're going to a karaoke night that you should prioritize your energy or the energy of the night? And maybe that will propel your energy up? Because let's say I am feeling something a little bit slow and melodic and I wanna, do "Hurt" by Johnny Cash or something like that.

And, but it's been a party night the entire way, but My body's telling one thing, but the energy in the room saying that something else. Do you believe you should trust what you need as an individual or trust that if you dive into the energy in a room, that that could help pull you up to what? What do you, what do you think you should trust?

Do you trust the individual or the energy of a room?

Katherine Werbiansky: Hmm. I think it's about how the two dance together. You know, right? Like how are you the drop and in the ocean at the same time? , How do you feel yourself a part of that wave, but know that you are this single droplet and that your droplet still matters, . So I would say, you know, kind of checking out, trusting that your body needs to express that, and it's the melody and the song that's in your heart, there's probably somebody else that really needed that message.

sung too, even if the vibe's super high, if it's what's on your, on your heart and your body and your mind. It's worth sharing with the room, but you could also lean into the collective and let the collective carry your energy. And if you're like, Yeah, I'm gonna use that hype and I'm gonna jump on their wave, see if that takes you somewhere.

Ed Cunard: I love that you mentioned the chicken soup thing earlier because when I think of chicken soup, I think of health and wellness cuz that's just your folk remedy for everything that ails you was chicken soup. But what are some mistakes karaoke singers may be making in terms of their vocal health?

 I know there's a lot of stuff that goes Throat health and singing health and all of that stuff, and you're someone who would know more than Adam and I would

Katherine Werbiansky: I would say folks should stay hydrated. Get some H two oh n in between your alcoholic beverages while you are at karaoke. It can be drying and cause a lot of inflammation. there's something in. Vocal technique called straw phonation, they're called, SOVT exercises. It stands for semi occluded vocal tracted.

And what that basically means is you're putting something in front of your mouth. So whether that's going like a lip trail or a hum, it's really efficient. To do it through a straw. So you take your straw on your drink and you hum going,

and you slide your voice while you just have your drink. And it's a loud barn. It's a way to secretly warm up. Nobody will know. And it teaches your vocal bands how to make nice symmetrical closure. It gets you, it's like getting, it's like bending down and touching your toes and feeling the stretch all the way back down your hamstring.

So hydration. Do a little straw phonation and have a good time.

Adam Wainwright: That is, Yes, I needed that. That's exactly what, now I'm, I'm equipped now. Well, I'm almost equipped, dad. I'm almost equipped because, Okay. Katherine, as you may be able to tell, Ed and I have a certain kind of voice. We have a very particular voice that doesn't necessarily fall into any, let's just say high notes, just in general, just, just high.

 But there are some great songs that you need to rock a falsetto. Like you need to go into a head voice and falsetto. Um, how do we do that?

Katherine Werbiansky: How, How to, how to rock that falsetto,

Adam Wainwright: Yeah. How do we rock if that, and I wanted to rock a falsetto if we wanted to bust out, I believe in a thing called Love by the darkness one day. How do, how do we, how do we get, how do we do it? Like what's a, I understand it probably takes a lot of training and practice, but just if we wanted to dip our toes right in the water, how will we do it?

Katherine Werbiansky: I would love to hear you give me a beautiful hootie owl sound. Can you give me like a woo, like a woo woo up there? You didn't know you were gonna get put on the spot, did you?

Adam Wainwright: No, go ahead,

Ed Cunard: Woo.

Katherine Werbiansky: yeah.

absolutely. Absolutely. If you can do it with you and hang

Ed Cunard: Woohoo.

Katherine Werbiansky: Yeah, absolutely. You can think that walking to Running is speaking to singing. So if you can approximate a speech pitch and if you can sustain that with a little bit of a generator of consistent airflow and energy and intention, you're on the way to singing.

Adam Wainwright: I feel, Ed, I feel like we're just singing falsetto. Next time we're together. Now we're, we're,

Ed Cunard: We're

gonna try that. That is so much better than, what everyone has told me to like, just sing through your nose. And I'm like, But the noises come out of my mouth. I can't do that.

Katherine Werbiansky: Mm. Actually an interesting thing about falsetto is that there, there is technically, you know, it's a term that a lot of people know and understand. But where it really comes from is that, you know how back in the day, We had little choir boys and they would turn them into eunuchs so they could keep their soprano boy voice around.

So it's kind of a, a leftover hangover from when that would occur. And they called it, you know, the falsetto voice was around that. But really our voice is able to have so many different colors, so many different shades, but it's about coordinating your vocal bands so that way they can make thicker, darker sounds.

And lighter higher sounds, and you can think of it more like creating a vocal palette of colors that you're really going for, rather than like a bunch of different voices that you're trying to find and achieve. You've got one voice and it can paint many different colors.

Adam Wainwright: and this may be the most poetic interview we've ever done. You're just full of them. You're like, It's a pallet and none the scene. You're like, you're blowing. Oh my goodness. Oh, this is beautiful. I I love this so much, Ed. What? Yeah. Right. Is this, has it been the most poetic interview we've ever done?

Ed Cunard: I feel like there's gonna be a poem written after this, you know, based off this, It might not be a good poem because I'll probably be the one writing it, but like it will be a poem.

Adam Wainwright: But it'll be structurally sounded. That's what I know about you. It may not be a great poem, but it it'll, it'll be a poem that's for sure.

Ed Cunard: This is technically a poem. Yes.

Adam Wainwright: Katherine, this has been so much fun and like I, I'm dead serious when I say, like, I, I appreciate the, the, not just the poetic nature of what you're saying, but the, the, the value when it comes to mental health to singing that you've really brought to this show. It's been wonderful, but now we got kind of, we gotta kind of flip it, it on its head just a little bit, so we're.

We're gonna play our quick fire with air quotes game. Hit me with your best shot. And what's about to happen is we're gonna ha ask you five rapid fire questions. Rapid fire. Yeah. Um, and just give us the first answer that comes into your head. You don't owe an explanation to anybody if it's an unpopular opinion.

That your opinion, who cares what? Anybody else? Thanks. And we're just gonna roll right through it at the end. Because it's only fair that you set our hot seat for five questions. You're gonna have a chance to fire away and ask Ed and I any one question that you like. It can be about karaoke or really anything.

And we solemnly swear that we're gonna answer honestly. So with all that being said and outta the way, are you ready to play? Hit me with your best shot.

Katherine Werbiansky: I'm so ready.

Adam Wainwright: Great. Question number one. What is the best thing you have seen at karaoke?

Katherine Werbiansky: Oh gosh. I love when people are really working through their feelings of divorce. I love when people are out there on stage and just break up divorce cry singing. It's the realest raw and I'm here for it.

Ed Cunard: I love that.

Katherine Werbiansky: Is that okay?

Ed Cunard: Yes. Yeah, no, I, I've been at those nights and I, I, I love seeing that. Conversely, what is the worst thing you've seen at karaoke?

Katherine Werbiansky: I think what it's like when the sound unfortunately is so painfully offkey. And they're nervous and because they're so nervous and offkey, the whole room is like, Ah, when is it gonna end? This is no fun for anybody right now.

Adam Wainwright: Ooh, yeah. That palpable tension that's in the air. Yeah. Yep. Just, just, yep. Just picturing it right now and I'm uncomfortable right now. So that's, that's a great answer. Question number three. what is a song. That you would love to sing. You would love to sing at a karaoke, but you've never been able to find a version of it to do at karaoke.

Katherine Werbiansky: Ooh, I think, uh, I would say Lilac Wine. Nina Simone's version.

Adam Wainwright: Ooh, oh oh. Add.

Ed Cunard: Yeah, I had a very visceral reaction to that. Yeah. Oh, no, that would be so good. Yeah, I would love that. Like, not for me. I, I couldn't do it, but, Ooh. Yeah. No, that would, that would be great. I would love to hear you do that.

Katherine Werbiansky: someday.

Ed Cunard: But now, What I need is, for you to imagine that someone kidnapped your family and all your loved ones, and the only way to release them was to wow the kidnappers with a karaoke performance. What song do you choose?

Katherine Werbiansky: Oh my God. Hold on. I have to like really put myself there. Hold on, let me take this in. I think I think I take them through Whitney Houston's dance with somebody and I take all the options up and they eventually wanna dance and let my family go.

Adam Wainwright: Oh man, I love that strategy. Just make the kidnappers dance and they'll let them go. That's, it's perfect.

Ed Cunard: , you can't hold someone captive if all your limbs are in motion. So it makes

Katherine Werbiansky: That's true.

Adam Wainwright: It does. That's, that's science. We, we are exploring science on this show. So, Katherine, last question. if you could magically strike one song from every karaoke playlist forever, which song would you choose?

Katherine Werbiansky: These are hard. you know, I'm really over. I want it that way. Backstreet Boys. I'm real over that one.

Ed Cunard: Tell me why.

Adam Wainwright: I was gonna say, bye bye. Bye I want it that way. I agree. We see that a little bit too often and it's always, it's a fun song, but I'm, yeah. Grew up in that era of that, that war between the Backstreet Boys and the NSync and like the scars are too deep that I'm tired of hearing about and reliving that war. Catherine, that was, that was perfect.

. Those are great answers. We, we sincerely appreciate it and since you were on the hot seat for five questions, you have a chance to fire away and ask us one.

So what question you have For Ed and I, we, we, we, we promise we'll answer honestly.

Katherine Werbiansky: Yeah. I guess what is, what is like what of your most memorable or, or memorable, or like what is the time you went to karaoke and you really felt like you expressed something deep? When was it ever like truly cathartic for you and what was the song?

Ed Cunard: It's very rare that I express something deep either in karaoke or on the podcast. The last time I remember expressing something that like I really felt was after that jury acquitted George Zimmerman and I did, "Killing in the Name Of" by Rage Against a Machine, really got something off my chest.

Katherine Werbiansky: Absolutely. That's the power of it, right? A healthy way to channel that rage, that puts it in an appropriate place, but does no harm. That's beautiful.

Adam Wainwright: . I know we've mentioned, we talked about it on the podcast before, Ed, but from my perspective, Ed and I's, hey, Day of Karaoke, we, we had a good like two, three year run when we were together and we were going to karaoke five, about five to six nights a week is what it ended up coming down to.

 , and our small, little rural western Pennsylvania town. And then I moved to Kentucky, for work. And the last karaoke session, like karaoke night, I was able to attend before I moved. We were in one of our regular haunts on a Wednesday night, and I sang, Johnny Cash's version of "We'll Meet Again." it wasn't, it's not a karaoke song, but the DJ knew me well enough that he just handed me the mic and I did at acapella. Um

And out outside of like, whatev what happened out there. It's something I needed to do because I'm not great with goodbyes. I am, I'm the person at a party that will be like, as opposed to saying goodbye to, everybody will just leave.

I'll be, I'll be like, Everybody's busy, okay, now's the perfect time for me to just disappear into the night and they'll wonder where I went. But it'll be fine. Like I'm not, because cuz I just, especially if it's important goodbyes, I just never. Do super well with goodbyes. It was my way of being able to stand there and say, you know, Hey, I've loved everything that we've, like, I've loved this, and we will come back together again in some way, shape, or form.

So, uh, it was very cathartic for me too.

Katherine Werbiansky: That's really beautiful. I have to ask, are you, are you, are you Irish?

Adam Wainwright: Me, I, a little bit

Katherine Werbiansky: No, I think I've heard that call, like they call that the Irish goodbye, where you're just

Adam Wainwright: Yeah, it is. It is the

Katherine Werbiansky: piss

Adam Wainwright: goodbye. I am a, I am part of, Yeah, I am. I am part Irish. But yeah, it was, it's just the way I,

Katherine Werbiansky: Yeah. It's, it expresses what we don't have the words for.

Adam Wainwright: Exactly. That was a beautiful question too, Pam. Just, that's a, that's the pin in the episode right there. Perfect. Love it so much. So at this point, Katherine, we're just gonna turn the floor over to you. Elevate whatever you like. Whether it be a message, a, a, a cause, a social media, your business, whatever you wanna do, basically, we're just handing the show off to you.

 The greatest song ever song Poorly is now hosted by Katherine. Take it away.

Katherine Werbiansky: Hi. Hey y'all. I am Katherine Werbiansky from Voice Revolution. You can check out my stuff at Voice Revolution on Instagram, or you can go to my website, voice revolution.com. If you're interested in finding what it means to hone in on your vocal vibe. I like to call myself a vocal vibe coach. Everyone's got a vibe.

Everyone's got a groove. We just have to learn how to subscribe to it, . So if you're needing help, needing to feel more confident into your voice, whether that's speaking karaoke, singing, run in a boardroom meeting, I'm, I'm your person to kind of navigate those situations, you can step into your power.

Ed Cunard: And we all need to step into our power at some point in our lives. Katherine, thank you so much for coming on our show and talking about what you do and talking about karaoke with and we certainly hope to see you singing at a screen sometime soon.

Katherine Werbiansky: Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. This is a blast.

end notes

adam wainwright: Now that I have the tools to actually improve my singing, I'm gonna work on it. So next time you hear me sing the Darkness, I swear it's gonna be better. So next episode, I'm gonna be better when you listen to my new recording of me singing the Darkness. Or if you wanna make sure that never happens again, you can go to patreon.com/sung poorly, and if you donate, if you pledge for $3, you're gonna get all the bonus content that's uh, associated with that polite, clapping.

And I swear I will never attempt to sing the darkness again. And goddamnit, I think this is gonna be the biggest driver we've ever had to our Patreon.

ed cunard: Yeah, I have to figure out if I can sign up for our Patreon, because I will, I will gladly pay that to never ever hear you sing the darkness again.

adam wainwright: I think there will be many people that will do so. Ed, you know what else they can do though? Whether, whether they're out there surfing, what we'd like to call the interwebs, they can go to www.sungpoorly.com. They can leave us a voicemail asking for some karaoke advice. Check out back episodes, buy some merch.

The whole nine yards is all out there. It's the internet. It's amazing.

ed cunard: And, while you're out there, sailing the worldwide web, If you're on Apple Podcasts, if you're on Podchaser or if you're on Goodpods, we would love a review. We would love a five star review because we are egotistical. But we would love a review with that. Good criticism also, I mean, if you wanna shoot some criticism our way, you can DM us on any of our social media.

You can send an email to sung poorly gmail.com and while. Doing all that. You need some music to back up all your internet browsing. Please check out Ben Dumm. He's the guy who gives us our theme song. You can find him at the Ben Dumm 3 on Apple Music or on Spotify, or on whatever other music platform you choose to mainline those sweet, sweet chords into your body.

adam wainwright: I do not like the verbally created image there's something very, very nasty about it in an uncomfortable way. so with that being said, make sure you mainline those cords into your body and check us out in two weeks and we begin to hit the end. N. Of the season. Of the season, we're gonna be back guys.

We're gonna do this forever. As long as, long as Ed and I have an internet connection, we're gonna be doing that. But that's right. There's only two more karaoke, trivia bullpens until the season ends. Top of the 10th in the score is Adam 24, Ed 28 today. So that's it. That's all. There is no more. So until next time, I'm Adam Wainwright.

ed cunard: I'm Ed Cunard.

adam wainwright: remember, the singing Off Key is still technically singing.