Name: Abigail Lapell
Occupation: Singer, songwriter
Nationality: Canadian
Recent release: Abigail Lapell's Anniversary is out via Outside Music.
Pure Vocal Music Recommendations: This new album has the first song I’ve ever released with just vocals, as well as a bit of body percussion and stomping. We recorded it live off the floor standing around in a circle in the middle of the church where the album sessions took place, and it was so beautiful and unlike anything I’d experienced in a recording setting.
Tony who produced the album with me suggested trying the song this way, and I was a bit hesitant at first since it was so out of my comfort zone as far as being able to tweak and fine tune and make things sound perfect. In the end it’s one of my favourite tunes on the album and really captures a playful, childlike experience.

If you enjoyed this interview with Abigail Lapell and would like to find out more, visit her official website. She is also on Facebook, and Instagram.

For a deeper dive, read our earlier Abigail Lapell interview, and our conversation with her about her creative process.



Do you think that some of your earliest musical experiences planted a seed for your interest in your voice and singing? How and when did you start singing?

For sure. I always loved singing and joined a children’s choir at a young age. I was especially obsessed with singing harmonies.

I went to French immersion school and also extracurricular Hebrew school – plus the choir which had a lot of church-y music repertoire – so looking back I exposed to so many kinds of music from different languages and cultural traditions, which is a big influence on the kind of songs I write. A lot of wordplay and stylized language and internal rhyming schemes.



If you're also playing other instruments, how does the expressive potential of these compare to your own voice?

I love the interplay between voice and other instruments, especially so on guitar which is my main instrument and feels most intuitive to me, almost like another lead vocal at times.

I often sing and play doubled or complementary guitar or vocal lines, or sort of play in a round with the vocal line, and I definitely think as a writer in terms of the two in tension or in harmony.



Singing is an integral part of all cultures, and traditions. Which of these do you draw from – and why?

This isn’t a specific tradition really, but I feel I’ve been very influenced by my time teaching early childhood music, and learning a bit about music pedagogy for babies and young children.

For one thing it’s taught me a very democratic approach to music – like, everyone can sing, we’re all born with music and rhythm as an inherent part of us. Music is more like language, something humans acquire innately, and maybe have more or less opportunities to flourish and develop over time rather than needing to be “taught”.

Anyway, it’s helped me think of singing and music less as a professionalised skill, the way I think we tend to experience it in western culture, and more as a force of nature and part of the rhythm of everyday life.

Also children’s music is so physical and playful. There’s kind of no distinction between music and movement, from a developmental standpoint. Holding hands in a circle, dancing, keeping a beat, singing and playing – it’s all part of the same thing. I feel like that perspective has helped me loosen up and get over some of my own ego and stiffness as a singer and performer, frankly.

I’ve never been comfortable with dance and movement but working with kids you kind of have to move to the beat and be very silly and un-self conscious.

What were some of the main challenges in your development as a singer/vocalist? Which practices, exercises, or experiences were most helpful in reaching your goals – were there also “harmful” ones?

Well I always loved harmonies so much, and growing up kind of before the dawn of the digital age, I didn’t have a ton of tools for composing and recording at home.

I remember eventually figuring out I could create a primitive looping system using two side-by-side tape recorders: I’d record a vocal part, then play that back into the air while singing live into the second tape recorder, and then flip it around to sing a third part, and so on.

I’d end up with these very degraded but actually kind of cool, ghostly sounding recordings as a result.

How do you see the relationship between harmony, rhythm and melody? Do you feel that honing your sense of rhythm and groove has an effect on your singing skills?

It’s something I’m always working on, for example trying to understand how drum and bass elements fit together to complement melody and harmony. I’m also honestly just not a very dance-y person yet I really feel the difference if I can loosen up and focus on the beat and move around a bit, kind of keep it more on the bodily plane versus getting too much in my own head.

A lot of the harmony ideas I write feel like rhythmic elements to me, too, like counter-melodies or ostinato parts that offset or complement the main melody. I usually hear tons of vocal parts very clearly while writing and singing.

I also love walking and singing! The rhythm of footfalls is so meditative and I think helps with all of the above.

What are the things you hear in a voice when listening to a vocalist? What moves you in the voices of other singers?

I listen most to emotion and a kind of raw colour and expressiveness. The vocalists that touch me most just sound so profoundly like themselves.

How would you describe the physical sensation of singing? [Where do you feel the voice, do you have a visual sensation/representation, is there a sense of release or tension etc …]

Singing to me feels like a great comfort and release. It’s soothing and cathartic.

Also very compulsive – like hunger or some kind of physical addiction that needs to be satisfied. Almost like a physical craving in the back of the throat and chest region.

What kind of musical settings and situations do you think are ideal for your own voice?

The new album was recorded in an old church with this stunning natural reverb. It was wild to me how much different a performance it brought out, being in a visually and aurally majestic space like that versus a little isolation booth or something.



We have a speaking voice and a singing voice. Do these feel like they are natural extensions of each other, ends on a spectrum or different in kind?

I think spoken language is deeply musical.

I sometimes think about trying to connect my singing voice with my speaking voice more, as in trying to feel less artful in my delivery and more having the intention of saying something, communicating with someone, in a more natural way.

When you're writing song lyrics, do you sense or see a connection between your voice and the text? Does it need to feel and sound “good” or “right” to sing certain words? What's your perspective in this regard of singing someone else's songs versus your own?

Definitely, I’ve always been super interested in the sound of words and getting the flow of syllables that fits the melody. To me the content or meaning of the lyrics is secondary.

Singing someone else’s songs feels easier in a way, in that respect, because I struggle with committing to lyrics or finalizing what the song is “about.” Whereas coming to something that’s a finished product and already frozen or decided in some way, I feel I can take the pressure off.

Strain is a particularly serious issue for many vocalists. How do you take care of your voice? Are the recipes or techniques to get a damaged voice back in shape?

I’ve been experimenting with water straw exercises, which is a fascinating technique that is supposed to protect and warm up your voice by giving you some gentle resistance to not overdo things. It sounds really silly and bubbly.

I am trying to be more consistent with this, especially on tour when my voice is always on the edge of collapse. They say it’s the talking in loud venues that does it, primarily.

Motherese may have been the origin of music, and singing is possibly the earliest form of musical expression, and culture in general. How connected is the human voice to your own sense of wellbeing, your creativity, and society as a whole?

Definitely. I feel like voice is so primal and truly a defining element of being alive.

Viva voce, a living voice – literally and metaphorically, it’s one of the cornerstones of human experience.