Name: Andrea von Kampen
Nationality: American
Occupation: Singer, songwriter
Current release: Andrea von Kampen has two new singles out now: “Sister Moon” as well as the seasonal “Silent Night.”

If you enjoyed this Andrea von Kampen interview and would like to stay up to date with her music, visit her official website. She is also on Instagram, Facebook, Soundcloud, and twitter.
 


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?

I grew up in a family of musicians and choir directors and was encouraged to sing from a very young age.

It was so natural to sing that I never thought much of it.

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

Voice will always be my main instrument and the easiest to express myself with.

I love playing guitar but I’ve always viewed it as a vehicle to accompany my voice.

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

I grew up in a German Lutheran tradition where hymns are the foundation of singing.

Learning four-part harmony as a child and singing those hymns every week massively helped my songwriting, pitch, sight singing and ear training.

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?

One of the toughest things when studying vocal performance is finding the right kind of voice teacher. Performing music is such a broad concept and many vocal performance professors focus mainly on classical singing.

While the basics of breathing and vocal health are important, the world is changing so quickly and it can be hard to find a vocal teacher who is realistic about the type of singing their student is planning on doing for a career.

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 for tone, timbre, correct pitch, and what story they’re telling me through the song.

What moves me the most is when a voice is so effortless that I stop thinking about those things and I relax into the experience.

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 is like breathing. I think about my voice like a wind instrument. I’m breathing through it and creating sound and I don’t want anything to obstruct the pure sound coming out.

I try to breathe well and sing through my face mask and not my throat.

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

I’ve always gravitated towards folk songs. I also spent some time singing in more of a vocal jazz setting.

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?

When I sing my own songs I feel that my singing voice is an extension of my speaking voice for sure. But I write in my natural range and write lyrics I would speak.

From whispers to screams, from different colours to dynamics, what are the potentials and limits of your voice? How much of your vocal performance can and do you want to control?

I can’t belt very high but other than that, my voice mostly does what I want it to.

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?

Absolutely. Writing melodies and lyrics that work with my voice feels very intuitive. I think any great song in the right key for your voice will also feel intuitive and personal.

For instance, I arranged this song to be in my vocal range and changed a few melodic choices and the chords and it very much feels like my song.



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?

Breathing and placing the pitch in your face mask while singing is really important.

If I find after a long run of shows that I’m experiencing vocal fatigue I go back to the recordings I have on my phone of old voice lessons with a great professor I studied with in college. I’ll remind my body of how to sing well and keep up with the vocal exercises.

If you’re singing with proper technique, there’s really no reason that you’d have massive amounts of vocal strain. Keeping the tension out of your throat and not controlling the pitch from that area is helpful in feeling healthy.

How has technology, such as autotune or effect processing, impacted singing? Has it been a concrete influence on your own approach?

I like reverb on my vocals in a live setting but other than that I don’t really use any other technology in a live setting. You’d have to ask my engineer what he’s doing with my voice in the studio. I have no clue but I like how it sounds.

For recording engineers, the human voice remains a tricky element to capture. What, from your perspective, makes voices sound great on record and in a live setting?

I didn’t know the human voice was tricky to capture in a studio. I think great voices sound great in most settings if the people involved are enhancing the sound and not masking it or over doing it with effects.

I think good mics are important but I’m not an engineer and would be curious to ask mine this question!

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?

I think it’s the best vehicle for communication and communication is vital to our well being. Stories are our way of connecting and singing them or acting them out is what we do as humans.