A few years back, in one of their episodes of “Incredible Human Machine”, the National Geographic gave us a look inside the vocal instrument of rock singer Steven Tyler to measure vocal cord vibrations during singing.
In case you have missed the episode, here is a short clip showing how the vocal cords are reacting to produce sound going form low notes to very high notes:
Did you notice how the cords stretch and zip up for the highest notes?
Here is another clip, this time from Fox News in an interview with Dr. Steven M. Zeitels who performed the study with the National Geographic and also operated on Tyler who had suffered from bleeding vocal cords due to vocal and drug abuse:
This also goes to show how important general health is for a singer along with healthy technique. Surgery, after all, should always be a last resort approach.
Check out the National Geographic website for many other fascinations: