A changing voice is a crackling, unpredictable sound that prompts less-extroverted boys to avoid speaking to girls. So it's little surprise that many boys dealing with puberty would never even consider singing.
"Changing voices make boys self-conscious, especially if they are singing," said Shaun Cloonan. "I gave up singing for several years when my voice was changing."
Cloonan, 26, a music teacher at North Hills Junior High School, is trying to remedy that fear and embarrassment.
"You do not have to stop singing when your voice is changing," he said. "You just have to work with your voice."
On Monday, North Hills Junior High School will play host to Western Pennsylvania's first singing festival specifically for sixth- through ninth-grade male students with changing voices.
The event, "Mucho Macho Music," is sponsored by the Southwest Pennsylvania Region of the American Choral Directors Association. About 200 singers from 18 school districts will participate.
"It's exciting. There are just not that many festival choruses that are just for males," Cloonan said.
It includes a seminar will be run by Kenneth Phillips, a professor of music at Gordon College in Massachusetts who is a specialist in adolescent vocal training and the author of "Teaching Kids to Sing."
In the book, Phillips presents a systematic approach to vocal techniques geared to the younger singer. "Not many people besides me have ever researched this area," he said.
Phillips has run seminars for adolescent choristers all over the world. He recently returned from a training session in New Zealand.
"It shifts from one muscle to another," he said. "You start using two voices, sort of like having to downshift into first in a car."
Notwithstanding his expertise, choral instructors like Phillips face a daunting challenges in attracting young male singers. It's not an activity that has the allure of, say, football.
"It's not cool to sing in many schools," he said. "Boys, unless they have a good self-image, do not like to sing."
And it's not just a matter of changing voices. When boys are young, they might be able to sing well but refuse.
"Singing in a high treble voice makes many of them self-conscious, especially if they are around girls," Phillips said.
In many ways, singing has fallen into neglect in the United States since the 1930s. At one time, Phillips said, a more rigorous sort of vocal training was common in schools.
"There just has to be rigor and training with singing -- how to breathe, how to open your throat. Otherwise, you ruin your voice," he said. "Untrained singing makes as much sense as letting kids play T-ball with no direction."
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