April 2026
Textural ZZZZ's///
I remember the child's poem:
Fuzzy-wuzzy was a bear
Fuzzy-wuzzy had no hair
Fuzzy-wuzzy wasn't fuzzy, was he?
But in a different direction… The “Z” sound has a lot of air pushed through almost closed teeth. This gives it extra vibrations not heard in more open sounds like “Ah”. In the vocal-pedagogy world, “Z” is a semi-occluded vocal track exercise (SOVTE) in which the air pressure upward is approximately equal to the resisted air going back downward. This puts the vocal folds into neutral, which allows them to square up and regulate, making a cleaner and more beautiful sound afterward.
So, this is a case of a fuzzy texture leading to a smooth and clean one