Do you raise your head (tilt it back) for high notes?
Is this wrong?
Many times I have seen in studios, a singer sing with the head tilted back, the microphone set high, at eye level or higher.
Does this help you reach your high notes? No.
REACH is the operative word.
Notes are not “high”.
They may FEEL high to you but it is simply a more rapid vibration and this increases the “higher” you go.
If you raise your head, you WILL cause strain.
It may not be today or tomorrow, or it might be.
If you raise your head, you are trying to compensate for bad technique.
It won’t help to tilt your head back but there are things which will help.
It is almost a 100% certainty that if you tilt your head back, your larynx has risen way too high and you are also hyper-adducting your vocal folds (cords).
When they crash together too hard and the lubricative mucus on them dries up, the vocal folds will become irritated from the friction.
What happens next?
You can become hoarse from the swelling you have caused, you can lose your voice temporarily (laryngitis from vocal abuse) and you can even get calluses (vocal nodules) which come after the blisters and the blood blisters.
What to do? What to do?
Get training to achieve laryngeal stability so that your larynx doesn’t fly up to the moon every time you fly up to your high notes.
I COULD NOT CONQUER THIS ON MY OWN !!!
I did it for years, straining to get the high notes. I paid $175 per hour in the 90s, to get this bad habit eradicated (and also learned many more things which freed up my voice).
It was worth twice the price. I gained the freedom of LOSING the break in my voice and GAINING a lot more usable and COMFORTABLE range.
A caveat (a not so good thing): MANY vocal teachers have no idea how to fix this, much less know about the cause of it, and still, will gladly waste your time and your money.