Getting My Voice Back

My looming surgery and the enforced silence thereafter

Hello. You’ve reached Time & Temperature.

Well, it finally happened to me. All those years I spent laughing in the face of proper singing technique have come back to bite me… right in the throat.

I don’t imagine that anyone is so tuned into my upcoming performance schedule that they’ve noticed a gap that begins after my Dec. 1st gig at the City Winery in Philadelphia and extends into the spring. Well, there is just such a gap. And it’s due to a cyst on my left vocal cord that has robbed me of large chunks of my vocal range, ie the notes to which I should have access as a singer. If I want those notes back, the cyst has gotta go.

Now, I’m not laboring under the delusion that my voice belongs in the pantheon of history’s great singers, but I have always had access to to a large range of notes that have never failed to emerge from my larynx when called upon to do so. It’s been that way as far back as my memories extend. I remember singing in the bathtub at two years old, marveling at the command I had over the notes. Throughout my childhood, many areas of my life felt both out of control, and out of my control. My voice, however was always something I could control—until now.

I have spent the last few months in vocal rehab/therapy learning how to sing properly, how to prepare before performances, and how to take care of my voice after the gig’s done. I have been able to fix many of my voice issues, even getting the reactive polyp on my right “vocal fold” to decrease in size. But the cyst isn’t going anywhere without surgery, so here we are. [I’m including a photo of my vocal cords, but it’s a little graphic, so if, like me, you’re a bit squeamish, don’t scroll down to see the offending growth, which, to be fair, is actually smaller than a grain of rice.]

As soon as the surgery is done, I begin a week of absolute silence. I won’t be allowed to let a single sound pass through my throat. My kids, who will have come home for the holidays are already planning to harass me throughout my mute week. My son Max told me that he’s just going to sit there and talk to me and I won’t be able to say a thing. To me, honestly, that sounds like heaven. I’ve missed listening to his brilliant conjecture in person and at great length. Bring it on.

The required four months abstinence from performing? That’s another thing entirely. I haven’t had four months without a gig since I was 15 years old, not counting the pandemic, during which I was doing four gigs a week from my home office. Heck, I haven’t had four weeks without a gig in almost four decades. I’m kind of freaking out.

If you know me at all, however, you know that my creativity finds many outlets. I’ll continue to teach at The New School in Manhattan—they’ve asked me back for next semester. I’ve got some prose in the pipeline, both non-fiction and fiction. I’ll have way more time to keep up with my substack. I’ll continue to plan and expand my songwriting retreat schedule. And I’ve got a secret project in the works that I should be able to reveal in January. Like a shark, I must keep swimming or else get super-bored!

I’ll have a solo record looming—I’ll be recording the week before my surgery—with Murry Hammond serving as producer. I’ll be able to enjoy taking my sweet time getting that album in the can and into the world. It’s gonna be beautiful, I guarantee it.

The 97’s are already lining up tour dates starting in April of 2025. Fingers crossed that my voice will be back and fully available to me. Maybe by then I’ll be able to sing the last note on the verse melody of the song “Jagged,” or the high notes in the chorus of “Timebomb.” Maybe I’ll have access to parts of my range I could never reach before!

A: Doctor, will I be able to sing opera after the surgery?

B: Yes, of course.

A: Great. I never could before.

Obviously, I’ll keep y’all posted as things progress. Please try to make it out to one of my solo or 97’s gigs before Dec. 12th. After that it’s gonna be a very quiet four months!

Yrs,

Rhett

.

..

…

….

…..

Keep scrolling to see my magnificent (if compromised) vocal cords…

.

..

…

….

…..

……

…….

……..

………