Carrie Underwood’s Facial Stitches Made It ‘Physically Impossible’ to Sing
Carrie Underwood had to get stitches in her face after suffering a fall at her Nashville home in 2017, and in a new interview, she reveals how deeply that incident affected her singing.
The country superstar tells Vulture that the injuries delayed her latest album, Cry Pretty, because it was "physically impossible" to sing with stitches on both the inside and outside of her mouth. Once she got past the physical hurdles, she still had to confront the emotional aftermath.
"I felt like the differences were more in my head than they were in anybody else’s that would listen to the things I was doing," Underwood admits. "Going into the studio for the first time, it was a mind game: 'Do I sound the same? Is my diction the same? Does my mouth move the same as it did before?' I would sing something and then look at [producer] David [Garcia] and be like, 'Did that all come out clearly?' My m’s and b’s and p’s were kind of the issue. And he was like, 'I thought it sounded great.'"
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Despite her struggles, Underwood says she never sought help from a vocal coach after her stitches.
"I feel like you just kind of have to find your way through it," she states. "I don’t like it when people try to tell me how to sing, because it should be natural."
Underwood released Cry Pretty on Sept. 14, and the album's title song reached No. 5 on Billboard's Hot Country Songs chart. She released a second single, "Love Wins," in August, and she'll embark on her Cry Pretty Tour 360 in May of 2019. The tour was also delayed because Underwood is pregnant with her second child.
Underwood is set to co-host the CMA Awards with Brad Paisley for the eleventh time on Nov. 14. She is also slated to perform during the ceremony, where she is nominated for Female Vocalist of the Year.
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