Quote of The Day
“If you don’t ever stop singing your voice stays in shape. It’s like a marathon runner. You’ve got to run, run, run to stay in shape.”
Sammy Hagar
Regularly students ask me, “how often do I need to practice?” My answer is “how good do you want to get?” I look at vocalizing like going to the gym. If you want biceps to show up, you probably have to go to the gym and do bicep exercises at least 3 times a week. Any less and the progress will be much slower. There is the old saying “use it or lose it” and I can’t agree more with this statement as well as the quote above. I know that if I don’t get to really sing for a few weeks, I feel a slight decline in my control and have to go back to thinking about my technique rather than just getting to sing the song for the pure joy of it. Ultimately what we all want is to get our voices conditioned to a level that we don’t have to think about the technique and great pitch and power then come naturally from being in shape vocally. One thing to remember is that your voice is only one part of the whole instrument. Your body is the other part of the equation. I got a reality check a few years ago when singing a night of my usual Disco Diva repetoire when I got winded. Yikes, I’ve never been winded on stage in my life and the fear of becoming a middle aged Disco Diva gasping for air and not being able to sing 3, one-hour sets a night (in 6 inch platform shoes, no less), scared me into hitting the gym a bit more often LOL! It worked. My stamina, control, pitch and power come to me so effortlessly once again. So, as a singer, I recommend the following: Take care of your body as well as your voice by doing cardio exercises. Anything rhythmic in breathing like yoga, swimming, running, power walking are all great ways to help stay in vocal shape. Also, if you are not gigging or rehearsing regularly, try to get in at least 3, 20 minute sessions of vocal exercises and practicing your song(s) per week. (Remember to “map out” your lyrics first). Also, when you are rehearsing or gigging, be sure to warm up your voice for at least 5 minutes before hand. This helps you hit the stage ready for your audience and you know that first note is going to rock and not squawk!. Here are a few exercises to help warm up.
1.2.3.4.5.4.3.2.1 Pattern Exercise – on the first five notes of the major scale, (for example, if starting on a “C” the pattern would be C.D.E.F.G.F.E.D.C) sing the vowel sound “AH” being sure it sounds like the word “saw” and not “apple” which pulls the sides of your mouth back too tightly, creating stress. (Did you remember to take your singer’s breath? – air in/tummy out). Start with a comfortable low note and keep ascending in your range. When you start to feel that the notes need support, engage more diaphragm support by pulling towards your backbone and switch to the vowel sound “ee”, remembering to drop your jaw and not pull back the sides of your mouth. Go up until you have covered a couple of octaves from the start of the exercise and then descend back to the beginning.
1.2.3.4.5.4.3.2.1.5.1 Pattern Exercise – this is exactly like the preceding exercise except you will be adding a 1-5-1 jump at the end which means you will be engaging more diaphragm support on note 5 than you will on note 1 thus training your brain to recognize that note and how much diaphragm support you need to engage to land on it correctly.
As with any exercise program, take your time, laugh at yourself when you need to and keep trying. The results will be awesome!
Until next time… Happy Singing!
Angela
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