Truth and Lies about singing...

Recently I read something that said Truth and Lies about singing… I found several things that I will probably respond to, but this is one I get asked about quite often. There are definitely two schools of thinking regarding breathing for singers. They posted that:

Lie - You will need special instruction to learn how to breathe correctly for singing.

Truth - You were born breathing correctly. You’ve continued to breathe. You breathe in, and speak easily on a regular basis. YOU KNOW HOW TO BREATHE ALREADY!

I believe:

How we should breathe…

Well, I do agree that we are all born breathing correctly. However, we do not all continue to breathe correctly or naturally. The movement of a good natural breath should come from the diaphragm, abdomen rib cage, back and lungs. And although the diaphragm is an involuntary muscle, which does initiate the breath, in most people, the secondary muscles take over and the natural breath is inhibited by a lack of focus or training or just habitual learned behavior. During inhalation, the diaphragm moves downward and should open the abdomen, chest, rib cage, back, and lungs. During exhalation, the diaphragm moves upward pressing up on the lungs and expelling the air. In addition, natural breathing should begin through the nose. Breathing in thru the nose not only naturally filters environmental allergens, warms, and moisturizes the air, but it also helps to prevent the release of carbon dioxide too quickly. When we inhale through the mouth we almost always inhale and exhale air too quickly and in too large of volumes. I have read that some researchers believe mouth breathing and the associated hyperventilation it can cause may result in asthma, high blood pressure, heart disease, and many other medical problems. I can also tell you that in my years of teaching since 1991, I have never run into a student was already breathing thru their nose while singing unless they had already studied or were practicing yoga or something like it. This just isn’t the way most people breathe as they age.


So, then why don’t we keep breathing this way…

The diaphragmatic breath is not the normal breath in our society. As we grow up in this fast paced, competitive culture we do not continue to breathe naturally. In part because of constant pressures, the stress placed on us, (some from external sources and a lot we place on ourselves) we learn to breathe incorrectly, shallow and from the chest. It not only affects your singing but it affects your health and you life. This shallow breath I believe is also a way that people cut themselves off from uncomfortable feelings and sensations. By breathing less, I think we feel less. And just an aside, when you’re really singing, you need to tap into real emotions that hopefully you can still tap into and aren’t blocking by too much stress in the body, it’s important that you actually have them available.

We are for the most part a culture of upper chest breathers. Have you ever felt like you’ve taken a big breath… can you feel it in your chest… well if you can you are a chest breather and you are using the muscles in your upper body to lift the ribs off of the lungs so you can take in a breath. Unfortunately, breathing like this not only creates tension in the body (especially the upper body, neck and shoulders which is terrible for singers) it also causes us to breathe faster than we should. Breathing too fast may bring about what some call a chronic state of hyperventilation. That’s when we inhale by taking quick, shallow breaths from the top of our chest.

These quick, shallow breaths dramatically reduce the level of carbon dioxide in the blood. What’s wrong with that you may ask…. Well, those reduced levels of carbon dioxide in you blood cause your arteries to constrict and that reduces the blood flow throughout your body. When this happens, no matter how much air you are trying to get in, you brain and body will experience a lack of oxygen. When breathing like this, some may even experience themselves holding their breath. Any prolonged breathing in this way will trigger your nervous system into the “fight or flight response” and will make you tense, and anxious. It will also reduce your ability to handle any complicating stressful situations so you will become irritable and you will stop thinking clearly.

Another contributing factor that I mention quite frequently is the growing lack of daily exercise in our society. With so many people sitting at desks for many hours each day or in front of video games instead of actually moving by actually playing a game or sport, this has gradually conditioned our breathing to a very shallow range of movement. We don’t even get a chance to exercise the lungs during vigorous exercise because many of us live very sedentary lives.

Like I said not only will this affect you singing and your performance, it will affect how well you sleep, how much energy or lack of energy you have, how well you handle stress, danger and fear. If you’re not breathing well and you are compromised because of it… you won’t perform as well, practice as well or sing as well for as long… and I don’t know about you but I love singing and want to be at my absolute best all the time and for a long, long time…

So in my opinion breathing is not something that most of us continue to do naturally and as we get older, we may need to unlearn those bad habits life has taught us and re-learn the natural breath. The natural breath we were born breathing.

I believe as a vocal teacher and fitness coach that we all need to get up, get moving and get breathing…. Deeply...

My Practice Schedule….

I read something this morning that made me think this might be a good time to talk to you about practicing…. Again…... I was reading my friend and colleague, Judy Rodman’s, newsletter… She is a wonderful singer and teacher; you should check her out … she’s got lots of great products and advice and is an awesome lady… Anyway, I was reading her blog about singing with power and thought yes I agree whole-heartedly that many students do try to over sing and use too much power too soon. They start pushing for louder and louder sounds and it winds up damaging the voice instead of strengthening it. It also occurred to me that many of you have commented on my posts about my practice schedule… and since I have a strong voice and have power behind me if I choose to use it, I thought I’d go into a little more detail about how I practice and why. (Don’t confuse power and breath support and control. Power comes in part from good support and control, but is not the only thing. I am always supported when I sing… I just use more power now and then to accentuate passages in the song)

As many of you know I have taken a few months off recently to care for my father so I have had to work on my voice to get it back in shape for the work I have coming up. Remember the vocal cords are muscle tissue and need to be exercised just like every other muscle in your body. I thought I’d go thru my practice routine with you and clue you in to how I go about opening up that power without damaging my voice.

First I’ll tell you that I get in an hour at the minimum every practice session. Yep… let me say that again… I practice at least one hour 5 to 6 days a week.

If time permits, I have worked my stamina up to 90 minutes without strain and am working up to two hours with ease… here’s the clincher… even though my voice is … let’s just say… “seasoned”… I have been working about 4 to 6 weeks to get it to that place where I can comfortably sing what I’m working on full out and not get tired. That may be a long time for some and a short time for others but you must know your voice and you must prepare. I ask a lot of my voice and do not want to risk vocal strain or damage by pushing too hard too soon. So I schedule in the appropriate amount of time in this case about 4 to 6 WEEKS of practice so I can get things back in working order without strain or damage…

There is still one big “money note” in one of the songs that I have only recently been singing in full mix voice. I keep things light and in the right placement, with the right amount of breath support, till I am confident that the placement and muscle memory is secure, then and only then do I open up and start putting some power behind it!

Here’s my full routine… this is usually over an hour. I will leave some things out and do 30 minutes of warming up and vocalizing and 30 minutes of singing if I only have an hour.

I START BY SHUTTING OFF MY CELL PHONE!
I do some breathing exercises
I humm on long low to medium notes (always in a comfortable area, not too high or too low)
I go thru my warm up exercises anywhere from 30 to 40 minutes
I go thru my vocalise exercises (Lutgen, Seiber, Solfege, Vacci, and some Aria’s are the things I practice with)
Then I sing the songs I am working on.


The things I hope you take from this blog are the frequency of my practice - 5 to 6 days a week, the length of time not only the hour per day but the number of weeks it takes even me to tune up the voice appropriately and the fact that I do a LOT of technique work every week. Practicing doesn’t just mean turning on your favorite song and singing along.

Remember, this outline is in no way intended to be a specific guide for you. You should get with a teacher and learn exactly what is appropriate for your voice and then follow what they say…. This is only intended to show you that professionals like myself take practicing very seriously and it is a part of my every day routine. My voice is my life, my passion and I want to take care of it and still be singing when I’m 80… Being a singer is a gift.. Take care of it!

But I might look stupid!

I was talking recently with a colleague about young singers and their performance skills and abilities. With the state of today’s record industry you have to be able to put on a great performance in order to keep your fan’s coming back… remember “frequency”… They have to keep coming back for you to have longevity in this career…and if you don’t know how to put on a great show, you may lose fans not keep or gain them.

A lot of time young artists tell me they are afraid of “looking stupid” or saying something silly. My thoughts on this are if you are being real, being who you are things won’t ever come out wrong. I think it’s when artists are “trying to be something” or someone they think they should be that things come out wrong and don’t look natural.

Fans want to get to know you. They want to see you being exactly who you are. If that is silly and goofy, let it show… if it’s serious and moody.. Be moody… if you’re a type A personality… take command of that stage (it will feel normal to you)…

Remember, performance involves some sort of emotional connection with the song, when you put the emotion on your face and in your body, you will sing completely authentically.

Here’s a big thing to get your head wrapped around. The perception of the audience is reality to them. But I thought what I was doing was what’s real… Nope.. Get this into you…. “The perception of the audience is their reality.” What they think of your performance is true to them, and determines if they will follow you and your career or not.

Now, there’s no way to guess and give every member of the audience what you think they want, right… I mean can you imagine looking out at a sea of people and trying to be everything you think they might want… That doesn’t work… You need to be yourself and they will enjoy your performance because it is from the heart, authentic. You will feel more confident and comfortable on the stage and you will sing better because you’re not stressing yourself out trying to do things that may not be natural to you. If you sing with confidence and handle the occasional mistake like a professional, most of your audience will be convinced that you meant to sing it that way. I heard this and thought this was a great way to think about handling mistakes… “Professionals sing creatively, amateurs make mistakes”

Please remember that wishing your voice and stage show was pro, won’t get it there. If any of you have any doubts about how much preparation it takes to put on a show, you should go and watch “This is it” MJ’s rehearsal footage… I think you’ll find it interesting! You’d be surprised what one-hour of specific vocal practice five days a week can do.

And this doesn’t mean singing your favorite songs in your car or singing the same song over and over again in your bedroom. You may make some improvement this way, but making a practice vocal schedule would be much better for you and you’d make much faster progress.

So many singers avoid doing vocal exercises they say they can warm up by singing their favorite songs. While some professionals will do this occasionally, most of them train their voice using exercises and warm up before every performance. Professional singers know that warm ups will take your cords through muscle movements that singing a song could never do. Practicing correct vocal exercises and warm ups will help you develop necessary muscle memory for difficult passages that you will run into in songs that you sing.

So be prepared and be yourself… if you do those two things you will ALWAYS have a great show!

Working out: Can it cause vocal damage?

As some of you know with my background in dance and Pilates, I have always wanted to get my personal trainer certification, which I just completed. I am now a certified trainer with NASM, National Academy of Sports Medicine. I have been working for many years now studying how working out effects singers. In particular how it affects breathing, support muscles and strain on the larynx. I’m going to start incorporating workout and training tips into my blog for singers because I think it is imperative that you understand how to train and how not to train, what exercises will help you in singing and which ones will actually make singing more difficult.

Weight training if done incorrectly can over-strengthen small muscles surrounding the vocal apparatus, causing a lack of flexibility around and in the larynx. As you may imagine, this is not good for your voice. Incorrect physical training can also tighten the throat, neck and shoulders, which need to remain free of tension while singing.
If a trainer is not used to training singers and doesn’t watch specifically for things like holding your breath, the trainer may not notice that you are tightening the glottis, which can cause vocal damage! My best advise is to find a personal trainer who is training singers, understands their special requirements, and knows how to protect them.

In the meantime, here are some tips I have for you whether you are working out by yourself, or with a trainer. And if you are working with a trainer make sure they are aware of what you do and have a good working knowledge of which muscles a singer needs to use when singing. And as always…

CONSULT A PHYSICIAN BEFORE BEGINNING ANY EXERCISE PROGRAM.

Avoid any exercises that cause too much tension or strain in your neck, shoulders, upper back and chest.

Do stretching exercises before and after you exercise. Do plenty of stretching exercises that stretch the chest and neck. Stretch gently and hold all stretches for 20 to 30 seconds and release slowly. Repeat this 2 to 3 times per stretch.

Do exercises that strengthen the core. And no…. I don’t mean a whole bunch of crunches. That actually shortens and tightens the muscles you need for correct breathing. All this does is make it more difficult for you to perform the in and out action required for diaphragmatic and abdominal breathing. There are MANY more support muscles you need to strengthen besides and in addition to the rectus abdominus muscle.

Make sure you are not holding your breath. There are actually breathing patterns that your trainer can teach you that support the breathing you should be doing while you are singing.

If you are lifting weights, make sure you are not gripping the bar too tightly. Keep your hands relaxed.

DRINK PLENTY OF WATER. HYDRATE YOURSELF BEFORE DURING AND AFTER YOUR WORKOUT!


And finally, avoid lifting weights right before you sing. You need to give your muscles time to relax. Allow at least 12 hours for your muscles to relax after lifting before you sing as a guideline. It is fine to do aerobics on performance days, but remember to breathe correctly… in through the nose and out through the mouth. And remember it’s just as important to get proper rest between your aerobic workout and your performance. You don’t want you body to be tired and over trained before you hit the stage, studio or rehearsal. Become a fan of the “nap,” your body and voice will thank you!