You already can breathe properly while using the diaphragm. You wake up each morning and you are alive because your diaphragm works by itself. Notice when lying down in bed, your rib cage looks as if it’s moving up and down. Up to take in breath; down to sing, speak or release air. You need just the right amount of support or air pressure for singing. All you have to do is just think about air while singing. Instead of training your breathing muscles, let’s apply to singing what is really important. Instead of spending lots of time teaching people to train there rib cage muscles what to do, I train singers to use the inner muscles of the larynx (to find your larynx, place your fingers or a hand on the bump in the throat area and say words or sing something). These inner muscles are the ones that control your vocal cords (also called folds) which make your sound. I teach you to strengthen these inner muscles so they can keep your vocal cords coming together rapidly ( for instance, singing A above middle C, your cords or folds vibrate 440 times per second). Once mastered, you can progressively sing over a large vocal range with Ease.

Once you train these muscles to hold together or come together your breathing will become more regulated automatically. The thing to remember is that correct breathing is actually the effect of holding your vocal cords together. I give you lots of tools to help you do experience this effect; tools tailored to meet your needs for your vocal type. These exercises ‘Cause’ you to experience it. The ‘Effect’ is your correctly breathing. You will
practice these in order to train your inner larynx muscles. See my earlier blog regarding breathing where i quote an article by John Henny, studio city california voice instructor and coach.

Let me explain.  Of course you should use your diaphragm and abdomen while singing.  However, the notion of singing with “more support” is well-intentioned because it is supposed to create vocal power and balance in the vocal cords. The idea came from classically trained singers.  It is much needed by an opera singer who sings demanding arias.  That’s okay for skilled singers.

But when inexperienced singers apply the same intensity there is a problem. The rush of air against the vocal cords causes the new contemporary singer ’s vocal cords to break apart or come apart, OR the cords jam together in order as they try to resist the air pressure. Vocal imbalance is the result.

Vocal cords can’t handle the large amounts of air early in training; they have to build up over a good period of time.  Remember this:  Power comes from how much air the vocal cords can skillfully resist, not how much air you send to them.  It takes time and patience to make progress in lessons week after week, keeping in mind the goal is a balanced consistent sound in both low and top notes, and it really pays off.

I’m back with more reasons your lessons may not work so well for you.

Here are some things that can hold the voice student back. One could be not understanding what you are supposed to practice or how to practice. Another could be that the goals and objectives of the lessons weren’t defined.  I make sure the student and I are both happy with the plan, and that it makes sense to the student. I call this Solution Focused voice lessons.

Another obstacle is taking voice lessons with a teacher who has been trained classically, but not in contemporary or rock music. This can be a disaster. As John Henny writes in Backstage.com, sept. 2011 issue, “The Seven Deadly Singing Sins”, the belief is not as prevalent today as in past years, but it still exists that classically trained teachers can successfully teach musical theatre students or pop or rock singers.

You can hear the results of this on Saturday Night Live skits on TV.  The problem, as John Henny states, is greatest for women.  I know this how?  Because all I could find were classically trained teachers who said they could teach me any type singing.  I sang jazz and blues.  What happened?  I was never taught to sing in my chest voice.  And from high to low chest notes I still sang in my head voice.  Breathy is a way to describe it.

I believe as John does, that a singer should study voice lessons with someone who can teach what she or he is going to be singing.  Find a teacher who works in contemporary styles and who can show you how to blend your head and chest voice together and eliminate vocal strain.

I’ll offer even more reasons voice lessons can fall short in my next blog.

Thank you, Jane Jenkins

However, in my years of teaching I have noticed that not all singers notice they are unbalanced or inconsistent in their sound making.

What is the very first goal in training the voice?

RELEASE: The larynx (which houses the vocal cords or folds as they are called) needs to remain stable. It is this posture that is necessary to achieve the balance of resonation.

RESONATION is also called resonance. Many kids think of it as the echo sound. It is the balance of the resonance that is necessary to maintain a consistent tone from the bottom (chest resonation) through the middle (mixed voice) and into the top (head voice or head resonation) with no breaks or “yodels” or flipping into falsetto. This allows a consistent voice up and down with easy release. If the singer tries to sound like some of their favorite singers they will, most likely, use excessive muscle activity during singing in order to achieve what they perceive is the sound of their favorite singer. Thus they lose sight of what we so naturally have in childhood, which is our own voice. Children don’t have to find their own voice or wonder what their own voice would sound like. The children who come in to see me already have their own voices. As we age and have more freedoms and listen to what we want to we generally develop this desire to sound as good as the others we hear or copy them.

CAUSE AND EFFECT EXERCISES are used in the Vocal Ease Training Method. I know as a teacher that if i want more of a balanced tone from chest to top, but the student has no chest or light chest voice, then there is an exercises i need to do with them (cause) to produce the exact effect (singing in chest voice). With practice it doesn’t take long for the singer to have the registers needed to sing; Chest, Middle (or Mix) and Head. As the singing student catches on then the exercises are modified and tailored to what the student is doing and also more Cause/Effect exercises are introduced. This is what helps the voice sing from chest to top and back to chest with release and resonation, thus Vocal Freedom.

The term vocal CORDS is often referred to as “vocal FOLDS”.  So here you may read cords and folds interchangeably.

LARYNX: Your larynx, like any other organ of your body, is composed of living tissue.  It is possible to abuse your voice without even realizing you are doing so.  Think of the radio foodshow host, Rachel Ray who spent all summer after having had surgery from a cyst on a vocal fold recovering; learning that what had contributed to the cyst growing was that she had poor posture, she talked incorrectly and not in her “speech level” voice.  She talked too high, with- out air support and raised her larynx intermittently.  She often talked and laughed with excessive volume, smiling and going up so high, she talked with tension.  A muscular “battle” took place between her vocal muscles (in the larynx) and the outer muscles.  It led to so much straining and hoarseness that a cyst formed on one vocal fold.

OTHER FACTORS: Many people (myself included through way too many years) imitate the voice or style of a recording artist they admire, and they try to sing in that person’s key, which may be all wrong for them. Their voice and development may not be able to handle what that recording artist is doing. Rock singers and oldies singers  think there audience will know if the key is lowered a half or a whole note and not enjoy the performance. I would be amazed if the audience payed that much attention and had the perfect pitch they’d need to tell the difference.

CORD SHOCK: Excessive coughing, sneezing, throat-clearing and starting your song or statement with a sudden burst of air can strain or even damage the delicate muscle tissue of your cords.

EMOTIONAL STRESS AND FATIGUE: When you are tired, your body is under emotional stress and your neuro-muscular system cannot function properly.  You run the risk of using the wrong singing muscles to assist you through your practicing.

VOCAL VACATION: This merely means to take a vocal rest, eliminating any talking or singing or humming.  Just vacate and yes, this means carrying around a notebook around your neck like Celine Dion and other singers do to communicate with her husband and others during these crucial times.

SOME CAUSES OF VOCAL ABUSE: Talking in a restaurant or bar that is too noisy or has bad acoustics. The “in” thing in some new places is to not install ceiling tiles.  Looks very SOHO but sounds like a very bad choir warming up with a mixture of sounds that you try to overcome by talking more loudly.

Whispering is just as abusive as yelling and can lead to vocal damage, also.  Also talking breathy and singing breathy is not good for your voice.

TAKING CARE OF YOUR VOICE:

* Good Posture, including not shaking your head to the beat of the music while you sing. You may need to have someone check out your posture while you speak or sing to see if your spine seems aligned.
* Drink water, keep your folds hydrated, especially with water.
* Reduce or eliminate caffeine, alcohol, and smoking intake. All of these dry you out, irritating the cords.
* Increase amount of sleep if appropriate.
* Warm up your vocal cords before you lecture or present, or before you sing songs.
* Restrict use of loud voice in windy, cold, or outdoor areas.  In windy, colder conditions, place a scarf around your neck.
* Hormone changes will affect the voice; take care of yourself when these are occurring.
* The environment affects the voice.  Dust, fumes, smog, smoke and other allergens should be kept to a minimum.

REMEDIES THAT DON’T WORK:

Sprays, lozenges, hot tea, honey/lemon preparations. they don’t help you sing better.  Citrus is acidic and drying so orange or tomato juice is not recommended, nor is lemonade.

Whew, this is a long, long blog.  I hope you have found it helpful.  If I left anything out, let me know so I can include it in another piece somewhere.  I can imagine I didn’t cover everything here.  If you take issue with anything or find it offensive, check it out with a vocal doctor or a vocal institute. There is a wonderful institute in Denver, Colorado and another in New York.

Jane

In learning to sing right, you have to condition your muscles external to the vocal cords not to be involved in the singing. To produce produce more volume over a period of time your vocal cords will develop their own strength, allowing you to sing with more power, without any assistance from those outer muscles. You will be able to feel it when you get to that point. It feels very different when we DO use the outer muscles. It feels like there is effort; like we have to do something to reach a note (high or low). And it feels relaxed when we just use our vocal cords, it feels so effortless we often think, that can’t be all there is to singing. It’s got to be harder than that!

Signing off for now. Be sure to read more blogs about how you get to this effortless style. I’ll write a building block of ideas on this subject.  Meanwhile, email or call me for a voice lesson and you’ll see what I mean,  Jane

Today I want to talk about PRACTICING. During the lessons I record on a Tascam DR-1  digital recorder that looks like an mp3 and also doubles as one. You can bring or buy from me (only $10.00) a 2 GB flat SD memory card. I record on these, hand it back to you for you to practice the exercises or vowel modification we worked on in the lesson. You can use it on your computer, clicking on “play” on Windows Media. You can also download the lesson into your computer and/or you can burn a c.d. from the lesson.

It’s not how much you practice; it’s HOW you practice. But if you are a performer, you should practice as much as you perform, maybe even more. Why? Because singing in performance is not the same thing as practicing.

Definition of Performance: This is the culmination of the conditioning you have done for your voice, just as you would condition for athletics. You must place huge demands on your voice on stage. Regular vocal practice keeps your voice ready by practicing coordination. Any diversion of correct vocal technique can be corrected and worked on while you are practicing. If you are not a performer, you can practice once a day if you have the time to focus on what you are doing, but if you want to only practice 3 times a week, that is okay, too.

When should you NOT practice? If you are very tired, haven’t had enough sleep, or practicing incorrect vocal hygiene, but also if you have a sore throat and just coming down with anything that could make you too tired to focus well on the technique you are supposed to be doing.  Then it’s time to lay off the practice until you get enough rest, eat right, and so forth.

Looks like I need to write a blog on Vocal Hygiene.  That will be coming soon. thanks for reading this blog ; I hope it helps all of you.