Why is it that some students can easily learn numerous songs in a short amount of time, but others struggle to make improvement on a small number of tunes after many tiring practice sessions? When students seem to be on the slow side of this process we always revisit how they are spending their practice time.

Keep in mind that while it would be great if singing students sang their assignments every day, the real world says that more practice time gets accomplished in the car when singing to the radio and simply singing the songs they love. Let’s face it, when you love a song and you listen to music regularly, you listen to that song over and over again. So we place a lot of concentration on how to apply good singing skills to ANY song they want to sing.

Learning a Song in 6 Easy Steps

1. Listen to the song without making a sound.

If you can anticipate what is coming next (including lyrics) then you are ready to move on to the next step.

This is probably the hardest step for most singers. If a song moves you, you want to wail it not LISTEN to it, right? If you are one of those singers that just has to go for it, be smart about it. Follow good boundaries and recognize those sections that don’t come easily to you. Remember, muscles have memories. If you consistently sing a song with poor vocal skills, the memory of the involved muscles will include those poor skills. Breaking a bad habit in singing is much more difficult than creating a good habit from the get go.

2. Hum the song.

Make sure that you feel the buzzing sensation in the front of your face; moving up and down your face as your pitch changes. Your goal is to make that buzzing very specific with each note — just as if you were playing specific notes on a piano. (If you need more information on Tone Placement, see Singing is Easy, Lesson #6).

If you are new to this process, you may need to repeat this step many times. Be sure to monitor your airflow. TIP: Your notes need to be connected on an airflow river, not resembling someone standing on the shore skipping stones.

When you can hum the song completely with ease, connecting the notes on your airflow and feeling very specific about the buzzing sensations on your face, you are ready to move to the next step.

3. Sing the song with the lyrics at a very natural volume,

don’t push and don’t hold back…find the balance. Your goal is to place the words in exactly the same place that you felt the buzzing sensation when you were humming. Sometimes creating words makes us move the articulation arbitrarily around our mouth and makes singing much harder than it needs to be. Keep the words focused where you felt the buzzing and you will have more success. When you can sing the song easily at a comfortable natural volume with good vocal tone, you are ready to move to the next step.

4. Review the lyrics for performance purposes.

With each stanza assign a one word adjective that best describes how you want the audience to feel during your song delivery. This adjective is the emotion you put on your face, in your vocal tone and in your body language during your performance of that song portion. So if you believe the main adjective for a stanza is “hopeful”, it is much easier to perform hopeful than all the many words included in the lyrics. Try it, it really works. For those students that have never had acting training and feel a bit self conscious, this usually does this trick and helps them perform very moving performances…very quickly.

The only rule is you cannot use the same adjective twice. Remember, how do you want your audience to feel? Perception is everything.

5. Perform the song

Now you are ready to perform your song at a comfortable natural volume using everything you have practiced so far: good tone placement, good airflow, etc., AND add the emotional performance to the mix. I usually recommend sitting down for this step. In fact, to make the most progress I recommend that part of the performance practice be confined to the face. If you can move your audience with just your voice and your facial expressions, that’s an accomplishment. Use your body and movement as an embellishment, not something that your performance relies on for success.

The comfortable, natural volume is very important. If you are using poor vocal mechanics you will be unable to create some notes without “belting them” and that needs to be addressed. Keep in mind that although it is a natural comfortable volume, you should not sacrifice your vocal tone. Think of it like when you turn the radio down. You still hear the peaks and valleys of the song, still crystal clear, just at a lower volume. This is your goal as you perform this step.

6. Perform with full movement and voice, adding stylistic nuances where appropriate.

Be sure to use a mirror to help you make good choices. If you have followed the other steps correctly, by this step you will naturally begin to sing with more power as you become more comfortable with the song, the power properly reflecting the emotional peaks and valleys.

Again, if you are new to this process you might have to repeat each step several times. Singers that use this technique regularly will find that it gets easier and easier, and that songs are learned more completely with great speed.

“I encourage each and every one of you to share yourself through sincere song performance. Don’t settle for just good singing, strive to be a true musician that breathes life into every tone.”

About the Author
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Technorati Tags: singing, technique, Tips, vocal

By Andy Follin

It’s possibly the most common question for those studying voice. But it’s also the least answered. Or, to put it better, the worst answered.

The problem with head and chest

The reason is that the answers that most vocal coaches and singing teachers give seem innately wrong. No matter how hard people try to explain it, you really can’t convince anyone that the voice moves from the chest to the head, because you can always feel just where it is – in the throat!

The terms ‘head voice’ and ‘chest voice’ have some merit in that they can describe the location of some of the sensations you feel (muscle effort, for example) when singing higher and lower, but that merit is outweighed by the confusion caused when singers start to imagine that the sound-producing mechanism changes location.

Head and chest resonance

Head and chest ‘resonance’ can cause similar problems. It’s an acoustic principle that there can be no resonance before the sound source so – given that the chest is below the larynx – there can be no chest resonance. Chest vibration, maybe, but not resonance.

Similarly, the only way the voice can resonate in the head (as opposed to the mouth) is if the soft palate (velum) is opened to allow sound into the nasal turbinates. But this would give an excessively nasal sound – which is undesirable at best.

What’s head, and what’s chest?

Anyone struggling for an answer to this question will come up against a number of answers, even among those singing teachers who still insist on using the terms head and chest. Some say there are only two ‘registers’, some three (head, chest, mixed) and some four (add falsetto to the list).

The problem is that they can’t even agree amongst themelves! Are all high notes ‘head’? Are all loud notes ‘Chest’? So what’s loud and high singing? And what do they call very quiet low singing?

There’s no consensus – because there’s no scientific fact to back up any of their opinions. It’s like asking them to describe ‘blue’ (do you mean royal blue, or French blue, or cyan etc..)

So what’s really happening?

All of this needless confusion can be avoided through a better understanding of the voice.

The vocal folds (vocal cords) are complex and able to vibrate in a number of ways, but whatever you call a sound – Head, Chest, Mixed, Apple, Banana – it can be precisely defined in terms of how the vocal folds are vibrating.

The great advantage of Estill Voice Training™ over more traditional singing methods is that it replaces the vague and inexact concepts of Head voice and Chest voice with a precise understanding of the Vocal Folds and how they are vibrating in different parts of the range.

As a Certified Master Teacher of EVT, Andy Follin can explain how to control and allow the voice to move easily throughout your entire range – with or without a change in sound, and without introducing any confusing terminology!

Andy Follin is a Certified Master Teacher of Estill Voice Training, based in the North West of England. As the only CMT in the area, Andy is uniquely placed to help both speakers and singers who wish to understand and control their voice.

His website Vocal Skills, has an FAQ section that tries to answer some of the most common questions about the voice.

It contains a useful article on head voice and chest voice. Check it out to get the Vocal Skills you want and need. Take your voice and your career seriously.

Technorati Tags: singing, Vocal Technique, vocal training

By Kyle Hoffman

Singing is a great past time that can communicate powerful emotions to large groups of people with music. The best singers however, really know how to control their voice and leave a lasting impression on the audience.

You might think of yourself as a decent singer that can hold their own in the competitive world of music, but wouldn’t you like to be better? Here are 5 fast tips for good singing that can boost your vocal reputation and have you emerge from the crowd.

1. Learn to control your soft palate.

Raising your soft palate is a way of opening up your throat to allow more air to come in, and more sound to let loose. Raise your eyebrows while you sing to feel the immediate affects of this technique.

2. Adjust your daily habits to accommodate your voice.

If you’re very serious about performing vocals, shouldn’t you do everything you can for good singing? Small things like eating less dairy, drinking more water, and getting more sleep can have such a huge impact on the quality of your voice.

3. Take constructive criticism with dignity.

Every now and then you’ll receive some criticism where someone thought you should change an aspect of your voice and you can’t fly off the handle. Make it one of your strong points to take someone else’s opinions and constructive criticism in a positive way for improvement.

4. Add variation with dynamics.

If someone were to sing an entire piece with the exact same tone and level of volume, the performance would be very boring. Mix things up and create variation by raising and lowering your volume in order to accentuate certain emotions in the song.

5. Communicate the song’s meaning.

You might have the best voice in the world, but you won’t be considered the best singer if you can’t express what the song is saying. Learn to appreciate the true intentions of the song you’re performing and showcase its emotions to your fullest.

There are a lot of great singers out there, but you can be one of them too with practice and hard work. Try out these simple but effective tips and be more confident the next time that you take the stage.

Kyle Hoffman has been a lead singer in acclaimed hardcore and rock bands for a number of years and is considered an authority figure on vocals. Learn his FREE valuable tips for vocal singing and other strategies to sing well now!

Technorati Tags: for good singing, Music, performing arts, sing, singing, to sing well, Vocals