Building a strong foundation (World Voice Day Edition)
If you’re using your singing and/or speaking voice on a regular basis, one of the most important things you can do is to build a strong foundation to develop and protect your voice. Building it takes time and perseverance. Here, our founder Louisa provides some guidance on where to start.
I spend much of my week working with students who I’ve taken through several stages of their training journey. This includes as beginners - which doesn’t necessarily mean no experience, it can also mean they’ve been singing without training and need an understanding of how their voice works; some need guiding through the stages of adolescence, when the voice is shifting, developing and changing all the time; some are getting performance/gig ready; and some are simply maintaining their training, good vocal health and practises once they move into industry. All of them have been through the steps below, to ensure their voices have a solid foundation:
The anatomy of the voice. The voice is an instrument like any other. And just like when playing the piano and not just the keys are doing the work; when we open our mouth to sing, it’s not just our vocal chord’s are at work, either: singing is a full body experience and good posture is a piece of the puzzle.
Breathing. Good, effective breath flow in singing is fundamental. Understanding how the breath connects with the voice and the rest of the body when you sing or speak, will start to build the foundation Click here to read a previous article on how to breathe in singing.
Ask yourself the question; where am I comfortable, when I sing? The answer is in your chest voice (also known as your ‘modal’ vocal register). This differs from person to person, so a good place to start exploring this is to sing the note that comes out of your mouth naturally and comfortably when you do a simple ‘ah’. If you have access to a piano, find this note as a starting point. Work your way up and down the piano, exploring the notes until it starts to feel uncomfortable (if you don’t have a piano, click here to access one of our warm-up exercises) … Your chest voice are the notes before it becomes uncomfortable.
Warming-up is also fundamental! This should include a combination of physical and vocal exercises that suit your voice and your specific needs. There are literally thousands of vocal exercises on YouTube, which is both a good and bad thing: it’s great that we all have access to so many resources; but it’s not great if you’re not sure where to start! Your coach will work with you to establish which exercises are going to be most useful for your stage of vocal development.
Building the habit. It should be no surprise that with all this stuff, regular practise is essential. Creating the strong foundation takes time and expecting immediate results is unrealistic: you wouldn’t expect to be able to play full songs on the guitar without months of perseverance and your voice is no different. For vocalists in training, it’s good practise to check in with your voice most days, with your vocal arm-up (it does also need a day off … aa topic for another time!). This will help you understand how your voice is feeling and how that foundation is developing.
Please comment below with any questions and if you have any additions for the list