Hey you guys and welcome back to The Singing Studio. Today is a little bit different. We’re going to be talking about our vocal routine. The most important thing that we can do for our voices is to practice everyday. I know I talk a lot about making sure to practice and making sure to review all of the supplemental videos that I make because practicing is a wonderful way of strengthening our voice. But the only way that we can practice effectively is if we create our own routine. So today I’m going to show you how I like to build my vocal routine and hopefully you can build one for yourself.
The first thing I do are breath exercises. Breathing, like I’ve said before several times, is the foundation of singing. It’s really important to remind ourselves and remind our bodies that we are in singing mode and that we need our breath to support that. I often like to take at least 5 to 6 minutes just focusing on breath. I also love this time because breathing really relaxes me and we want to practice relaxed. We don’t want our jaws to tense up and we don’t want our shoulders to tense up either. So breathing can really help relax our bodies and get us mentally prepared and ready.
The next thing I like to do is warm-up my voice. I don’t want to automatically dive right into the more intense exercises, you could say. I want to make sure that my voice is nice and awake. I like to do lip trills, humming, and some sirens. That way I can get my voice nice and awake, warm, and just ease myself into these other exercises.
The next thing I do is I go into some full-range exercises. So I go from the lowest part of my voice to the highest part of my voice and from the highest part of my voice to the lowest part of my voice. I like to totally reach the full range of my entire voice. Now this can look different for everybody and it can also look different day to day. Sometimes if I’m a little bit more tired or if I’m just getting over a cold or something, I won’t be able to warm-up my full range. So as you are warming up your full range, don’t push yourself. Make sure that you’re only going as low or as high as you are able to. Sometimes you may even find that your range has increased which is really exciting because that means that you’re working on your voice and you’re strengthening those vocal cords. So just know that practicing and warming up that full range is going to look different for everybody and just to go at your own pace.
The next thing I work on is my chest voice. I like to go to my chest voice because that is the voice that I am personally most comfortable singing and speaking at. I like to work on my chest voice first because I feel like it gives me confidence. It also helps my voice build on the previous warm-ups that I had just got done doing. I feel like it’s just a really nice way, again, of easing myself into the harder exercises. So I like to sing down low. I like to focus on different vowels and diction in my chest voice. I’m really digging in and making sure that I am fully supported with my breath and that my jaw is relaxed. I go from my full range exercises to my chest voice exercises.
Now that we have really warmed ourselves up I like to go into my head voice and the head voice like I mentioned in previous videos can be a little bit tricky for some of us because the head voice isn’t typically the register that we speak in and it’s up higher and some of us get nervous to sing high. That’s totally okay- I like saving the head voice more towards the end of my vocal routine because my voice has had a chance to wake up to warm up and to really explore my full range. So now I can really focus on my head voice. I like to take it easy up there. Again, depending on how you’re feeling that day, how much time you take up there is totally up to you. I typically like to take five to ten minutes singing up in the head voice doing lots of really cool exercises. Sometimes I’ll do a couple of sirens before I begin working on my head voice so that way I can remind myself that I’m going to be singing up high and that I need to think nice and forward and open and also to have that vocal consistency. So whatever exercise I start I need to start it strong. I need to end it strong making sure that I’m totally consistent.
And last, but certainly not least, I work on my bridge. This is where I love doing slides, specifically the wee slides. I love it because it really just melds everything together that I have worked on that day with my voice. The bridge is tricky. It’s probably the hardest thing that singers have to overcome because the bridge is just awkward, like I’ve said previously. I like to save it for last because I’ve worked on my chest voice, I’ve worked on my head voice, and now we can work on this bridge that goes between the two. That way I’m fully warmed up in my two registers. Working on the bridge won’t be as strenuous or as hard because my voice is really warm and ready to go.
Because I save working on my bridge for the end, I have to remind myself that I need to keep that good breath support. So sometimes taking a couple of deep breaths right before you begin is a great way of reminding yourself that you need to have good breath support as you do bridge exercises. Don’t forget to drink water through all of this. I totally forgot to mention this, but make sure you have a water bottle with you at all times while you are practicing.
So just as a recap for what I do. First, I do breath control exercises. I do a few warm-ups to wake up my voice. I explore my full range. Then I isolate and work on my chest voice and then I work on my head voice. Finally, I work on my bridge. So those are all of the steps I take to create my own vocal routine.
My challenge for you is to review some of the supplemental videos that I have filmed that have all of these different exercises. I want you to write down your vocal routine. Write down your favorite breath exercises. Write down what sort of bridge exercises you like. Chest voice, head voice, and so on. Or maybe you want to switch it up. Maybe you don’t like the order that I have and you want to try something different. That’s totally fine! I just like to share my model of how I warm-up so that you can have a template to base your routine off of.
Make sure that you are practicing every day. Hopefully you take a lot of what I talked about and apply it to your own vocal routine. If you haven’t started a vocal routine, now is a great time to start. I hope you take my challenge and write down all the things. I’m so glad that you watched this video. Be sure and check out my previous videos and all those supplemental videos. We’ll see you in our next video.
I do these videos every other week, but if you still want more musical theatre, check out my newsletter! It’s called “Beyond The Score”, and it just takes a closer look at musical theatre history. You can find that at jskstories.com.