If you’re wondering how to keep going and feel really fresh for choir or solo singing when all of the current crisis issues calm down, then look no further! The first thing to remember, is that having a rest will probably do your voice good. There is a lot to be said for being quiet for a week or two, before waking up your vocal cords. Allowing the larynx to rest, and the body along with it, will make fertile ground for the singing you’ll do for Christmas.
When you are ready to sing:
1. Stand with your feet at two fist widths apart. That will create the beginnings of a solid foundation on which to support the voice. Singing is a ‘whole body’ instrument.
2. Release your shoulders. Imagine your shoulder blades sliding down your back! This makes for freedom and physical space for the voice to manoeuvre.
3. Dip your chin to your chest and come up slowly, finding the position of comfortable balance for your head upon your neck.
4. Give your jaw and tongue a wiggle then let them settle into their natural resting place.
5. Give your whole body a good stretch and then bring yourself back to the good posture you found earlier.
6. Be still. Drop any tension and weight through the lower half of the body and into the earth. Be grounded there.
7. Breathe normally, through the mouth and remember not to over-breathe. The lungs and ribcage need ease, not force.
8. The moment you breathe in is a moment of potential, so don’t snatch air or allow the intake to make the jaw tight or shoulders tight.
9. Sigh an ‘ah’ and feel relieved as you do! Sigh an ‘ee’, an ‘eh’, an ‘oo’ and any other vowel you fancy. Get a feeling of flow as you breathe in, ease at the top of the breath and flow as you breathe out. Try from different parts of the voice. Low, middle, higher.
10. Take these sensations and transfer them into some intervals down and up. Any will do.
It’s helpful to be, at this stage, more concerned about the comfortable feelings than correctness of pitch, although, any comfort felt will automatically give you a better sense of pitch because the body will be aligned and not tight.
When you come to try this within a song, it’s vital to know that your sense of comfort and air flow is a priority for your feeling of well-being. Without this, the music cannot live.
Keep the jaw loose and the physical balance feeling settled. Place the sound as if it is the most beautiful and precious thing you ever wished to do and keep the air flowing as you sing into your phrase.
Deborah Catterall
Published in April 2020 Newsletter
