Have you ever wondered how professional singers are able to maintain their vocal health? Whether they are performing on stage for a weekend run of a musical or on tour across the country, there are certain things singers must do to ensure their voice is in the best shape each performance.
This takes discipline with a vocal health regimen.
As a responsible singer you have to maintain your vocal health so we are going to give you some tips on how to do this.
First and foremost, get some sleep!
Your body is the main thing that creates your ability to sing well. The way that you use your body and the way that you treat your body will produce the best sounds possible with your voice. This includes getting enough sleep at night. Every muscle in your body gets tired when you’re tired. Parts of you like your vocal cords, soft palate, mouth and diaphragm are all tired when you’re lacking rest. If you are having trouble with being able to sing well regularly and are only getting four to five hours of sleep a night, don’t be super surprised. You need to make sure that you have good sleep and good food in your body to have enough energy to sing well.
Stay Hydrated
Being dehydrated is very difficult on vocal chords, because they need a lot of lubrication and water throughout them to maintain vocal health. This will allow them to be used regularly and produce higher pitches and lower pitches, etc.
Let’s say you’re going to sing something and you’re like, “oh my gosh, my throat is dry. Let me drink some water real quick,” unfortunately it’s too late. Staying hydrated means you prepared about an hour before your show, minimally, or even better 24 hours before then.
Avoid cold beverages
Singers spend hours warming up their voice properly to be able to sing at their best.
For example, let’s presume you have warmed up your voice and you feel really good about being able to use your voice properly. You’re feeling comfortable, and high notes feel good. Then you drink some ice water. You have now undone all of the warming up you previously did. So make sure that you’re drinking water that is room temperature when you’re singing. Because cold is the literal opposite of warm.
Why should you warm up to maintain vocal health?
Because if you were going to go run a marathon, not stretching before would make it way more difficult to be successful. Warming up prepares your voice to be successful in your performance. Doing multiple vocal exercises to make sure that your voice has the best ability to make those sounds and to be healthy is imperative. Often times, people find warm ups on YouTube or use warm ups that they did with their choir teacher when they were in elementary school. Whatever works for you and your voice is fine. Here at Voicercise we do scales, breathing exercises, lip rolls, and other things that are important for you to be as warmed up as possible.
Overall Bodily Health
If you have a bunch of mucus in your body on a regular basis think about the things that you’re consuming that could be creating that from a health standpoint. Foods like dairy products can create a lot more of that. Also pay attention to the over-consumption of things like sugar and caffeine. The mucus will become worse and the more that you don’t take care of it. Try taking out one thing at a time to identify what foods are affecting your body the most. The idea here is to be conscious about the time in which you consume these things, ideally not before a performance.
Think about your body as a vessel. And as Naomi T Kaye used to say, “Singers don’t party. Singers are at the party.” They’re the performers and they’re the entertainment. So you must be responsible for maintaining your vocal health.
