#5essentials

The Singer’s A-Z of Vocal Technique and its weekly journey continues - but the end is in sight with just 7 letters (the trickiest) left to explore. 

Of course, in any endeavour like this, you’re likely to double back and cover the same/similar ground, revisit and link to related issues. 

With singing, this is essential.

‘Support’ is a great example. It’s been talked about, pondered on, hinted at many times since I started writing this series of posts/articles. Back in February, talking about Expiration, I wrote

When you’ve got it, you’ve GOT it, and that word (support) becomes part of the skillset, a component that is so hard to explain. Unlocking the puzzle initially, finding new ways to nudge students along the path of learning is a challenge because different ideas both mean and feel differently to each person.

So, when you teach, you need to be inventive and resourceful to teach the same thing to different students. I’m a great fan of ‘liptrills’ (it is a golden warm-up exercise), but many singers, especially early on, find them elusive at best and will dismiss them as ‘too difficult’ and miss out...

Today’s infographic suggests an alternative way of feeling what this notion of support truly is. Get a good rolled ‘RRRRRR’ going and watch how your body maintains the sound. 

Related and useful blog-posts about ‘support’:

The delicate question of ‘support’

The importance of the body’s backup system

The connection and synchronicity of flow

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One of my teachers, Ilse Wolf, would always talk about ‘singing on the breath’. I really didn’t have a clue what that actually meant. I would listen while she explained, while she showed me diagrams in books that had pretty much been worn out by her fingertips over the years, as she pointed out the movement of AIRFLOW in the body as we breathe in and sing OUT.

But that was more than 30 years ago - and now I so GET everything she was sharing with me. I didn’t understand then, but I’ve pursued my learning journey to the point where I am now teaching the same principles, just as she did then, to all her singing students.

Take this infographic - a favourite of mine, because it provokes thought and gives a hint of what is truly involved in the rather paradoxical ‘breathing mindset’. But, in truth? It’s the tip of the iceberg.

Very much aligned with last week’s post about ‘Airflow, not AirBLOW’, here I offer the suggestion that breathing has to do with ‘allowing’, and to do what comes naturally. Relax those abdominal muscles as the air goes in, and allow the diaphragm room to lengthen and flatten out. To do that, you must release any abdominal tension, but not in any way give in to collapse. It’s a paradox, a contradictory thought. It is never as simple as filling your lungs with as much air as possible with the hope of holding on to it and making it last. NO!

Singers concern themselves with their breathing over and above other basic vocal techniques, thinking that if they could only master their breathing, everything else would fall into place. Airflow is one important ingredient of the whole vocal recipe - but to truly understand what’s going on, and therefore make progress, it has to be studied in context and seen as one part of the 5Essentials of vocal technique.

There’s always more to learn. But that’s all part of the JOY.

Improvement to the voice, spoken or sung, takes time. It requires expert guidance, patience and gentle, CONSISTENT pursuit. Know your vocal basics, explore them thoroughly and revisit them, often.

As a teacher, what more can I say? This is MUSIC to my teaching ears and heart. If any of this resonates with you and you too would like to get involved with any Little Soprano vocal activities, just click on the relevant links below:

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