Lip Trills
Take a breath, and send the breath between your lips and let them vibrate. Make sure your lips are
relaxed, and you will find yourself doing a lip trill! When it comes to using lip trills for a vocal warm-up,
you will want to take it a step further and add pitch to your trill, so that you are essentially “singing” via
lip trills.
Lip trills are very beneficial as a vocal warm-up for several reasons:
They help relax your lips so that you can deliver clearer diction and vowel sounds
They take the pressure off of your vocal cords during warm-up
They warm up your diaphragm and its surrounding muscles for better breath control and support
Try singing some pentascales or arpeggios through a lip trill, and for even more exercise, try singing
through an entire piece on a lip trill.
Sirens, or “octave slides,” sound exactly like what their name suggests: sirens. To break it down, a siren
means sliding on an “oh” or “oo” from your lowest comfortable note all the way up to your highest
comfortable note, and back down again. This exercise can seem obnoxious and silly, but it’s incredibly
effective. Sirens warm up the very highest and lowest parts of your registers while also connecting these
registers. If you struggle with a smooth transition from your chest voice to your head voice, this is an
excellent exercise for you!
Warming up by singing through your vowels is a great way to focus your tone and energy before you
start singing through your repertoire. Sometimes when we are tired or distracted, our tone can close up
without us recognizing it, so taking a few moments to consciously focus your tone will result in a much
more efficient practice. You can start on any note and move up or down by a half step as you go. Sing
through the vowels “ae-ee-ah-oh-oo” and do your best to connect each vowel, not breathing until you
move up to the next note.
Arpeggios
Arpeggios are not only effective as a vocal exercise but as an ear training exercise as well! The quicker
you sing arpeggios, the more difficult it gets to hit the center of each pitch. As you sing, really focus on
moving from one pitch to another with precision. You can sing arpeggios on a vowel sound such as “ah”
or “oh,” “solfège,” or, you can add a phrase with the same number of syllables as there are notes. For
example, try: “Mighty fine weather today.”
This exercise causes you to focus on pitch and syllables at the same time, so it’s a great way to fire up
your brain when you’re working on memorization. Start slow and work on increasing your speed.
Solfège ladders are also a lot of fun to sing in a round! Have one person start the exercise, and when
they reach measure 3, have the next person start from the beginning. You can do this with as many
people as you want! The more you have, the more difficult it is to hold your part!
In order to have the best air flow and therefore the best sound, you need to have good posture. This
goes for when you're both sitting and standing. Imagine a line at the top of your head, through your
back, holding you up.[1]
If you're standing, keep your feet flat on the floor, shoulder width apart. Balance equally on both legs.
Keep your head up and shoulders back. Every part of your body should be in the same line.
If you're sitting, follow the same recommendations as you would for standing, but also keep your back
off the chair, sitting towards the edge of your seat.
Breathe deep. Most people have a bad habit of only using the top of their lungs. Doing this though
doesn't employ the diaphragm and doesn't let you use your full power.[2]
If you are tense at all while breathing, it will resound in the muscles of your vocal folds. Breathe
normally, but be conscious of keeping your shoulders low and your chest relaxed. Concentrate on
breathing lower staying loose throughout your core. If you need to, place a hand on your stomach to
remind yourself that that's the part that should be moving up and down -- not your chest and shoulders.
Hold an "s" sound (like a hiss) when you exhale to control the amount of air that you can expel.
Any tension at all will keep you from your best sound. Your jaw is the instrument your voice comes out
of -- you have to take care of it, too. The best place to sing from is your diaphragm, so stick it out to
breath there.[3]
Massage your cheeks with the heel of each hand. Push in and down right below your cheekbone and
rotate in a clockwise motion. Your jaw should open without you even thinking about it and be forced to
relax. Do this several times.
Drink warm liquids. Ice cold water will limit muscle function in the throat, while very hot water can
cause those muscles to relax too much and swell the mucous membranes in the pharynx. It's also best to
avoid caffeine and nicotine, too. All these things constrict your throat and keep you from sounding your
best.[4]
Warm teas or room temperature water are your best bets. You definitely want your vocal cords to
stay lubed up, but you don't want to freeze or scorch them! If you do choose tea, make sure it's not
scalding hot.
Do scales. You wouldn't run 5 miles (8.0 km) out of the gate, so don't expect your voice box to be able
to go up and down 3 octaves either. Doing scales slowly warms up your voice, extending it to its top and
bottom ranges. And it's pretty easy to do, even alone.
If you are breathing right and holding yourself correctly, it'll be easier to hit those notes in your high
register. Be patient, though, and work gradually. You'll actually hurt your voice if you start off too low or
too high, forcing it to do things it really doesn't want to do.
Another common method to warming up apart from scales are trills. They relax the lip and tongue,
engage breathing, and eliminate tension.[5]
For lip trills, simply create a raspberry sound by loosely placing your lips together. Experiment with
different consonant sounds, like "h" and "b." Go slowly up and down your range, but don't do anything
that's uncomfortable or hard to maintain.
For tongue trills, think of the Spanish "r." Place your tongue behind your upper teeth and exhale
strongly. Hold the sound and air steady, varying the pitch while trilling. Again, don’t do anything your
voice doesn't want you to do. You'll know.
Some of the more fun warm ups are sirens and kazoos. When you do your siren (which should start low
and go high), use your arm and toss it in a circular motion, going up and down with the pitch.[6]
Kazoos focus of the sound and stretch the vocal folds in a healthy, controlled way. Just pretend like
you're sucking in spaghetti -- it's as simple as that. On an exhale, make the “woo” sound; it'll come out
like a buzz. Holding the sound steady, go up and down to the extremities of your range. Do this several
times.
Try some tongue twisters going up and down in tunes. This is preparing your voice for complexed
songs. A good one is 'Seven salty sailors sailed the seven seas (repeat up in Do Re Me.)
There are a million reasons to practice vocal warm-ups, but the main one is that good vocal health
means that you are actively protecting one of your most valuable assets – your singing voice.
Your vocal cords are delicate, and you need to treat them with care. By stretching and helping these
muscles to relax, you reduce the risk of tension, damage and voice loss.
Vocal warm-ups also work wonders for singers looking to smooth out their vocal break, practice
breathing exercises, and improve their range.
Whether you are learning to sing or whether you are at the height of your career, vocal warm-ups
should come as standard as part of your vocal training plan. If you want to keep your voice in tip-top
shape, we have ten of the best vocal warm-ups to change the way you sing.
You may wonder how blowing air through your lips like a horse will affect your voice. Lips trills are an
excellent exercise for practicing exhaling endurance – and we all know that better breathing leads to
better singing.
Slacken your lips and blow air between them, be sure to keep your lips loose. If you need to; place a
finger at the corners of your mouth and push upwards towards the nose.
Once you have the lip trill, you can start counting in your head. The aim is to maintain the trill for four
counts. This vocal exercise will also help with breath control as you will need to take a big deep breath
before starting your trill.
As your endurance improves and your chest stays firm, you can start to lip trill for more extended
periods of time. You can even lip trill songs that you know.
Tongue trills are similar to lip trills except here you will be using air to vibrate your tongue instead of
your lips. Place your tongue directly behind your upper teeth. Take a deep breath and then exhale while
causing your tongue to trill or vibrate with an “r” sound. Try to hold your sound steady with your breath
connected.
Again, as your endurance improves, you can practice your tongue trills for more extended periods of
time. You can also vary your pitch, moving up and down the scale while trilling.
Care should be taken not to push beyond what is comfortable at the top and bottom of the scale
practices.
Learning solfege is an excellent vocal warm-up exercise to stop you slipping out of tune when singing.
Not only will this neat little activity keep your sound strong, but it will also work on your range and help
you to recognize the right pitch by ear.
Those who are familiar with The Sound of Music will already know Do-Re-Mi-Fa-So-La-Ti-Do. In the
world of singers and vocal training, this style of singing is called solfege.
You can practice singing solfege acapella or with a piano. It will help you to hit your pitches perfectly. As
you progress with practicing your solfege, you can start at a higher pitch each time to see how much
higher you can go.
Practicing your “nays” and “gees” are two different vocal warm-ups that sit in the same camp. First,
saying “nay” helps for vocal cord closure in your head voice.
Imagine your “nay” voice as a very annoying child. It needs to be nasally and whiny to be useful as this is
what causes your larynx to go up.
Alternatively, after a few rounds of “nay”, you can follow with your “gee”. Your “gee” will cause your
larynx to drop. The “hooty gee” is a great exercise for those who are experiencing tension when singing.
However, the “gee” should be treated with a pinch of caution. If you notice your vocal cords tighten
more when you say “gee”, you may need to consult a vocal coach for assistance to ensure you do not
injure your vocal chords.
Find out more about your “hooty gee”.
The siren is a great low-impact voice exercise that will not overstretch your muscles when singing, will
help you warm up your range, and will encourage sonic vibrations to travel through the body.
Think of the noise a fire engine makes when attending an emergency, and simply imitate it. Start at the
lowest note in your vocal range and take it to the highest. Doing the siren as part of your warm-up
singing routine is a terrific addition to your vocal training plan.
Shaping your mouth when singing is another exercise that will lead to a better vocal technique. Start
with singing “oo” (as in food) in a five-tone scale. Begin at the upper middle of your range and work
down in half-steps.
Repeat this exercise with all the vowels, paying close attention to the shape your mouth is making and
how each vowel opens or closes the throat muscles.
Afterwards, you can practice the same technique with the consonants, noting the vowel sounds within
each of the consonants. When you close your consonants, the song you are singing will sound
inappropriate because it physically pulls on the muscles in your larynx and changes the position of your
vocal folds.
Once you have mastered how you pronounce your vowels and consonants, you will be able to change
tones without losing control.
Tension can collect in the throat, whether you have been pushing too hard, suffering from a voice
disorder like vocal cord paralysis or reflux laryngitis, or even experiencing a dehydrated singing voice.
The aim of this exercise is to shake out the tension in the vocal cords that are within the Adam’s apple
area of your throat.
Place your fingers across your Adam’s Apple and swallow, noticing how your Adam’s Apple moves up.
Keep your fingers there and practice a yawn, also noting the same movement. The downward motion is
releasing the tension from your throat.
Yawn five times and exhale at the end with a soft sigh like an “ah” (at a comfortable pitch). Yawning will
also relax your soft palate and give you better sound and breath support
“Side stretches are great for expanding your rib cage and making your lungs feel like they are full of air,”
says Voice Actor and Coach Heather Costa.
“Simply take a deep breath and raise your arms up to the sky. Exhale and slightly lean to the left,
lengthening in your side body. Hold it there for just a couple of seconds before you inhale to center, and
then exhale over to the right.”
“Next, stand with your feet hip-width apart. Inhale your arms up to the sky, then slowly bend at your
waist on the exhale and take your hands toward the ground. It doesn’t matter how far you can go, the
action of bending over is enough to give you a nice, warm stretch! Stay there for a couple of breaths,
and then on an inhale slowly come back up to a standing position.”
A loose, gentle modulating hum is a nice way to ease in your facial muscles as well as create space for
resonant sound. It gets your resonators going which in turn will help restore your vocal tone quality
after sleeping for several hours.
Lip trills and flutters will also help loosen facial muscles and get your vocal cords warmed-up. Even
better, if you try them in the shower.
Another good trick to open up the passages is to descend on a nasal consonant sound. If you are a fan or
student of IPA (the International Phonetic Alphabet), you know that there are a number of ways you can
warm up your sinuses and nasal passages.
Articulate, articulate, articulate. In the voice over business, this is one of the most important aspects of
your performance.
If you don’t articulate or enunciate clearly, no one is going to understand a word of what you are saying.
5 Classic Tongue Twister Exercises
Unique New York, Unique New York, Unique New York…. (repeat and speed up as necessary)
A big black bug bit a big black bear
She sells seashells by the sea shore
Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers
How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?
Now that you’ve warmed up your resonators and articulators, let’s address range.
Yawning naturally drops your jaw and regulates oxygen, while extending your soft palate.
In this Time Magazine interview, Morgan Freeman reveals that yawning is part of the secret behind his
very successful voice.
“If you’re looking to improve the sound of your voice, yawn a lot,” he says. “It relaxes your throat
muscles. It relaxes your vocal cords. And as soon as they relax, the tone drops. The lower your voice is,
the better you sound.”
Bonus: With more oxygen flowing up to your brain, you’ll also find that you are more alert.
How to do a Yawn-Sigh
Open your mouth as if to yawn, and slide all the way down from the top of your vocal range to the
lowest grumble you can muster.
You’ll know when you bottom out.
It may go without saying, but a good sleep the night before, about eight hours if you can swing it, and a
well conditioned, lubricated voice is the best preparation for warming up at the crack of dawn. This
means staying well hydrated, well before you need to perform. Water is your best friend!
Do Your Vocal Warm-Ups in the Shower
If you’re a multi-tasker, you could probably fit your warm ups into your morning shower routine. The
acoustics will be great and warm water is a plus. The humidity will also help as the moisture will coat
and help protect your throat, vocal cords and more.
Do a few head rolls by dropping your head to the left side, and moving clockwise, roll it down towards
your chest, to your right side, and letting it dip slightly towards your back, returning to the left side.
(Don’t let your head completely hang back, as over time that could damage your neck.)
Repeat starting on the right side, going counter-clockwise.
Roll your shoulders back and down, 3-5 times.
Let your head drop to the right side of your shoulder.
Place your right hand over your head, gently pulling your head towards your right shoulder.
You should feel a stretch on the left side of your neck reaching down to your shoulder.
Drop and raise your left shoulder a few times to intensify the stretch.
Repeat on the other side.
Place your hands gently on your face, on your jaw.
Starting near the ear, massage with your fingertips gently, in little circles. Work your way down your jaw
toward your chin.
You may accompany this with some soft vocalization, like sighing on the exhale.
Now hold your hands flat, like paddles.
A good vocal warm up should take about 30 minutes.
Any more than that and you’re probably tiring out your voice.
And remember, the point of singing is to perform songs, not exercises.
So don’t gas yourself on vocal warm ups when the whole point is to sing songs.
30 minutes is about the minimum amount of time you’ll need to properly warm up your voice.
So don’t short yourself on warm up time if you’re going on stage tonight.
Budget enough time to get a full 30 minute warm up in.
Place them on your jaw, starting near the ear.
With your paddles, smooth down toward your chin gently but firmly.
This should encourage your jaw to drop.
Wake up your resonators by giving them a little massage.
Your resonators are the amplifiers of your face: they allow your sound to fill an auditorium instead of
just your shower.
Use your fingertips to softly massage little circles on your forehead, your cheeks, and even your nose!
Do this while gently making an “Mmmm” sound, and notice how you feel the sound in different areas of
your face.
Does your face feel great?
Remember: Do this 3-5 times
As you start to sing more regularly, you’ll probably need to up your water intake.
You may even notice that you have a vocal crack if you’re not well hydrated.
That’s because the vocal folds require lubrication to get a healthy vibration.
This strong vibration is responsible for the power in your voice.
Sometimes, mucus from allergies or acid reflux can get in the way of this healthy vibration.
In addition to keeping you hydrated, drinking water also keeps the vocal folds clean and free of mucus.
Even if you’re having a singing lesson, adequate sleep plays a big part in how well your voice functions.
That’s because even though singing is an important part of your life, evolution does not place singing
high on the list of priorities.
So if you’re low on sleep, your brain automatically dedicates more focus and energy to more important
functions.
In addition to losing focus, a lack of rest can also contribute to vocal fatigue.
And if your voice is tired, you’re more likely to push your voice to hit the same notes you normally can.
This overcompensation can be part of a vicious cycle:
You’re tired so you push your voice. But then your voice becomes even more fatigued because you’re
pushing it
Even if you’re having a singing lesson, adequate sleep plays a big part in how well your voice functions.
That’s because even though singing is an important part of your life, evolution does not place singing
high on the list of priorities.
So if you’re low on sleep, your brain automatically dedicates more focus and energy to more important
functions.
In addition to losing focus, a lack of rest can also contribute to vocal fatigue.
And if your voice is tired, you’re more likely to push your voice to hit the same notes you normally can.
This overcompensation can be part of a vicious cycle:
You’re tired so you push your voice. But then your voice becomes even more fatigued because you’re
pushing it
If you have a medical issue with your voice, a singing warm up won’t be as effective as when you’re
healthy.
So if you have reflux, nodules or just a sore throat, obviously singing isn’t much fun.
Depending on the severity of the medical problem, it may be best to see an Ear, Nose and Throat Doctor
(a.k.a. “ENT”) first.
The Doctor will give you a treatment plan to fix your medical issue.
And some voice Doctors will actually recommend that you see a certified voice teacher as part of your
treatment plan.
If you have vocal nodules, for example, an ENT may recommend you rest your voice in order to help the
vocal folds recover.
Finding the right posture is one of the easiest ways of improving your voice.
By maintaining the correct posture while you warm up, you’ll sing with less tension and more power.
So if you find yourself slouching or leaning over while you sing, it’s time to correct your posture.
The best posture for singing is known as a Tall Posture.
The good news is it’s really simple.
Here’s how you do it:
1. Stand up and spread your feet so that they’re evenly spaced on the ground and in line with your
shoulders.
A low belly breath is one of the best secrets to a good vocal warm up.
By taking a diaphragmatic breath, you’re supplying your voice with the fuel to sing powerfully.
The good news is that learning to sing from the diaphragm is really easy to do.
Here’s how you do it:
1. Place your hand on your belly and take a slow, silent inhale through your mouth.
2. With your hand on your belly, allow your inhale to expand your stomach outward.
This jaw tension may be the result of a habit or a more serious joint disorder such as
temporomandibular joint disorder (a.k.a. “TMJ”).
In either case, learning to release tension in the jaw can make a huge difference to your singing.
While it’s true that narrow vowels can help you sing some notes better, we always want the freedom to
move our jaw without tension.
Try to practice in front of a mirror and monitor the openness of your mouth as you sing.
The first step in getting your voice warmed up is getting you connected to your chest voice.
If you haven’t heard the term chest voice before, don’t worry.
I’ve written an article on 10 Singing Techniques to Improve Your Voice that explains chest voice in more
detail.
But here’s what you need to know:
In the old days, singers found that notes at the bottom of their range resonated in their chest.
They called this range of notes Chest Voice.
how to hit high notes
And if your voice is light and breathy on bottom, you don’t have a chance of singing high notes with
power.
That’s because the chest voice is the foundation for all the notes that come above it.
So it pays to start here.
Here’s the best way to strengthen your chest voice:
Take the power of your speaking voice and apply it to your singing voice.
This may sound like a strange solution but follow me for a minute.
Many people who have a strong speaking voice sing too lightly.
So if you applied the same strength of your speaking voice to your singing you would end up with a
strong foundation for your higher notes.
So the first exercise we’ll use to strengthen our voice is the 5-Tone Count.
Begin by saying the number “One” aloud at a comfortable volume.
2. Find a comfortable starting pitch (try C3 for guys and G3 for girls) and say the word “One” on that
pitch.
3. Next, say the numbers 1 through 5 on pitch with the ascending 5-Tone scale pictured here.
Remember that the whole point of the 5-Tone Count is to match the strength of your speaking voice
and your singing voice.
So if you hear any breathiness or lightness in your tone, you’re doing it wrong.
The goal of this exercise is to speak/sing these notes.
This exercise may sound ugly to you. But we’re not doing it to sound pretty. We’re trying to get the
full power of your chest voice on the notes.
Stay at a consistently strong volume.
The lip trill is one of the safest and most powerful vocal warm ups.
In this we’re going to let our lips flop together in order to create a safe way to sing to the top of our
range.
The lip trill is almost like a compressor for your voice.
For those of you who tend to sing really loud and strainy at the top of your voice, the lip trill will help
you hit high notes without straining.
Or for those that tend to sing a little breathy or back off at the top of their voice, the lip trill will help the
vocal folds stay together throughout your whole range.
That means hitting high notes with a mix of the chest voice and head voice.
Blow some air between your lips to make them flop together.
This should be done in a very relaxed way. Make sure you’re not holding your lips tightly in order to get
the lips to bubble.
Just relax let them gently vibrate together.
2. Now while your lips are flopping together, add a bit of voice like you’re saying the word “Uh” behind
the lips. It will probably make a bubbly sound like you’re under water.
3. Find a comfortable starting pitch (try C3 for guys and G3 for girls) and allow the lips to flop together
while you sing the on that pitch.
While the lip trill is my absolute favorite warm up exercise, it doesn’t work for everyone.
That’s because some people need a little more vibration in the vocal folds in order to get a strong mix of
the chest and head voice.
If you noticed that you “flipped” or had a vocal break, don’t worry.
We can fix your vocal break easily with the Octave and a Half Squeaky Door Exercise.
Pretend you just had a delicious meal and make a humming sound on the consonant “mm”.
Go ahead and make it really enthusiastic “mm, mm, mmmmm”.
*Note that your mouth should be closed and the humming should be coming through your nasal
passage.
2. Now, take that “mm” sound and hum up to a higher note keeping the “mm” really squeaky like a
creaky door.
3. Use the squeaky “mm” sound and sing it on a comfortable starting pitch (try C3 for guys and G3 for
girls).
4. Now hum the squeaky “mm” on the Octave and a Half Scale like this:
Sure, the lip trill can be great for singing high notes without falsetto or strain, but it doesn’t sound like
real singing.
So what do we do to get ready to sing songs?
Let’s work on the Octave and a Half “Gee”.
With this exercise, the “ee” vowel lets the vocal folds stretch, which helps us find our head voice.
Say the word “Gee” as in “Geese” at a comfortable volume.
2. While saying the word “Gee”, make sure that you are enunciating the “G” consonant.
3. Now find a good starting pitch (try C3 for guys and G3 for girls) and begin to sing the word “Gee” on
that pitch.
4. Sing the following scale.
The Octave Repeat “Bee”
Now that we’ve gotten your entire range warmed up on the “Gee” exercise, it’s time to isolate a few of
those trouble notes in your bridge or passage.
If you haven’t heard the term bridge before, don’t worry.
I’ve written an article on 10 Singing Techniques to Improve Your Voice that explains the bridge in more
detail.
But here’s what you need to know:
The “bridge” or “passagio” is the area where the voice transitions from the chest voice to the head
voice.
Some singers can make this area sound perfect.
But most singer’s voices will have a vocal crack or strain in this area.
Learning to connect the vocal registers is one of the 40 proven singing techniques to help you sound
better.
So let’s take a look at those notes specifically.
One of the best ways of warming up your voice is hitting those notes on a “Bee” exercise.
The bratty “Nay” is probably the most well known Speech Level Singing exercise.
#1: it’s really silly.
And #2, it really works!
Now while the Bratty “Nay” is a pretty ugly exercise, it can be a great vocal warm up to help you sing
with a mix.
The bratty sound that we use for this exercise keeps the vocal folds closing more efficiently.
And the “ay” vowel helps point us toward our head voice.
The result?
You can hit amazingly high notes without falsetto!
Here’s How to Do the “Bratty” Nay
1. Say the word “Nay” (as in “Neighbor”) in a bratty way. The sound should be buzzy and nasal-sounding.
2. Now sing a comfortable starting pitch (try E3 for guys and C#4 for girls).
3. Sing the following scale.
That bratty sound isn’t only good for those notes in the middle of your voice.
Done correctly, the ugly, bratty sound can help you hit some amazing high notes with power.
The only problem is that since “Nay” is a somewhat narrow vowel, your voice may tend to squeeze a bit
once you get into your highest notes.
Don’t worry.
Instead, let’s sing across your whole range with an ugly “Nae” (as in “Nasty”) exercise.
Here’s How to Sing the Bratty “Nae”:
1. Say the word “Nae” (as in “Nasty”) out loud in an ugly, bratty way.
If you need inspiration, just remember how kids tease each other on the playground “Nae Nae Nae-Nae
Nae”.
2. Now sing the bratty “Nae” on a comfortable starting pitch (try C3 for guys and G3 for girls).
Sure, the bratty “Nay” is great for helping you sing with a mix, but it’ll only take you so far.
Obviously, nobody wants to hear you sing “All of Me” with a bratty tone.
So let’s do a vocal warm up to get a more performance-ready tone.
The Octave Repeat No gives us all the good stuff of the bratty “Nay” without the funny sound.
The “N” consonant helps the vocal folds close just like the “Nay”.
But the “Oh” vowel allows the larynx to relax slightly, normalizing the tone.
And that creates a sound that’s much closer to real singing.Pronounced a buzzed “Zzzzzz” sound and put
your fingers on your throat and feel the vibration. The looser you are, the more vibration you can feel.
Find the point in your throat where the sounds produce the most vibration. Your lips are slightly open.
Repeat the tone sequence from Exercise 1 or a long, slow slide tone from the fundamental to the octave
and back. Remain completely relaxed in your throat. Try different positions/pitches here as well.
Breathe loosely into your stomach area and do not tense your abdominal muscles. Place your hands on
your stomach at the level of the rib cage. Pant like a dog a few times in a row. Now you can feel your
diaphragm flexing, which separates the abdomen from the chest.
Then sing short melodies (maybe again the tone sequence from the first two exercises) using vowels,
the tones coming directly from your stomach. Start with an A and then try out the other vowels. With
the sound of the vowels you can feel how you sing from the diaphragm, because breathing and sound
should not come from the throat. At the same time you can feel how your chest starts to vibrate while
you sing.Start with a soundless yawn. After that, yawn on a tone. Feel how much space there is in your
mouth and throat. Leave your mouth in yawn position and sing a sequence of the first five notes of a
major scale:
1–2–3–4–5–4–3–2–1
Yawn the tones. The extreme looseness in your mouth and neck helps you to further utilise the range of
your voice. This exercise also relaxes your vocal chords.
Short sound bursts
Make short sound bursts on the sound “Ha“. Have the thought that with each burst the space in your
neck increases and decreases again during the pauses, when your vocal chords lie loosely together. Sing
the exercise on the tone sequence from Exercise 4. Try out slow and fast sequences, i.e. right behind
each other. Put your hands back on your abdomen and feel the control when the air stops between each
sequence. Feel the bursts like trampoline jumps in your diaphragm. This exercise helps to regulate your
breathing and you will learn how to divide and pace the airflow.
The Lip Bubble is a fantastic tool for not only warming your voice up quickly, but also for reducing vocal
tension. It's very similar to blowing a raspberry like you may have done as a child. Here's how to get the
lip bubble going:
Put your fingers into your cheeks near your lips on both sides of your mouth.
Relax your lips, jaw, and tongue.
Blow a raspberry without any sound until you can get that going consistently without breaking the
flow of air.
Add an "ahhh" sound while you are doing the lip bubble.
Once you have that going nicely, you can use the Lip Bubble with any simple vocal exercise such as a
major scale or arpeggio. If you would like a video demonstration on how to get the Lip Bubble going,
Elevator Slides are a great way to work through your vocal registers and smooth out any breaks.
To do this exercise, you're going to make a noise similar to a long, slow siren. I recommend starting with
an "ah" vowel and slowly ascend from low to high and back down again. Make sure you keep your
throat relaxed and don't let your notes catch in your throat as you sing higher. This will happen if you
don't move the resonance up into your head voice.
You can speed this exercise up as your voice gets warmer and switch the "ah" vowel to an "ee" and then
"ooh," which work on a slightly different vocal placement each time.
Similarly to the Lip Bubble, the Tongue Roll is excellent for warming your voice up quickly and reducing
vocal tension. The primary cause of vocal tension is your tongue, so it makes sense to practice rolling
your Rs to keep your tongue loose and flexible. Practice rolling your Rs first and see if you can keep that
consistent without breaking or spluttering for the length of one breath. Then add an "aah" sound to it.
While you're doing the tongue roll, do a simple vocal exercise like moving up and down three notes. You
may find that you can't sing up quite as high with this exercise because the Tongue Roll keeps your
larynx down slightly. If you find this exercise really easy, then move onto to doing the Tongue Roll with
major arpeggios.
Your warm up needs to be about more than just vocalizing and relaxing. You want to also be working on
your intonation and connecting to your breath, and Octave Jumps are a great way to do just that.
Keeping your notes staccato (short and detached), start from a low note in your vocal range and quickly
switch between that note and the same note an octave above three times. Because you're keeping your
notes short, your pitch accuracy may falter, so concentrate on hitting both notes straight on each time.
Don't make the common mistake of falling flat on the top note or singing sharp on the bottom note.
Then move this exercise up a note and repeat.
