5 Tips to Keep Your Singing Voice Healthy and Performing at Your Peak
This post helps you get started, but that’s only the beginning. What would it feel like to sing your heart out with a transformed voice performing to thousands of people by the end of the year? Come join the tens of thousands of singers who have already transformed their voices with my Singers Gift Warmups. Set your voice free in just 20 minutes a day with these revolutionary techniques found only here! Click here to find out how.
Keeping your singing voice healthy and performing at its peak is the aim of every performing singer. Nothing is worse than when your voice isn’t holding up.
After working with singers (and being one myself) for over 4 decades I know a thing or two about keeping your voice healthy. My early interest in natural health and the biomechanics of the voice led to many discoveries.
Here are my top tips for keeping your singing voice healthy and performing at your peak.
1. Focus on good vocal health and hygiene in the weeks prior
Performing at your peak requires attention to your vocal health and hygiene in the weeks prior. The voice is an instrument housed inside the body and is affected by the state of health.
For instance, when dehydrated, you will have more trouble with vocal range, smoothness, and tone. Keep in mind that most people are dehydrated. If you are tired, you will struggle more with the extra energy required to sing well. If you constantly get sick, your voice will be compromised, and performing at your best will be difficult.
The two things you can’t mask or hide in the voice are dehydration and sleep deprivation. Both are important to keep your voice healthy and to perform at your peak.
Try this:
- To avoid dehydration up your water content for the week before the performance. Drink half your body weight in water. Add fresh green juice (organic) a day and eat salad and fruits like melons for more hydration. You can add these fruits or vegetables to your water as well for a little extra moisture: Add lemon, limes, melon, or cucumbers. Steam: Steaming is an additional way to hydrate the vocal folds before performance. Inhale steam over a pot of hot water or use a nebulizer *see below.
- Sleep:
- To help get a full 8 hours of sleep, keep your room as dark as you can, avoid blue light for one hour before bedtime, and keep the room cool which helps sleep.
- If you can’t get a full 8 hours, take 10-20 minutes of power naps throughout the day.
- Keep your immune system healthy and avoid getting sick
- Often before a performance, there is extra stress and it’s easier for your immune system to drop.
- To keep from getting sick – try these quick tips:
- Germs incubate in the throat for 3 days before blooming into an illness. You have 3 days to flush them out!
- Nebulize with 3 parts water and 1 part hydrogen peroxide (food grade) Here is my recommended nebulizer. I love it because it’s portable and easy to clean.
- Gargle often to flush out germs.
- Germs incubate in the throat for 3 days before blooming into an illness. You have 3 days to flush them out!
For more information click here for me Three Day Rule —a list of do’s and don’t to follow for three days before performance to dramatically improve your vocal delivery!
Click here -> The Three Day Rule: Performance Prep For Singers
2. Keep up with your Vocal Technique Practice
Peak performance is attainable when you have a regular consistent vocal technique practice. Every singer performing at a high level of performance works on their technique to improve their vocal production.
If you don’t have a good daily vocal technique practice – get one now. Don’t sleep on this!
Try this:
- Arrange 20 minutes a day, 5 days a week for your vocal practice
- Schedule it right on your calendar.
- Make it non-negotiable.
Want our 20-minute vocal technique warmups? We’ve got it all organized for you in 20-minute lessons on video and audio. Learn more here.
3. Stretch the muscles surrounding your instrument
One of the main contributing factors to issues with vocal performance is tension in the muscles surrounding the voice. Contracted, tight muscles surrounding the vocal muscles constrict the singing voice. This tension literally “squeezes” the voice causing a tight, thin, raspy, or throaty sound. Tension in these muscles constricts range and can lead to vocal problems such as early fatigue, vocal loss, and problems with consistency in performance.
The muscles to work on are the jaw, tongue, neck, throat, and abdominal muscles.
The best overall body stretch which gets everything is yoga or some form of full-body stretching. Massage is also a tool to release tension and open the voice for singing. See #4 below.
Try this to stretch out your neck muscles:
- Stretch your right hand up towards the ceiling alongside your head.
- Let your right ear press into your right bicep.
- Reach over your head to grasp your left ear with your right hand.
- Gently pull your head to the right letting your right ear fall into your right arm.
- Take a deep breath and pull a little more to the right while letting your head fall into your arm.
- Repeat on the other side.
- This stretches out the side neck muscles (sternocleidomastoids) helping to eliminate tension surrounding the vocal instrument. Do daily.
The jaw and tongue can be a big contributor to vocal limitations in performance. Tension in these muscles can limit the range, constrict tone, and cause early fatigue and vocal loss. Stretching these muscles is one of the key techniques in warming up that I include in my technique because it gets such great results and helps singers perform with more confidence and consistency.
Try this to release tension in the jaw:
Note: *the jaw releases when you move it slowly, not when it is yanked or pulled with force.
- Close your mouth.
- Gently grip your jaw with your hand and open the jaw to where it naturally sits open.
- Gently pull the jaw down another half inch. If you have TMJ open the jaw just before it clicks.
- Inhale and exhale in this position, while feeling a heaviness in your jaw muscles. Let the jaw relax in this position will help to stretch it out and release tension deep inside the muscle.
A tight tongue causes all kinds of problems with vocal tone and timbre. When the tongue is too tight and too active in vocal production the voice can sound too thin, tight, nasal, strained, squeezed, pinched, too bright, or strident sounding. A tight tongue can also cause an overcompressed uncomfortable sound.
The tongue, as a small muscle, also tends toward tension. Tension in the tongue can cause all kinds of problems including nasality, cracking and breaking on notes, going too early into head voice, lack of power or belt, and difficulty with high notes. In vocal technique, we stretch the tongue to lengthen it reducing tension which helps produce more sound and smoother, more consistent high notes.
Try this to release tension in the tongue:
- Take a washcloth or paper towel wetted with a little water and pull the tongue straight forward.
- Stick the tongue out and downward towards the floor. Inhale and exhale reaching the tongue down toward the floor to stretch it out.
To work on all of the specific stretches and massages for your vocal instrument: jaw, tongue, neck, all part of a vocal warmup series to open and free your voice for performance, grab a copy of my Singers Gift Vocal Warmups here.
4. Open your throat before singing
When you sing without opening up the throat the voice is tight and the larynx tends to sit in a high position which destabilizes the voice. This results in a constricted, tight sound and causes early fatigue in performance.
In my Singers Gift Vocal Warmups we use two movements that open the throat. Here is one of them.
Try this.
- Yawn with your finger horizontal at the top of the throat. Try to yawn more with the back of your throat vs. your jaw. A little of both is good.
- Watch in the mirror. Do you see your finger and throat slip downward as you yawn?
- Now hold an imaginary cup of water and bring it to your mouth to drink. As you prepare to drink do you notice your throat slip downward? This is a movement we do throughout the day and is easy to feel and repeat.
- This is a motion you want to do when warming up your voice to open the throat. This moves the laryngeal muscles and tongue downward and lifts the soft palate preparing your voice for singing in an open and free way. Once it is programmed into the body it becomes a natural movement that you don’t even have to think about.
Warning: You can’t force these muscles down. They need to be gently and correctly trained to sit in the right position. Practice with my Singers Gift Vocal Warmups that come with full demonstrations for how to execute this technique. When the throat is more open and the larynx sits in a deeper bed (which comes from training) you have more control over your voice and high notes.
5. Vocal Massage
Vocal massage reduces tension and opens the voice for singing.
During singing, air comes up from the lungs, hits the vocal folds, and vibration and sound occur. As you sing, this action tends toward pushing the vocal muscles upwards contributing to strain, inflammation, and a choked or tight sensation in the throat area. This can also create a “high” larynx which destabilizes the voice and causes issues with cracking, breaking, or early fatigue and hoarseness.
Vocal massage helps to return these muscles to their original position and remediate the extra tension that is accumulating.
Try these vocal massages to help reduce strain on the vocal instrument:
- Wrap your thumb and fingers around the vocal muscles at the top of your throat.
- Start a slight yawn in the back of your throat
- As you yawn, slide your fingers downward gently pulling the throat muscles downward. Do not force – be gentle.
- Repeat 2-3 times each day.
- This vocal massage will help decrease tension in your throat and will help to reduce hoarseness that accumulates from over-singing or yelling.
To get my specific vocal massages that free your vocal instrument for performance grab a copy of my Singers Gift Vocal Warmups here.
To get started on your journey – start with my Singers Gift Vocal Warmups. We address all of these techniques inside the series. Use the coupon code SG25off at checkout for an additional $25.00 in savings!
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Medical Disclaimer: The information provided on Cari Cole’s website is informational only and should not be used for diagnosing or treating a health problem or disease. Those seeking personal medical advice should consult with a licensed physician. Always seek the advice of your doctor or other qualified health provider regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read on Cari Cole’s website. If you think you may have a medical emergency, call 911 or go to the nearest emergency room immediately.
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Hi, I’m Cari Cole.
You’ve got talent, but you want to become great at it. You’re in the right place! My mission is to help you refine your unique artist vision to bring to the world.
About Cari Cole
Cari Cole is the CEO / Founder of caricole.com and CCVM: Label Without Walls. She is a Holistic Vocal Coach, Artist Development Expert, A&R Director, and Songwriter based in New York City helping artists for the past 38 years. She is a mentor for Women in Music and The Association of Independent Music Publishers.
Her latest venture, CCVM a label services company, provides artists with a seamless path from creation to completion. After 30+ years of observing the overwhelm and challenges that artists face, Cari pulled together the best top creative professionals and designed a new approach to supporting our artists.
Disclaimer:
The information provided on Cari Cole's website is informational only and should not be used for diagnosing or treating a health problem or disease. Those seeking personal medical advice should consult with a licensed physician. Always seek the advice of your doctor or other qualified health provider regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read on Cari Cole's website. If you think you may have a medical emergency, call 911 or go to the nearest emergency room immediately.
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