There is no doubt everyone loves music. It doesn’t matter if it’s a different language or genre. Music has a way to move people deeply because it expresses one’s emotions and it might bring back memories of sadness, joy or even a sense of peace. Singing has many more positive benefits than you think.
We all can agree that singing makes us feel good or feel some kind of emotion whether it’s happy or sad. Do we actually know what happens to our body when we sing? Research has shown music has a more positive effect on your overall health without working too hard on it unlike physical exercises. Let’s find the reason why singing is good for you and the benefits of singing.
Here are 3 main benefits if you sing everyday
Mental Health
Singing strengthens our immune system. Singing releases oxytocin levels which aiding bonds and decreases cortisol. Cortisol is the hormone that causes stress. Singing releases other hormones called endorphins too.
Singing releases endorphins, we feel happy and light. Endorphins are synthesized in the hypothalamus and released from the anterior pituitary. It’s a pain reliever that is well known for producing pleasant feelings. Singing has also been found to help with depression. When endorphin is released, which is a pain reliever, it improves depression.
Physical Health
Next physical benefit from singing is posture! Yes , you will be surprised how having good posture has anything to do with singing. While singing, we enhance lungs functions. It increases lung capacity and engages the muscles around the ribcage. Your tone will correct on its own if you have good posture.
Social
Have you been to a gathering or social meet when there is music playing and few people start singing? This lights up the environment in that group. Singing improves the empathic relationship between people. Collective singing groups like choir have a positive identity in terms of physical and psychological.
The next time you want to sing, just do it! I love to sing because this is the way I express myself. If you ever have a hard time expressing. yourself try singing any song or something to that subject. Trust me, it feel a sense of relief that will come over you.
Yes , you can! You have a vocal range that you are usually comfortable to sing in. As you get more confident in singing, you will eventually reach a point you wonder if can you increase your voice range to challenge yourself bit.
Increasing vocal range should be taken as a good challenge for yourself but not strain your voice. You can’t go right to 6 octave of change right away. Here are some of few and better ways you can right away implement so you can still sing healthy range while increasing it.
1. Incremental 1%
I hope you been recording yourself singing ever since you start singing. If not, I got a post about different recording app you can use. If you have been recording, increase your vocal to 1 octave. Use the vowel “hummm…..” To ascending key.
Octave in relative to the piano key is 7 white keys and 5 black keys. There are 8 octave all together in a tradition piano. The keys to the right is higher octave while the key to the left is lower. This is the simplest way I can explain to you what octave means.
Practical way is to use a keyboard, you can find it online option that allow you to follow play the key yourself.
OR
Go to YouTube and search for “vocal warm up 1 octave” or “two octave warm up for pitch accuracy”
1 % increment can easily mean it’s all about muscle memory. Again, learning how to sing is about skill, not much talent, choosing the right song.
2. Proper Warm Up
Warm up is a MUST step to get your voice, body ready for singing. Skipping warm up might lead you to injury. Do your usual warm up with either a lip trill or hummm. If you already consistent with warm ups, it might be great to lengthen the time or add in another type of warm up. This way you are giving your vocal a chance to explore more than what it already know.
3. Recording your journey
I wish I knew this. I was blindly always singing from sing a long to karaoke and was always being praise that I can sing that I never once consider to record it! Now I am getting more serious about learning how to sing better, reading music notes and exploring vocal production so I document everything!
Use any type of voice notes, recording you have that is easy access. No worries if you don’t have a voice recording app , here is a post which I have research about other option you can record your journey.
4. Rest
“You can only train as hard as you recover” – Tom Brady
This is so true. I use to drive myself to do more thinking it’s really good for me. For example going to the gym. Now I realise working out lesser helps me recover better with no injury.
This goes the same for your voice. It’s part of your organ and supported by muscles. Nothing kills a journey more than injury and also feeling tired, coughing which leads you to zero days of learning how to sing. Make sure hydrate keep your diet as healthy as possible!
Generally you want to make sure you are increasing vocal range for the right reason. Maybe you want to feel inspired to sing a certain song that is not in your comfortable range or maybe it’s to challenge yourself. Hopefully not because you are trying to copy and exact artist voice that you admire. Your idol may not have the same range as you.
So what would you do to increase your vocal range? If you have been a seasoned singer, let us know what have you learn while increasing vocal range on the comment below! We would love to hear from you.
Yes! I highly recommend warming up your voice before singing because your throat is made up of organs that are supported by muscles, and ligaments. Properly warming up can create a lot more space to expand your vocal range and it prevents you from straining. In this post, we are going to use this post as a baseline guide on what type of warm-up you can use and how long should your warm-up be. Do I warm up my voice before singing? is not the question you should begin asking yourself.
In what ways can you warm up?
OR
How long should your warm-up be? is what you should be asking yourself.
Different types of exercises for your warm-up
Yawning
This exercise is not really you doing a full yawn. At the start of a yawn position, your tongue placement should be behind your lower teeth, jaw relax. Do this with Ah Vowel and behind with “Ahhhhhhh……” Do it with ascending and descending. Ascending and descending in singing is basically singing incrementally higher or lower using DO RE MI FA LA
Humming
Place the tip of your tongue behind the bottom of your front bottom teeth and keep the front of your mouth close. “hmmm.. ” ascending and descending. This is the easiest and my favorite warm-up. This is easiest because of how natural it is for your mouth, and jaw placement. Just make sure you include the “h” not only sounds “mmmm”
Lip Trills
This was one of the challenges for me when I first started to learn different warm-ups because somehow I lack air support in my abdomen. So to make things easier I found all coaches recommend placing 2 fingers on the side of your jaw. Here is how you do it:
Tongue Trill
Some may find it hard for this warm-up but not me. If you are one of the few that struggle with tongue trill. Start with the alphabet “R”. Be best to do without any trill or ascending or descending. Just pronounce the alphabet “R” with your tongue curling up or touching behind the upper teeth.
Try these above and make sure to record your warm-up to know where you are now. Practice this all the time. To add in, have a great posture while doing it.
How long should my warm-up be?
For beginners would be best to do a 15-20minute warm-up. This is all possible to do because of how everything is. There is no need to do more than anything else.
You can always mix different warm up and longer warm up but as long as you stick to a routine that you are comfortable with and do not skip warm then it’s great.
Learning how to sing should be fun but if you are reading this, you are already thinking of improving your singing so add in a little discipline. Being consistent is just about doing it over and over again. Use your voice memo to know if you have actually improved from day 1. I love kicking in new habits with the 21-day.
And Is it true anyone can learn to sing?
Yes! Yes! Yes!
Anyone with a healthy speaking voice can sing. You might have sing in the shower, in your car, and sing along with co-worker when a famous song comes out. I know you probably have wondered if you can ever sound good while singing. So how can you learn how to sing beautifully?
Fortunately for you, I have found some ways great ways how you can to learn how to sing without going to music school.
Now, Why do you want to learn how to sing?
I love to sing! Like alot. Everywhere there is music either I’m actively singing or humming even if I don’t know the words to the song. But I wonder if there is a way to learn to sing without going to the choir or even music school. I have been to karaoke alot and can sing okay? I can sing loud but not properly. Thanks to the pandemic shutdown I finally got time to hone this hobby into actual practice. I want to sound freaking great when I sing, so this is my why! 😉
Maybe you just want to sing in your church
OR
Maybe you want to sing to someone special that you have been eyeing on
OR
Maybe you want to sound great in a karaoke session
OR
Maybe you want to a new skill to your guitar or piano skills
Singing brings the best euphoria or makes you feel the emotion that is real or it brings you to memory lane of the best times of your life. Singing connects people together just like food. Learning how to sing is a gift? Like any other skill, like riding a bike, driving, or cooking it all comes down to learning and practice.
P.s I am not a vocal coach! so don’t shoot the messenger. I have been learning and wanted to share with you if you are scared to learn how to sing or think you are too old to try. Heck! I am turning 34 in 2 weeks, I’m proud that I even have the courage to go on this journey. ????
I found 5 easy ways to learn how to sing for beginners. Trust me, it’s fun! If you are not having fun, you are missing the point of singing.
How to learn to sing at home for free: YouTube
I love to find everything on Google or YouTube first before I try other avenues. While the pandemic wasn’t great fun with everything shutting down, it allows for exploration. I discover how to sing from Youtube as I was not aware of vocal coaches post the basic singing lesson on their channels. All these vocal coaches break down from warm-up, riff and run techniques, mistakes to avoid, and how to take care of your voice, posture, and breathing as well.
Here are some vocal coaches that I enjoy learning from
Cheryl Porter
Tara Simon
Healthy Vocal Technique by Victoria
Ramsey Voice Studio
Eric Arceneaux
Proper Posture
Singing is athletic. Your throat and neck is the only part of your body that you are using for singing. Your whole body is an instrument when you sing. I’m a big believer in maintaining good posture most of the time. It’s the start with respecting your own body and it makes you look confident anyway, so why not practice good habits right?
Before you start warming up for singing, get in the right position. Your legs stand hip-width apart position, toes point out a little, and shoulders keep it down, [not shrugging], it makes you look relaxed. Pull your shoulder back gently. This allows for an open throat as well since an open throat means you are relaxed.
Learning to sing with proper posture is important as you want to build good habits. It’s alot harder to unlearn the bad habit and create a new habit again. As you get more experience with your vocal ability, you can always start to move your body as you please.
Warm up & Learn Your Basic
I was a personal trainer and can’t emphasize warm-up and learning basics for beginners. Heck, I don’t like doing it but no one wants to be more prone to getting injuries. Learn more about your throat anatomy. This same goes for warming your throat before singing. Without warm-ups, you can strain it easily.
Here are a few warm-ups you can choose from
Lip Drills
Hum
Tongue DrillsPractice in ascending order and descending order. There are plenty more warm-ups you can do, I will write a post on more warm-ups in another blog post.
Practice Daily
Like any skills that you have now, it all comes from consistency. Maybe you don’t even deliberately practice walking since you first started to walk but you do it every day and use your legs to walk every day. This is the same for learning to sing, you have to practice if you want to at least have decent skills. Remember why you want to learn how to sing in the first place.
Nothing great or even close to good is ever created if there is no consistency.
I know this firsthand from being a personal trainer. If only people who want to lose weight and get in shape to be consistent and stick to a routine longer then can walk around with more confidence in their new physique.
Listen to a different genres of music
I love to listen to ANY song that is why I appreciate all kinds of music even in a language I don’t understand. Someday if I want an easy day when practicing a song, I will sing lullabies or children’s nursery rhymes. This gives me so many ideas on different melodies, tempos, and vocal placement.
What you are used to may not be suitable for your voice range. We love a sing-along session in karaoke with friends but it doesn’t mean it’s something you should practice when you are actually learning to sing.
I recently more open to singing country songs, it’s easier on my voice. Singing should be comfortable and fun instead of straining and feeling exhausted
These 5 ways you can basically start your journey of learning how to sing on your own without breaking your bank account for a vocal coach and also going to music school. Since I prefer to use whatever tool I have, for now, I will eventually invest in vocal coaching. I want to hear about your experience if you ever learn how to sing and what is your thoughts on these 5 ways that I recommend.
