Assignment 20- Sheridan Wagner

How to Sing Like You Mean It

I been singing for my entire life and would consider myself as having a large amount of expertise on the subject. Now I've been partaking in lessons and my church choir long enough to pick more than a few things. You may be thinking "Huh, church choir? Well hunky dory," but this isn't your typical church choir. C.V. Stanford Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis in C, G, and F, Malcolm Archer's Incarnation Mass, Allegri's Miserere; look them up, I've sung them all, have them pretty much memorized, and would consider myself well trained in singing classical pieces such as these.

Posture: One of the most fundamental things that impacts your sound is how you stand. Natural you should be standing up straight, but their is much more to producing a strong, resonant sound than this. Your knees should be relaxed and flexible, definitely not locked. Your hips should be rolled forward so that your spine is aligned and your back is flat. My voice teacher will sometimes have me sing lying on my back. Leg straight (not locked), back flat against the floor, head and neck both relaxed; this is how your posture should be standing up. Your sternum should be tall as if you were trying reach it towards the ceiling. Your neck should also be aligned with the rest of your back. All of this is to be down while keeping your neck, head, jaw, and throat relaxed. This will allow you to take bigger breaths and use your air more efficiently so you will produce a better sound.

Breathing: Singers would be nothing with out breath support. First and foremost, breathe from your diaphragm. When you take a deep breath your shoulders shouldn't move at all. You should feel the breath below your ribs. It's almost as if your breathing into your stomach area. Posture play a major role in this because if your hunched over or constricting your diaphragm you are not going to be able to take a proper breath. Also when your breathing in you should feel as though you are breathing through both your mouth and your nose at the same time. Also you should breathe in  your vowel, which pretty much means go ahead and make your mouth the same shape as the word you are about to sing and breathe like that. All of this creates proper air usage.

Actually Singing: This is more complicated than the sections above because it really depends on what is right for that circumstance. No matter what you're singing, however, it is important to always keep your tongue relaxed and against the front of your teeth. This way you avoid constricting your airway and sound is able to come out right. Now when you're singing classical music in a choir setting, your vowels should always be bright and tall. If everyone in the choir does this the sound becomes easier to blend and tune. In order to do this you must raise your soft pallet and feel as though your voice is coming out of your forehead. Each vowel is slightly different, however. For me, I try to make my "eh" vowels brighter by making "cheekier" and positioned more in the mask of my face. Vowels such as "oh" I make more open and aim my sound for the bridge of my nose. Of course every voice is different. People with smaller bodies tend to have a brighter voice, while me, since I'm taller and have larger lungs, I have a much darker tone so in choir I always have to try especially hard to brighten my vowels. Despite this, every singer must always much such that their pitch doesn't sag and go flat, every voice naturally wants to do this so always stay on top of the pitch.

So there was my long, overly detailed description of how to sing.