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Easy Singing Basics

by Vic Dorfman

Table of Contents Introduction..3 Chapter 1 The Singing Mindset Everybody Can Sing Well..4 Relaxation4 Nervous Habits.6 Personal Issues.6 Chapter 2 Posture Feet..8 Hips..9 Chest9 Shoulders..10 Head.10 Arms.11 Chapter 3 Breathing.12 Chapter 4 Vocal Production Larynx..14 Onset15 Mask.16 Vibrato17 Chapter 5 Auditions & Competitions..19 Chapter 6 Finding A Great Teacher .21 Chapter 7 - Music Schools22

Introduction
Did you know that YOU have a genuinely beautiful, unique voice? I know what youre thinking: You have to be born with it. Right? Nope! Everybody has the same equipment and to say that you have to be born with it to sing is like saying that you have to be born with it to walk. We all have legs and we all can walk. We all have voice boxes and so we all can sing!

Singing is a technical subject: I'm talking huge textbooks and enough physiology diagrams to freak out a med student! But lets be real, you dont want to read through all of that stuf and I dont blame you its boring! You just want to sing! Thats why Ive cut all the fat and covered only the essentials that you need to know to begin singing better today! Right NOW!

Whether youre in middle/high school or middle age, in a choir or a shower, this book will show you how to develop a powerful singing voice quickly and easily while loving every moment of it!

Chapter 1 The Singing Mindset

[Everybody Can Sing Well] Every single human being can learn to sing well. That doesnt mean that everyones voice is going to be as beautiful as Pavarottis (insert your favorite singer here!) but it does mean that with proper technique everybody can produce a healthy, free, resonant sound. That means YOU!!

[Relaxation] In singing, relaxation is key. Learn to observe and feel your body and understand its language; it will always tell you whats going on. A lot of people have various tensions and it takes time and patience to retrain how your body behaves but its totally doable! Theres no such thing as complete relaxation.

Remember when you first rode a bike and clutched the handlebars while your whole body tensed up trying to learn this new and scary skill? Then you finally figured it out and relaxed. You have to make some sort of muscular efort or you'd fall of the bike like a limp noodle! But now that you know what to do - your efort is minimal. Its the same with singing: find the minimum amount of effort required to achieve the greatest result. Less is more!

[Nervous Habits] We all have them They betray our emotional states and level of comfort. Whether you rock back and forth, fidget, twiddle your fingers or play with something to occupy the silence of a relaxed body, there are reasons for it. I encourage you to explore them. Also remember that a nervous habit is just that - a habit! You

can develop confident, calm, relaxed body language simply by paying attention to it and correcting it until it replaces the old habit. If you plan to perform for others, even if its just your friend, mastering your tics will go a long way towards giving a truly great performance.

[Personal Issues] Everybody has emotional/psychological issues; fact of life! The sooner you deal with yours, the sooner you can move on to productive pursuits. I'm not a psychiatrist - why do I bring this up? Because the mind-body connection is HUGE for a singer! A singer's body is his or her instrument and any kind of personal issues can and will afect your singing and mental clarity. I've found self-help books to be really valuable for sorting out my "stuf". They're cheap, efective and empower you to overcome

your problems, yourself. Notice that growing requires you to step outside of your comfort zone. Learning to sing will definitely do that . . . enjoy the ride! Ok . . . Less talk, more rock! Heres the good stuff!

Chapter 2 Posture
The first thing we need to do is to get you standing correctly.

[Feet] Stand up in front of a full-length mirror. If you dont have one, just observe yourself carefully. Plant your feet shoulder-width apart or wider (whatevers comfortable for YOUthats a golden rule!)

[Hips] Next, swivel your hips back and forth. Feel where the top of your body meets the trunk of your body and line up the top and bottom. If you swivel the hips too far back youll be bent forward and falling over. Too far forward and youll feel a pinch in your

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lower back and a feeling like you want to fall backwards. (Find where its comfortable for you!)

[Chest] Pretend theres a string connected to the middle of your chest and that its lifting your chest straight up. This is about where you should hold your chest. Too low and youll feel your ribs collapse (theyre connected to the breast bone!). Too high and your shoulders will pinch and youll look pufed up and silly! Find a happy medium that feels comfortable for you.

[Shoulders] Consciously relax your shoulders. Check up on them frequently to make sure they are at ease.

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[Head] Swivel your head slowly in every direction and feel where it sits evenly and in balance. You should be looking straight ahead.

[Arms] Your arms should hang freely at your sides. You may feel awkward at first but it will feel natural soon enough. The idea is that your body is open and exposed and all the power of your being comes out in your voice. Allow yourself to feel vulnerable; it will lead to growth.

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Chapter 3 - Breathing
Put your hands on your lowest ribs. Pretend like youre breathing into the floor and notice how your ribs move up and out slightly. Once you have taken your breath, notice the position of the space between your chest and hips. This is the area of your carriage and it should remain in this slightly elevated, out-of-theway position as long as youre producing sound. As you exhale air during singing, maintain your carriage in this position. When you breathe out and relax, its fine to drop this back down.

Allow air to rush into your lungs rather than forcing it. Theres very little you have to do to get a low, deep breath. Just relax and let it happen. More breath is not necessarily better. As you progress you will develop intuition around when to breathe in music and how much breath to take. Take only as much as you

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need to sing a phrase comfortably. Make sure that when you allow air to come into your lungs, you don't heave your chest. Your breathing should feel like you're filling your lungs from the bottom-up NOT the top-down.

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Chapter 4 Vocal Production

[Larynx] Put your hand on your throat and swallow. The structure that just moved up and down is called the larynx (pronounced leh-rinks). To achieve a free, resonant voice you must keep the larynx in a low, stationary position during singing. There are a few ways to do this: Keeping your hand on your throat, take a breath in through your nose like youre smelling some roses attentively. You will notice your larynx drop. Keeping your hand on your throat, yawn. You will feel your larynx drop.

Whats happening is that your tongue is moving back and down and depressing the larynx. A lot of people can simply drop their

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larynx. Get in a front of a mirror and try this. If you cant do this yet, use these methods until you can simply lower your larynx on command. Avoid jamming it down forcefully. Simply lower it until it is comfortably settled.

[Onset] The way you begin a sound is called your onset. There are three diferent kinds: hard, soft and balanced. You want the balanced onset. Here's how to do it.

Pretend like your baby nephew is trying to put a dirty toy in his mouth and say "uh-uh!" Do it a couple of times. Now do it slowly. What you're feeling is your vocal chords opening up quickly and popping just a little bit. This is an example of the hard onset. Now pretend like you want to annoy your friend by

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breathing garlic breath on them by saying "ha". Do this without any sound at first, then add a little sound. It will sound breathy. This is the soft onset. The balanced onset is in between these two extremes. Keep doing both and taking away or adding air and pressure until your sound comes out without a pop and without breathiness.

[Mask] Close your mouth and hum at a normal volume. You will feel a distinct buzz in the nasal area of your face. This area is your mask. Play around with how much buzz you can get going in the mask. You want to feel vibration in this area at all times. A good teacher can help you determine how much mask is appropriate. Too much will result in a "nosey" sound and too little will result in a hooty quality. Certain vowels lend themselves to resonance in

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this area. Eeh as in Me, is the easiest one. You want to maintain resonance in the mask on every vowel at all times. This will take some practice because sensations in the mask tend to be elusive (especially for young singers). Butyoull get it! Keeping the sound in the mask gives it a point which helps singing in-tune dramatically and brightens the tone.

[Vibrato] Vibrato is a periodic beat in the sound during singing. It is the result of getting your breath control handled, tension minimized, larynx low and sound in the mask! Listen to a few high-level singers and pay attention to the relaxed consistency of the vibrato. It may take some time to develop a consistent vibrato, particularly if you have some bad vocal habits to get rid of. Be patient and work with a competent teacher and it will come.

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Once you have it youll wonder how you could have ever sung without it!

Vibrato cant be taught, as such. But it can be recognized as being vibrato or not-vibrato. This is your process for acquiring vibrato:

1.

Listen to (paying particular attention to vibrato) and emulate world-class singers

2.

Follow Golden Rules at all times (larynx down, sound in mask, carriage in elevated position)

3.

Experiment with adding vibrato and spinning the voice. The more you play with these sensations the more in touch youll be with what feels and sound right and what doesnt.

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You wont necessarily know when you finally have real vibrato until youve had it for a while. This is one area where a teachers continual guidance is super valuable.

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Chapter 5 Auditions & Competitions

Whether auditioning for roles, solos, schools/universities or singing in competitions the same basic principles apply. Learn your music very well! Spend concentrated, interruptionproofed time marking, analyzing and practicing your music. If working with an accompanist, make sure you agree about the interpretation and be diplomatic yet firm if you think theyre playing too slow, fast, loud, soft, etc. Visualize using all of your senses in great detail exactly how youre going to sing your pieces. The more vividly you do this, the better it works.

Breathe slowly and deeply and realize that (a little) nervousness is normal and actually helps performance. However, the better you know your music the more relaxed you'll be! Let go of wanting an outcome. Whether it happens for you or not is meaningless!

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Singing badly once doesn't make you a loser any more than singing well makes you a winner. Those are labels that only mean what you think they mean. Let go of all that. Become indiferent to the outcome and youll find yourself enjoying the process. It's counterintuitive but it's true: The difference that makes the difference is indifference.

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Chapter 6 Finding A Great Teacher

A good place to begin looking for a teacher is at the nearest university with a solid voice program. Preferably find a teacher of the same gender as you.

You will want a teacher who: - Has sung professionally for many years. Ask for some recordings or a demonstration. - Communicates clearly and effectively with YOU. There are many competent teachers out there who teach poorly or whose teaching styles might not jive with the way you learn. This is going to be your teacher for a while and youll be paying good money so make sure you can understand them!

Is utterly honest with you. If you sense theyd rather sugarcoat things, lie to you about your progress (or lack thereof)

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and take your money in a slow, frustrating process of amicable deception keep searching. Trust your gut on this one. Youll be glad you did.

Meet no more than once a week and prepare questions and comments BEFORE your lesson and give full attention to your instructor while in the lesson.

Every few months or so go for a trial lesson with another qualified teacher. It will raise new questions and issues and challenge both you and your primary instructor to grow.

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Chapter 7 Music Schools

Music schools are not for everybody and are not necessary to be a successful, competent musician. If, however, you choose to attend a music school or university music program here are a couple of considerations when choosing where to go:

The weight of your decision should fall on the quality of your singing teacher. Meet with them, ask them questions and kindly ask for a brief demonstration of their singing. Ask them about their teaching schedule for the semester. Many teachers have too many students in their studio, which makes it hard for them to give you the full attention you deserve and pay for. Milieu: Go somewhere you think would be a nurturing environment for YOU. Find a place with an atmosphere that

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agrees with your personality and doesnt bring you down. This is a HUGE factor . . . really think about it!

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Take It To The Next Level!

Review with this book once a day for only 20 minutes of uninterrupted, concentrated practice and you will hear tremendous results in both your singing and speaking voice. These are the fundamentals (mostly taken from SLS speech level singing) and they work. Period.

Now, its one thing to read about how to sing in a book but if you really want to grow quickly as a singer, there are a few singing courses that can help you. Ive personally purchased and reviewed over a dozen online singing courses on my site, http://www.singingsoftwarereviews.com and if youll excuse my directness, most of them are overpriced crap. I even had a guy (not going to say who) threaten to sue me because I gave a bad review of his terrible product.

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Anyhow, NONE of these courses cover everything you need to know they cant, singings just too huge a subject. BUT, if I had to pick 1 course thats excellent for beginners all the way through advanced singing students and is sufficiently comprehensive, its Per Bristows Sing With Freedom.

Per is the ONLY vocal coach out there that goes into the mindbody connection and the psychology of singing in-depth, which goes back to what I was saying about resolving your issues and how it afects your singing in a very real way.

Per also has an hour long free video voice lesson on his site. If you want to check it out, heres the link:

Per Bristow's Sing With Freedom

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Conclusion
Youve made the first step in having the voice you want which is a step towards having the life you want. Respect!

If youve gotten any value out of this ebook whatsoever, share it with your friends and family! Email it, review it on your blog and feel free to ofer it for download from your own website. Sharing is caring and the world could always use more beautiful voices singing together.

Good luck on your singing journey! Vic Dorfman