Vocal Care and Protection is VITAL for Professional Singers

Learning to care for the voice is a must for all singers. Vocal care and hygiene should be a large part of any vocal training program that you sign up for. Some singers I have worked with do not realize how important vocal care is until they lose their voice. If the voice is pushed too hard by improper singing from the throat or a lack of breath support or singing without awareness, damage to the vocal chords can result. If you push your voice and over-work it, not only can Laryngitis occur, but nodes or vocal burn can impact the vocal chords, often requiring a need for total vocal rest, sometimes lasting several weeks.

Professional singers who have trained their voice know they must protect their instrument, pamper it and do the work of learning to master breathing technique and the work involved in building strong breath support and vocal control. It is like you need to make the training your religion (so to speak) as a singer, and learn to love your practice time. --"I don't like to go on the road because it messes with my practice time." -- Sonny Rollins

I've seen students who try to sing like Christina Aguilera and some actually sound pretty good.  But, when I try to impress upon them that they need to sing like themselves and retrain their voice and learn to sing properly so they are not pushing from their throat to sound like her, they disagree.  They don't realize that pushing and singing from the throat is damaging.  Breathing shallowly and singing from the throat is like rubbing sand paper over your vocal chords. They are very sensitive and need to be respected and cared for or they may just stop working. Some singers feel that as long as they sound great, why should they sing, "properly.?"  Well, a strong, long-lasting healthy, voice that won't burn out...is the reason.  

If you are a singer who has not trained your voice with a voice teacher or vocal coach, do yourself a huge favor and find someone who has a solid teaching program that includes vocal hygiene or care of the voice.  As a singer, you need to know your instrument, how it works, the parts of your voice, the ways to build, access, train and control it, so that you have it working well and healthily for a long time.

Learning diaphragmatic breathing and breath control, which allows the breath to rise up from the diaphragm, catch your tone and carry it out into the room, as opposed to your pushing it from your throat, will serve you very well.

Many famous singers like Adele, John Mayer and Keith Urban have had to learn this the hard way.  They all experienced problems with strained and damages to their vocal chords after rigorous touring schedules.  The attached article explains in detail what happens when singers do not take proper care to get the training and take the steps to care for their voice.  Article - Getting Vocal about Voice Care

To learn more about proper voice care visit:   Learn Voice Care & Control

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