Vocal Voice Training
Vocal Voice Training – Learn to Breathe All Over Again
Vocal Voice Training
Breathing is an automatic process you don’t usually think about until you get a cold, someone heavy sits on your chest or if something medical has happened to your vocal chords.
However when you decide to belt out a tune, the voice and its vocal chords become a focal point for that effort. Conrol over the vocal chords is a requirement for being able to sing a pure note. For many people this mean that, vocal voice training involves learning to breathe all over again.
To some people, this sounds unusual, but it’s really quite true. The singing process is fueled nearly entirely by the amount of air that passes over the vocal chords and how that air is manipulated as it courses through your breathing apparatus.
In order to have fantastic sound quality, one needs to be able to minutely control the amount of air as it leaves the body.
This is necessary as it becomes part of the singer’s ability to hold notes as long as needed without becoming breathless.
Taking Control of Your Breathing – Vocal Voice Training
When you begin training of the voice, one of the first steps is learning how to control the release of air from the lungs. The fundamental difference between a breath taken for the purpose of singing vs. one taken for speech is that in singing one needs to very carefully manage the release of air dependent on the words and notes one is using.
In other words, when you breathe normally, you have no specific pattern or need for air at a specific moment. You just breathe. When you sing, the air you exhale must be controlled so you don’t run out of air too soon in the middle of word sets. The only way to ensure that you can match the exhalation process to the singing is to learn control.
Below are a couple of beginning exercises that focus on the abdomen muscles, which control how fast air is expelled during the exhalation process.
Exercise 1 – Vocal Voice Training
- Stand using good posture
- Place your feet approximately shoulder width apart
- Extend both arms out until they are perpendicular to your body
- Turn the palms down
- Breathe in for 3 to 4 seconds
- Hold your breath for 3 to 4 seconds
- Breathe out for 3 to 4 seconds
- Exercise 2
- Stand using good posture
- Place your feet approximately shoulder width apart
- Breathe in deeply
- Exhale as long as possible while making a hissing sound
These two simple breathing exercises teach you to control the release of air. In the first exercise, you can begin increasing the amount of time you spend inhaling and exhaling air. This will increase lung capacity and teach you to control the time it takes to release air.
In exercise two, you are learning to release air steadily. You don’t want your breath coming out in short bursts or gasps, as that is completely contrary to the act of singing, which requires a steady stream of connected sounds.
Training Your Breath
Most vocal voice training begins with breathing training first. There’s a good reason for this: songs have specific notes that require paced, timed breathing.
For example, long notes require extended steady exhalation without interruption. The range of pitches that you must glide through when singing also requires breathing control.
You should do your breathing exercises regularly until the techniques become almost like second nature. When singing, you won’t even have to think about your breathing pace or holding notes, because those things will come naturally.
There are a number of available breathing lessons that will expand your capacity during vocal voice training. While you are working on your breathing control, you also want to concentrate on avoiding tension. In other words, try not to exhale air to the point where tension is created in the vocal cords because you are trying to force air out that doesn’t exist.


