What is “health in singing?”
This is a phrase that came to me one day literally out of the blue. I had been agonizing over how to encompass not only the way I teach voice, but what I believe about singing. After years of training and learning about the intricacies of the vocal instrument, I’ve come to learn that actually learning vocal technique is only a small portion of developing a healthy and free singing voice.
I’ve talked many times about how a singer’s body is their instrument. I’ve researched and taught on the ways physical fitness impacts singing (hello master’s thesis!). This has all been wonderful, transformative, and valid, but it also misses the mark sometimes. It is not all encompassing. So I started training as a life coach and working on my voice from the perspective of my mindset. I started diving deep into the way I thought about things and began giving more journaling exercises to my students. We talked more about connecting to the emotions of the characters in the rep they were singing. We had FUN and made some great progress, but this is also not all encompassing.
I’ve searched for so long for a specific thing that was the golden ticket to singing success. I’ve searched for the black and white answers to finding ease in an artform based around expression. The truth is, there is no one way to “right” singing. In fact, despite my training, I don’t believe in one “right” way of singing. Not any more.
Healthy singing connotes the physical. It likely brings your mind to the physical things like vocal technique. It also can pigeonhole us into a specific sound or style of singing. That’s why we’re not using that language here anymore. Health in singing encompasses all of it.
Health in singing is about your authentic expression of your voice. Yes, the physical foundation of vocal technique is important. We need to master the basics like posture and breath support in order to explore more challenging techniques and repertoire in a sustainable way. We need to read music so we can communicate in a common language. We do need to develop a solid foundation, specifically at the start of singing. But here’s the thing about voice that’s so different from other instruments: we’ve all been using our voices for our whole lives. We may not have been conscious about how we were using them, but we do know how to use them. I don’t need to teach you that. If you’ve walked into my studio and talked, you’ve already used your voice. Singing and speaking are different, but they use the exact same anatomy. My goal for you is to become conscious of the physical so you can replicate it longerm, and make sure what you’re doing technically is sustainable. My goal is for you to learn to trust your voice.
But singing goes far beyond the technical. The voice is an emotionally driven instrument with a wide array of colors that can create so many different expressions of music. This means the thoughts we think and the emotions we are experiencing directly affect singing. Any trauma we’ve experienced (big T or little t trauma) affects singing.
It also doesn’t help that performers work in an industry that is hard on our nervous systems. We hear no more than we hear yes. We are frequently overworked and underpaid. Singing in front of a crowd is most peoples’ worst nightmare, yet we choose to do it on a regular basis.
There is nothing in your life that does not affect your vocal production either directly or indirectly. Your life can affect singing positively or negatively. The secret here is that health in singing means becoming a healthy singer. It’s more about you than it is your voice.
Join me as we collectively begin to redefine health and find what health in singing truly means as we explore and embrace our own unique voices.
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