Freya's Singing Tips: When you have to sing with a cold

hi is Freya with your next thing in ten since I've been sick recently with a cold I thought this would be an awesome time to share some tips and tricks for when you have a cold and you do have to stink what can you do because let's face it sometimes you just can't get out of it or what can you do so you get over the cold quicker and I'm talking about a cold that really get on your voice so to find out more please stay tuned as a professional singer I just always have to sing and there are times when I do have a performance coming up and of course as Murphy's Law we have it just the day before the performance I will get a cold this will happen in your life and it's just part of life but a lot of times I can't just cancel because first of all usually there is no substitute for me because there's nobody who does exactly what I do and second of all I wouldn't make any money and you're self-employed it's just you don't show up you don't make any money plus I want to be very reliable and always show up now the thing is whenever you do show up and sing never announce well I'm sick and that's why I can't sing that well today well nobody's interested nobody wants to know that you may not do it perfectly everybody just wants to know that you are giving your best don't ever go on stage and announce well you know I'm really sick that's why I stuck today don't do that nobody's interested so what do you do and you wake up and you find yourself having the cold and you notice that your voice is also suffering now first of all let me clarify this I'm not a doctor and you have to be careful of what to do with your voice when in doubt please do go and see your doctor I'm just talking about cases where you have a common cold that gets on your voice a little bit now the funny thing is whenever I have just a common cold I notice that singing doesn't really make it worse singing actually makes it better like in the past week when I've been sick I have been teaching just like I have all the time I have for teaching every day for hours and so how can you teach voice without trying to sing I mean I tried but it you just can't you always demonstrate something also I had a few gigs during that time right now so I noticed that it's just not getting worse actually the speaking part is what is a lot more difficult speaking makes my voice tired and speaking makes it dry or you know it's just irritated so here's the first tip speak as little as possible the speaking really puts a lot of strain on your vocal cords and whenever you have a cold your vocal cords are just a little bit inflamed and there's mucus on them there's phlegm on them and they just don't vibrate as easily so what you should do is really minimize your speaking or if possible you know don't speak when it's not necessary tip number two and this is so important rest as much as you can even on a performance day give yourself little islands of rest sleep an extra hour or take a nap or just lay down and close your eyes and let your body rest it really can do wonders don't be stressed and let's face it stress a lot of times comes from the inside and from your psyche so don't stress yourself try to be relaxed and try to give yourself as much rest as possible pamper yourself you know treat yourself to something a nice hot bad for example which I will talk about again later tip number three and this is really important as every day you should of course drink a lot now when choosing a drink of course water is always the best choice because water is neutral now what you should absolutely not do whenever you have an irritated throat and especially when you have a cold don't drink any juices than our acid II don't drink orange juice or apple juice or anything that has a lot of acid also don't eat anything with a lot of vinegar in it like like a salad with a vinaigrette this would really irritate your throat and it's really not good for the healing process now the most awesome thing to drink throughout the day just sip sh t sh t would really help decrease the inflammation it's soo this the throat the warmth of the tea is really good and for me it always feels so good when the warm tea runs down your throat don't drink it too hot just drink it to where it feels very comfortable it should be a little above body temperature you know very comfortable it shouldn't hurt when it runs down your throat but a nice warm tea with honey no honey is the best thing you know even for a cough it really helps calm down the cough and the irritation so sage tea with honey is awesome now you may want to be careful you can't drink like tons of sage tea because it may it will make you sick to your stomach at one point if you drink like 20 cups a day but you can drink about three or four cups throughout the day but the most important thing is just keep on sipping the warm tea and its really good for your throat also if you can't drink a lot of sage tea you can take some herbal drops like there's sage essential oil you can put it in some water and gargle it that's really good and that also really helps your throat back here you know to heal to help the inflammation now there's a product here in Germany which I don't think you can get it over in the States or anywhere else other than in Europe it's called salvia to mold and it's just a concentrate of a bunch of herbal oils and you put it in some water just a few drops and then you gargle it and that's it's really awesome you can garbled that throughout the day and it you could really tell it helps your throat a lot and it makes the cough reside and makes the irritation much better now one product that I have found that you can also get in the states is sprouts Voice remedy I will link it up below and the readers say that it's really great and it's helped people and it's also just some herbal essences that you can gargle gargle with I'm always one for natural things you know just help your body help itself and when you have a common cold let's face it the best thing you could do is just rest and wait and it will go away but as I said sometimes you will have to sing and these are kind of just like some SOS things if you do these you may get through the concert you know and it'll be fine the next tip is throat lozenges now this you have to be really careful about it's really good to have some throat lozenges and just to kind of have them in your mouth throughout the day and just keep the mucus flowing and just help your throat just you know be coated by something that soothes the inflammation however don't use any lozenges that contain menthol menthol dries out your vocal cords and your throat which you know in the long run it's really not a good thing because it makes it even worse you will have to coffee even more you know a short-term it clears up your nose and your sinuses but it really actually dries out so just don't do it I mention it before one really great product which you can unfortunately only get in Europe is Hillary voice it's the most awesome stuff that I have found and the singer there's tons of flaws and just out there and that claim to be for singers and they're really good for people that use their voices a lot but um the generate voice has been the best that I have found so far now I did a little bit of research and although I have not used it myself I read some reviews and they say that vocal zone is really great for your voice and you may want to try that that's also something you could take that those are some lozenges some Pesa tools and they're supposed to be really helpful for people that use their voices a lot like singers the next tip is take a hot bath don't take it too hot but just take it nice and warm to where your body temperature goes up it will also help you know the blood circulation even in your throat and around your vocal cords also people some eucalyptus into the bath water it's really good it helps clear up your sinuses and the most important thing is you pamper yourself and you feel better you just you don't feel so a key and you just feel more relaxed it relaxes your muscles which I will get back to later now whenever you have your performance this will really help you you may think your voice is really shot but don't underestimate the power of adrenaline the adrenaline can do wonders now the adrenaline whenever it rushes for your body it it makes your body be on alert which increases your circulation your heart rate and your voice will also work better and you will actually forget that you're sick you know don't suggest to yourself oh I'm so sick I can't possibly do anything and I'm terrible today don't do that just try to enjoy it anyway try to do your best you know concentrate and the adrenaline we really do a lot for your voice I can't tell you how many times I've had a performance to our thought oh my goodness my throat my voice is gonna be totally shot afterwards because before I'm already shot but you know what it actually got better I wasn't worse afterwards I was actually better the adrenalin will really do a lot so take advantage of that now the next thing is sing only what's necessary now even on a performance day don't do a bunch of rehearsals before don't do it if you haven't rehearsed enough and that's really terrible you should do your work ahead of time don't do a bunch of rehearsals before and don't do a really long warm-up just do what's really really necessary save it for when it's really important and finally and this is very very important sing intelligently now when you're sick and you don't feel good a lot of times you tend to throw your technique out the window it's just kind of like I don't feel good and I'm all oh and you don't support you don't breathe ride you're free the shallow and there goes your technique which will actually make your voice hoarse because you have terrible technique don't do that especially when you're sick you should pay extra attention to your technique pay extra attention to your breathing do you support to your phone nation to your resonating space help your help your vocal cords do less work you know the vocal cords need to minimize the work and the rest of your body is to increase its work because it won't be worn out your ab muscles are fine also if you have a choice don't sing the most demanding songs that night or that day if you have a choice you know pick some stuff that'll make it a little easier also one thing that I all the time to my students is even when a song is like a power song and it's really now it's never layout from the beginning to the end 100% of the time there's always time to remix your voice use those times to relax your voice it's so important and when you do have those high sustained belted notes you can absolutely hit them without hurting your voice by really supporting and having a good technique now let me tell you this story a few years back I had a really really bad cold that really got on my voice and I had three big performances coming up that week including an appointment at a big radio station with a big Orchestra and we were gonna make it recording for a CD so I could absolutely not cancel that because there's like 50 people Orchestra and all the technicians but I was really afraid that I would hurt my voice if I had three big concerts that be coming up plus of recording how could I sing on a recording if I thought my voice was chopped but what I did is I went to my doctor to my specialist my ahadees head ear nose throat specialist and he took a look at my throat and he said yes there is an inflammation you know it's it's a cold and there is some inflammation in the throat but he also told me you'll make it that's okay don't you worry you won't damage something that quickly your voice won't get damaged it would take years of abuse to really damage your voice now of course that's except for when you have a how do you say that a larynx inflammation that's really dangerous so I'm like I said when in doubt go see your doctor but anyway he went and you know he told me I assure you you'll be totally fine just gargle drink your sage tea don't speak shut up as much as you can and then do only what's necessary and you'll be just fine and you know what I was just fine I felt terrible with me for because my voice was just shot and I could hardly speak so but I told everybody I am NOT talking today don't talk to me I will only thing otherwise I won't be able to think and it worked just fine and my voice wasn't damaged or anything like that so this was a lot of stuff today a lot of tips and them just remember take care of your voice it's really important to take care of your voice you only have one voice so it's your decision how much or how little you do and take care of your voice it's so important I'm only saying that a lot of times it's not as bad as we think it is or sometimes we just have to rough it out in life in general these were just some tips that will help you make it a little bit better to get through this cold season hope you don't really get anything I just got over one bottom it's getting much better hope you have a wonderful day and don't forget I'm also on periscope if you want to follow me there you can ask me live questions which I'd love to answer I talked a little bit less about technical things on periscope but we kind of have a chitchat and I just talked about some thoughts I have about singing and life as a singer so I would love to ski there and interact and talk to y'all have a wonderful day and don't forget always keep Oh you

Channel: Freya Casey - Master Your Voice

Views: 6,546

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: singing tips, singing tutorial, how so ting, how to sing better, sing with a cold

Id: otBVUGRXYy8

Length: 16min 40sec (1000 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 16 2015