Breath Support for Singing - CLEARLY & CORRECTLY explained - FINALLY!

[Music] hello singer friends and welcome back to another edition of victoria's victorious vocal tips where i share my wisdom from 41 years of studying voice and 28 years of teaching with you today may be the most important video that i will ever make and maybe the most important video tutorial that you will ever watch on singing i'm going to make some big and bold statements so i hope you listen closely repeat this video as many times as you need to and take notes today's video is on supporting the voice and this could make an entire difference in your life as a singer these are big bold statements i know but they're true okay supporting the voice not often taught correctly i would say more often taught incorrectly or not taught at all often singers don't even know what support is they might have heard the term but they have no idea what support is as you know i like to make things as simple as possible in everyday language that even a child could understand we could get more technical later on but today i'm going to explain support concisely in everyday language and most importantly correctly singers often either do nothing when they sing they just inhale and they just sing or else they might have been told to support and then what do they do they pull in or else they push out okay which one is right do we pull in or do we push out or do we need support at all maybe it's just all for uh you know a bunch of talk for nothing okay the answer is all three are wrong okay in my opinion this is the only way to support what i'm about to tell you in my opinion everything else is not support at all and is not helpful support is based upon the centuries-old italian principle of apogeo from the verb apogear which means to lean does that mean that this is only for opera singers does it mean that she's trying to turn us into opera singers well of course not the reason this has been around for centuries is because it works okay that is the verb that means to lean that doesn't mean we lean over let me explain and this is really important for you to listen to because i find that when students understand a concept they will do it if they don't understand it it's just all mumbo jumbo that's fine goes in one ear and out the other and they won't do it you will get this when we inhale properly the body opens okay the abdominals open and release the diaphragm descends the ribcage opens if you do nothing nature will take its course and the body will quickly contract and collapse and that's what my friends many of you are doing i'm sure because supporting the voice is not a normal activity we don't do this throughout the day okay singing takes larger capacities of air and much more importantly the ability to control the air that's how you get more power without having to work harder i teach how to work smarter not harder so what do we do we know we don't pull in and we know we don't push out what do we do well we do a little bit of both here's the answer when we inhale the body opens the rib cage opens if you do nothing as i said the body will collapse quickly okay and you will run out of air and then you will have to push the enemy of the singer okay what your job as a singer is to slow down the contraction of the body slow down the ascent of the diaphragm slow down the return of the body to its original position and how do you do that by a gentle lean a pujari lean in the opposite direction so this is how we are doing two things at once the body is coming in yes the body is coming in the body will win but we must slow it down and the way we slow it down is by leaning in the opposite direction so instead of the body collapsing after the breath it's going to contract little by little because you are slowing down the contraction with a gentle lean in the opposite direction now before you scratch your head and say what the heck does that mean you know i love to make things as simple as possible i have some very simple analogies everyone gets this and if you are open to this it will change your life as a singer okay what i would like you to do is stand up place your hands around the midsection okay and pretend that you are blowing a silk thread very very thin silk threads you're just gonna you probably don't you shouldn't be feeling anything there that's like real that's just like talking to a baby hello hey baby you're cute okay now pretend you're blowing an easy balloon it blows up very easily go through these motions with me what do you feel around the midsection some people call it tension or tight i know what they mean but i don't like those words it's not tight what we're feeling is resistance all the way around the midsection front sides and back all the way around around the waistline also known as support okay that's the easy balloon now maybe you have a thicker balloon it's a little bit it's harder to blow so you have to apply a little bit more exertion what do you feel around the midsection you feel a little bit more resistance also known as my friends support do you see how this may be different from what you have heard this is in my opinion based on all my experience the only way to support everything else is not support because if you think about it why would you pull in you you've done this nice work of taking the breath and if you pull in well you're just helping your body contract that much more quickly okay why would you push out that doesn't make sense either because when you push out then you are actually hindering the body from coming back to its original position the body does have to win and if you push out then what you're going to do is you're going to push out the air that much more quickly or else you are going to lock another enemy of the singer no locking so we are resisting in the opposite direction as the body comes back slowly so the abdominals will come back into its their original position little by little okay so we just did the analogy of blowing the balloon okay let's stand up let's try the sneeze these are all muscles we use every day but we don't think about it in talking okay let's pretend we're getting ready now let's pretend we're going to sneeze same muscles you feel this resistance okay engagement all the way around the midsection how about a laugh the same muscles all the way around the the midsection what about the lip trill many of you still trying to do the lip trill engagement all the way around the midsection so remember the abdominals never lock we don't want them locked but remember singing is not a relaxed activity the abdominals relax for breathing and they engage for singing just like we did based upon the principle of appoggio okay what about the chest as you know i've said this before it makes me a little bit crazy when i see singers lift their shoulders and just to breathe and then collapse when they sing okay it looks bad it looks weak and it's more work for nothing a pajama also involves the chest i like to think of your chest as if it is being held up by a string it's just being suspended in air by the string so that you don't want the chest to collapse because those are your lungs and you can't afford to sing with the chest caved in and the ribs caked in you will have no air and you will push pushing is the enemy of the singer so if you're getting tired and you're getting sore throats or your voice is weak think about are you supporting the escape of air when we support my friends we are using the big muscles that can take the work and we're taking the work off of the very delicate muscles around the larynx and the delicate vocal folds we don't want to put a lot of work there they will open the vocal folds will open and close beautifully if we apply the right amount of air pressure which is controlled by our support the upper and lower abdominals the torso and keeping the chest up remember the body will contract we don't want to fight that the body will come back to its original position but your job is a singer and your one of your biggest jobs is to support the escape of air so i know i have made some big bold statements i will summarize however it's important to know that it depends upon the sound that you want so like i always say if you're just singing a little lullaby to a baby hush little baby don't say a word mama's gonna buy you a mockingbird then you don't need any of this but how are you gonna get more power are you gonna get more power by yelling are you gonna get more power by pushing pushing more more muscle and blowing out a lot of air okay that's pushing the enemy of the singer if if that's the only way you know how to get more power is by pumping it up and beefing up your voice and yelling uh you don't need to take voice lessons for that but working on support is what will allow you to have more sound to sing for longer periods of time without getting tired and your voice can sound healthy vibrant and youthful for the rest of your life i'll be honest i am not a spring chicken i have been singing since i was 14 years old i started serious voice lessons okay and i sing opera pop rock r b jess it works for all styles okay you know i love to demonstrate [Music] [Applause] all right that comes from stamina and support support will make you strong in the body it will give you more power more buoyancy more thrill in your voice while you are singing smarter if you have any questions be sure to leave me some comments i will be doing more videos on this because support is so important and like i said most often either not taught at all or misunderstood and this will make a huge difference in your singing life i hope you have enjoyed another edition of victoria's victorious vocal tips leave me some comments give me a thumbs up visit my website and i hope to see you all soon you

Channel: Healthy Vocal Technique

Views: 198,799

Keywords: breath support for singing, breath support, breath support for singers, support singing, supporting the voice, vocal support, singing breath support, singing support, how to support your voice, voice support, breath support while singing, appoggio singing, how to sing with breath support, how to sing with more breath support, Healthy vocal technique, how to improve breath support for singing, appoggio breathing, breath support exercises, How to breathe while singing

Id: WR2772TGrgo

Length: 13min 58sec (838 seconds)

Published: Tue Oct 01 2019

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