Ep.32: How to Sing with Power #2 – Vocal Cords or Psychology?

Ep.32: How to Sing with Power #2 – Vocal Cords or Psychology?

 

How to sing with power in your voice begins with having an ideal balance between the vocal cords and the air from your lungs.

 

But even if you get the balance perfect you must have the right psychology…the mental-emotional part. So every time you open your mouth to sing, the power in your voice is there waiting to be heard.

If the cords are right but the psychology is wrong, what do you get? 

 

How to Sing with Power – Vocal Cords

 

Suppose you have done the vocal exercises to get a good balance between the vocal cords and the air from your lungs. During your voice lesson you feel what it’s like to get the cords together firmly. No longer do you have:

• People who can’t hear you
• Excessive breathiness
• Running out of air
• No power
• No vocal presence
• Falsetto
• Weak Chest voice
• Limits to what you can sing

 

You’re excited. Your teacher’s excited. You’ve figured it out! You come back for your next lesson, your teacher is excited to hear your progress and it’s…. like you’ve never been there before. You are starting all over again. The vocal cords are not coming firmly together.

 

Perhaps you can do it really well during the exercises, but when you start singing, the vocal cords don’t come together like they did in the exercises.

 

Why? I think there are two major reasons.

 

1. You haven’t listened to your lesson and practiced it each day. Therefore, it hasn’t become muscle memory. You revert to the way you’ve always done it.
2. You did practice, but this new way of doing things feels very hard. You are making much more sound than you’ve ever made but you’re not really comfortable with it. It seems too loud, too strong, too big.

 

You can easily fix reason number one.

 

Listening to and practicing your lesson repeatedly will help create muscle memory so it becomes the way you sing without thinking about it.

 

But this second reason is what trips up so many of us singers.

 

The same problem exists with singers who pull chest voice too high and end up yelling or straining. Or who flip and crack and break. Or who like to sing in falsetto rather than in connected head voice.

 

How to Sing with Power – Psychology

 

Whenever there’s something new with our voices; a new sensation, a new sound, a new feeling, it can be very difficult to understand.

 

We might disregard it. We might think it’s got to be wrong. It may frighten us. It may feel awkward. For all these reasons and more, it makes it very hard to learn something new with our voices.  

 

But what happens if it’s contrary to your self image? What happens if your life can be described like this?

• Reserved and shy
• Soft spoken
• Filled with worry
• Never went first
• Never volunteered
• Afraid of failing
• Afraid of succeeding
• Never taking a chance
• Never wanted to be up in front of people
• Never wanted to be on stage front and center

 

However, now you learn to get your vocal cords together and start to experience balance, power and growing volume in your voice, but you’re frightened by it, emotionally you can’t accept it. You just can’t let yourself be powerful.

 

This is where singing and life are the same. We all have instances where we must change something inside us to get what we want.

 

Here are a few ideas to help a shy person stand up front and center and command the stage and enthrall an audience.

 

1. Listen to and practice your voice lesson. When you start making real progress with your voice your confidence goes up fast. Practice is important.
2. Sing and perform for an audience as often as you can. The more you do it the better you get and the easier it becomes.
3. Accept your voice. Realize not everyone will ever like your voice no matter how great you are. That’s OK. That’s life. Not everyone likes Pavarotti or Lady Ga Ga.
4. Realize that there’s always someone who’s going to love your voice. Sing for them. (Watch this video, How to Gain Confidence Singing for Other People from March 2015)
5. Take acting, dancing, public speaking classes. These will help you let go of your inhibitions.
6. Set specific goals to and work at them continually until you accomplished them. Like listening and practicing.

 

 

My Light Chest-No Chest vocal type singers progress quickly when they get their vocal cords together and find the power inside to let themselves be fabulous!

 

Do you know your vocal type? I’m not referring to whether you are soprano, alto, tenor or bass. Your vocal type is what you tend to do when you sing.

 

Visit PowerToSing.com and take the PowerTest, the vocal test. Take the quiz and immediately determine your vocal type. Then visit the Knowledge Center.  Watch the videos and download the exercises for your vocal type.

 

These exercises are designed to help you progress faster because they address your specific needs.

 

I’m Chuck Gilmore with Power To Sing. You can sing higher with beauty, confidence and power.

 

I’ll see you inside the next video.