Singing too much air means a breathy mixed voice. Inside this video I’ll explain why your singing is breathy, why it gives you a breathy mixed voice and how to fix it so you can have a more powerful singing voice.
The exercises I’m about to give you in this video eliminates breathiness. Do them as demonstrated and you will immediately experience a stronger voice.
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A breathy, airy singing voice means too much air is escaping through the vocal cords. This causes a soft, breathy tone that’s hard to hear.
Singing Too Much Air – Means a Breathy Mixed Voice
If you want to sing powerfully but all you get is breathiness, here’s a simple fix. Get the vocal cords to come together more firmly.
Here’s how you do it. Use an open vowel like [ae] as in “apple”. Now say [ae, ae, ae] with a firm glottal stop. [demo] Can you feel the vocal cords coming together more firmly? Now say [aaaaaaaaeeeeeeee].
Sing it in a 5-Tone scale staccato like this. [Demo] Ladies do this lower in your voice starting on the F#3. Men you start on the D3.
Try it ladies. I’ll demonstrate it, then it’s your turn. [demo] Ready ladies, begin.
Men, yours sounds like: [demo] Ready, guys, begin.
Now do it legato. Ladies, like this. [demo] Ready ladies.
Men, your’s sounds the same: [demo] Ready, begin.
This works best if you keep the vowel [ae] and not let it go to “eh” as in “Ned”. Also lean on the edge of the [ae] sound like this. [demo]
You must guard against the tendency to relax the vocal cords too much, like this. [demo] If you do that, too much air escapes through the vocal cords. Keep the cords coming firmly together. [demo]. Here is not enough adduction. Here is enough adduction.
If I sing a phrase without enough adduction, you can hear the air leak. [demo twinkle little star] With enough adduction it sounds like this. [demo]
If your vocal cords come together too lightly, and you’re singing too much air, this produces a breathy mixed voice. Imagine combining a breathy chest voice with head voice. The results will be a breathy mix. The vocal cords must be firmly adducted consistently from chest to head voice.
Appropriately adducted vocal cords will enable a strong chest voice to mix with head voice. You want to maintain a consistent adduction of the vocal cords everywhere in your range like this. [demo oh]
You may not have a problem with breathing either. It’s just too much air escaping through the vocal cords. [demo oh].
Appropriately adducted vocal cords will increase the power of your chest, mix, and head voice. Your tone will grow more powerful as you develop the vocal cord’s ability to balance with the air coming from the lungs. Until now, there has been an imbalance caused by too much air and/or too little muscle producing the tone.
Even though it’s simple, it’s not easy. You must overcome any self-identification of being shy or soft-spoken. That’s the hard part.
Shyness and soft spokenness does not produce strong singers.
Also, if you speak normally, with your vocal cords coming together consistently and appropriately firm, resist the temptation to relax the cords when you start singing. In other words, if when you speak you say, “a,b,c,d,e,f,g….” but when you sing you say, [demo breathy], you are in the habit of relaxing the vocal cords when you sing.
Don’t do it. Maintain the same speaking condition of the vocal cords when you sing. [demo] This is a habit you must overcome…or experience a breathy, airy voice caused by too much air leaking through your vocal cords.
If your tone was breathy, did this exercise help you get your vocal cords together more firmly? Let me know in the comments below. Have you found anything else that’s helped? Please let me know in the comments.
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This is a great start to eliminate breathiness, but you’ll need and want more exercises. To help you break old habits of breathiness, I’ve prepared a special PDF entitled, “Get Your Vocal Type”. This PDF contains links to a vocal test which you should take to confirm your vocal type. Once you confirm your vocal type, watch the videos about your vocal type and download the free exercises for your vocal type and get to work on them. They’ll help you plug the air leak in your vocal cords and get a more powerful singing voice.
Get the PDF here or in the description below this Youtube video.
Thanks for joining me today. Let’s get social on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram @powertosing.
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.
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