Please enjoy this excerpt from my book Sing Like You Speak™: The Morganix Method™

“There’s a fine line between genius and insanity. I have erased this line.”
~ Oscar Levant

Any wind instrument such as the human voice relies on open airways for breath flow. For instance, a trombone played with proper airflow, is a dependable music maker. The player’s breath moves unobstructed through the open brass tubing. A crimp in the windpipe of a trombone changes the optimal sound for which the instrument was originally constructed. The trombonist must work harder to get decent airflow through the bent instrument. The extra effort alters the resulting sound and the trombone has become an unreliable instrument.

The human instrument that has a crimp along the breath path has similar problems. You have to work harder to get breath to flow through the instrument, resulting in an altered sound. Conversely, it is also true that when the instrument is open and used as it was built to perform, you have a dependable music maker.

Vocalists have unique challenges because their body is the instrument – it’s alive! If our trombonist is tired or angry, the instrument, the trombone itself, remains physically the same. On the other hand, when a singer is tired, the vocal folds are a bit thicker and the body possibly a bit slumped. Both of these factors change the human instrument appreciably.

Let’s examine where these bad habits live in your body – your instrument – and how they interfere with vocal production.

Tight Jaw
Most people carry a great deal of tension in the jaw. You grind your teeth or clench the jaw in effort, work the jaw around as a nervous habit or jut the lower jaw forward. When the jaw is tight, it is physiologically impossible for the soft palate and nasal passages to open.

Let the jaw rest. Be aware of when you are tight and allow the muscles to rest.

Turtle Necking
Shoving the chin forward of the body is a nervous habit and quite possibly a faulty effort to “help” your sound release. But turtle necking puts tremendous strain on the vocal folds and shuts down the vocal tract where breath and sound ought to move freely. Stretch the back of the neck up and the top of the head to the sky to undo turtle necking.

Holding Breath
It is a common fallacy to think that if you conserve or hold breath – release it bit by bit – that you’ll be able to get through a monstrously difficult musical phrase without running out of air.

This is a false assumption.The more breath you release, the more you will have to use. Seems like an oxymoron, but in truth anything you do to hold or conserve breath creates muscular tension. Muscular tension that is audible. Once the tension takes hold you no longer have free or flowing phonation.
The solution is to continually let the breath move through the vocal tract.

Vocal freedom is what every singer wants. Follow the above suggestions to learn more about your instrument and to gain more freedom with your speaking and singing.

To learn more about studying Sing Like You Speak™ go to SingLikeYouSpeak.com Join us for a free webinar! Sign up at SingersKeyNotes.com

About the author

Sally Morgan is a professional vocal trainer with over 30 years of experience. Sally is also the creator and author of SingLikeYouSpeak(TM)!

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