5 Things Technique Can Do for Your Singing

Many people are afraid of formal vocal training. They may fear it is too challenging or perhaps in contrast, boring. Others may fear they will lose the unique sound of their voice. No matter who you are, if you are serious about singing, you should consider working on the technical aspects of singing because the goal of technique in singing is freedom.

Strong singers can be free of worry about phrases in the song and free of the need to control every moment. Good vocal technique means that muscle memory will take over the job of managing your voice and allow you to concentrate on delivering the meaning in the music. When you've trained you body to know how to respond to the demands placed upon it, you're able to think of other things, namely the music you're singing.

There's a common misconception that studying voice will restrict a natural singing style and will make you sound too classical. But in fact, vocal study will only develop and enhance your capacity to create a natural style with no limitations. It would take years of intensive study to achieve an operatic quality.

Good vocal technique also will not dampen any natural enthusiasm or musical passion. The emotional connection to your music can be strengthened by the technical adjustments that allow your voice to be free and open. At first you may find that you concentrate only on the physical requirements of a good sound, but remember that the ultimate goal is a healthy, open voice that is able to express the excitement of the music.

So what can good vocal technique do for you?

1. Increase your range
2. Increase both your power and flexibility
3. Develop muscle memory so that the body will learn to do without haing to think about it
4. Free you to concentrate on delivering the meaning of the msuc without the worry of physically managing your voice
5. Strengthen your emotional connection to the music

If you're worried about the sound of your voice, you won't sing as well as you will when you have the assurance of having trained your body. Vocal technique is the release, not the cage. The muscles involved in singing will need practice and repetition of specifically designed exercises, but the reward is a newfound confidence. You will replace frustration with trust in yourself and your vocal abilities.

The ILTS Question...
What is one thing that you can improve in your technique?
(i.e. posture, breathing, phrasing, etc.)

Please share your comments. Thanks!

Find Your Audience In Your Own Back Yard

by Randy Moomaw

via Brett Manning's SingingSuccess.com website

The path to landing a recording contract or grabbing the lead in a Broadway musical is paved with often exhausting roadwork that requires discipline, determination and honing your craft. Once you find your voice you need to take it out looking for opportunities to grow in the light of an audience. Ideally you want an agent to do the legwork, management to handle bookings, and various support staff to make you look good, feel great and stay healthy.

In the meantime there are opportunities all around you to be seen and heard you just need to uncover them. According to national radio personality Devon O’Day singers should look for ways to engage their gifts through community service.

“One of the most important areas that singers, songwriters, and artists often miss, is the service aspect of what they do,” O’Day said. “There are organizations that meet weekly, that need inspiration, motivation, and your music.”

O’Day is a published author and is sister of actress Faith Ford of the classic CBS-TV sit-com Murphy Brown. She suggests that singers work solo or as a group to create an inspiring presentation framed with a topic. It can be increasing awareness about environmental issues or things such as homelessness or AIDS awareness.

“You can call business, charitable organizations, and business clubs and do a 'free' keynote performance, gather email addresses, and sell lots of CD’s if you have applicable music. These same people will book you for house concerts, company conventions, and are more appreciative than any club where you could play.”

O’Day feels one of the greatest benefits is leaving with the feeling that you've done something worthwhile for someone with your gifts and talents. Tom Henry, a singer-songwriter in the outskirts of Friday Harbor, Wash. recently gained national recognition on CNN for a project that grew out of our country’s economic downturn. He wrote a song, I’m Looking For A Bailout, and created an organization that sets aside 50 percent of the sales of the song towards helping people in dire financial straits. Check out the song here.

“We’ve received thousands of hits on the site so far,” Henry said. “We hold they key to help ourselves.”

So what are some of your personal passions? What inspires you to sing? Is there a community theatre or professional theatre nearby that regularly holds open auditions? Getting stage experience is invaluable. O’Day feels there are endless possibilities whether you’re in an urban, suburban or rural area.

“You can use your gift for music to plant seeds is in school programs, university classrooms, in stores that don't sell music,” she said. “Everyone is looking for a way to bring in traffic these days.”

She also cites hospitals as a great place for sharing your gift and gaining positive exposure in your community.

“Hospitals need healing music, and many have programs for singers to share their gift to those who need it most,” O’Day said. “If you think of your gift as a service business it opens the window to the world in how to use it.”

Look for ways to use your gift to plug into your community. It’s a great way to grow a fan base, network with other creative people, strengthen your voice and gain confidence in your performance skills.

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So, the ILTS question is, "In what areas are you finding a surprise audience and increasing your fanbase?"
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About the Author

Randy Moomaw is a native of Virginia now residing in Tennessee. He writes poems, plays, and songs that reflect the journey between the glow of small town dreams and the shadows cast beneath big city lights. He also specializes in creating games to stimulate and encourage creativity. He's a Samuel Goldwyn Award winner as well as a winner of more than 20 American Songwriter lyricist awards. His plays have been produced in New York, L.A., Nashville, and Washington, D.C. He's a graduate of the University of Mary Washington in Virginia and has an MFA from UCLA. For more posts from Randy Moomaw, visit the Singing Success Vocal Tips Blog

Experiment: Everyone must have a CD, even if free

by Derek Sivers 9/21/2009

If you are a performing musician that sells CDs at your shows, please consider this:

Terry McBride of Nettwerk told this story at a recent conference:
A band he was managing was doing the usual thing of selling CDs for $15. They'd mention it once or twice from the stage, and sell about $300 per night on average.

He asked them to try a completely different approach: Say to the audience, “It's really important to us that you have our CD. We worked so hard on it and are so proud of it, that we want you to have it, no matter what. Pay what you want, but even if you have no money, please take one tonight.”

Mention this again before the end of the show, adding, “Please, nobody leave here tonight without getting a copy of our CD. We've shared this great show together so it would mean a lot to us if you'd take one.”

It changes the request from a commerical pitch to an emotional connection. (Replace market mindset with social mindset!) Allowing them to get a CD for no money just reinforces that. Terry said that the band did this for a while, and soon they were selling about $1200 per night on average, even including those people who took it for free! I think the average selling price was about $10.

But the important part came next: Because every person left each show with a CD, they were more likely to remember who they saw, tell friends about it, listen to it later, and become an even bigger fan afterwards. Then, when the band came back to a town where they had insisted that everyone take a CD, attendance at those shows doubled! The people that took a CD became long-term fans and brought their friends to future shows.

Want to try it? Document specifics.

So far this is just rough word-of-mouth from Terry, but it seems like it'd work. Anyone want to try it? If so, I'd like to tell your tale here in a future article (through sivers.org). So please log some specifics, before and after.

BEFORE: How many CDs did you sell at your last 5-10 shows? Average the number and price to come up with an average per-night total and average per-CD price. AFTER: What were those same numbers for the next 5-10 shows using this method?

Also, please note any specific things you did or said that worked exceptionally well, and perhaps any interesting responses you heard back from the audience. If you're able to note attendance at the same venue for a concert where you did this, then at that same venue afterwards, that's a nice bonus. Save these specific numbers, and either post them as a comment below, or email me at derek@sivers.org. Be able to give the venue info, too, because if this goes exceptionally well I'll be contacting the venue for their verification and perspective. Previous title for this post was “Experiment: Everyone must have a CD, even if free.” but I think the new title describes the real point better.

© 2009 Derek Sivers

What do you think about this idea? Are you going to try it? - ILTS

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Why Warm Up?

Mi Mi Mi Miiii Mi Mi Miiiiiiiiiii!!!

Singers are told again and again that warm-ups are important. But even if you are doing them, they might not be serving you well. If they are not a regular part of each rehearsal and are connected to the rehearsal or eventual performance, then what you believe about their value and what you do may be two different things. What you must do then is establish (or re-establish) the importance of warm-ups in rehearsal. Here are eight quick reminders why warm-ups should be important to you!

1. Warm-ups establish focus.
2. Warm-ups prepare the voice for singing.
3. Warm-ups allow singers to hear themselves.
4. Warm-ups establish physical readiness for singing.
5. Warm-ups establish proper breathing habits.
6. Warm-ups achieve unification of vowels.
7. Warm-ups establish intonation melodically and harmonically.
8. Warm-ups establish a connection with the music to be sung in rehearsal or in performance.

I Love To Singa!

I Love to Singa is both the title of a song written by Harold Arlen and E.Y. Harburg and a later Merrie Melodies animated short subject based on that song. Arlen and Harburg originally wrote the tune for the 1936 Warner Bros. feature-length film The Singing Kid. It is performed three times in the film: first by Al Jolson and Cab Calloway, then by the Yacht Club Boys and Jolson, and finally again by Calloway and Jolson.

I Love to Singa depicts the story of a young owlet who wants to sing jazz, instead of the classical music that his German parents wish him to perform. The plot is a light-hearted tribute to that of Al Jolson's film The Jazz Singer.

The young owl, voiced by Tommy Bond, best known as "Butch" of the Our Gang (Little Rascals) films, is unjustly kicked out of his family's house by his disciplinarian violinist father (voiced by Billy Bletcher) after he is caught singing jazz instead of "Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes" to the reed (pump) organ accompaniment of his mother (voiced by Martha Wentworth). While wandering, he comes across a radio amateur contest, hosted by "Jack Bunny" (a pun on Jack Benny), and billing himself as "Owl Jolson" (a pun on Al Jolson), wins the contest, but not before his father has finally seen his son's potential and allowed him to freely sing jazz.

The I Love to Singa cartoon has taken on something of a cult following in recent years. In an episode of the cartoon South Park, characters Eric Cartman and Officer Barbrady lapse into Owl Jolson's odd song-and-dance routine whenever they get hit with an alien beam. In Warners' 2003 film Looney Tunes: Back in Action, Owl Jolson's dance sequence from I Love to Singa repeatedly appears on the video screen of the ACME Corp. Chairman (played by Steve Martin), since he cannot properly operate his remote control. He also shows up in the Looney Tunes: Back in Action game, in the France, Las Vegas, and Africa levels. He can be turned on and shut off by being hit by either character. When approached, Bugs and Daffy will make comments.

We hope you enjoy this classic video clip!

Button, Button, Who’s Got a Button?

Look over on our sidebar and you’ll find several blog buttons you can post on your own blog. Tell everyone you LOVE TO SING!

To display the button just add an html widget (or gadget) to your layout, copy all of the html code in the box below, and paste it into your widget. It’s that easy to share ILoveToSing with your friends and fans!

Tell us if you have an idea for another one and we'll create it!

Forget MySpace: How To Build The Ultimate Website To Interface With Your Fans

by Eric Hebert, Evolvor.com

Being a musician these days can be wonderful as well as a daunting - there are so many opportunities out there (especially on the web) to distribute your music. It can be very easy to forget what the ultimate goal is: to acquire new fans!

That being said, many musicians are not very business or tech savvy and can get lost in all the networks and tools everyone is raging about. Should I concentrate on MySpace? WTF is Twitter? How can I get on iTunes?

While all of those tools are wonderful opportunities for musicians to connect with their potential audience, they are just tools, and not a means to building something that's long term; you need to use them, but your ultimate goal should be to use those tools to get new fans to come to YOUR own website.

Why is your site so important? Isn't it just the same as a MySpace page?
The answer my friends is a big NO.

Can you sell Mp3's direct from your MySpace page, without using a 3rd party service?
Do you own that "friends" list from MySpace? Do you have access to their emails?
No, and no. You don't have any control over anything.

And control over these things is one of the most powerful things you need to have if you want to take this music career thing to the next level. And I'm here to show you how to do it, all for the measly price of around zero dollars.

Now don't get me wrong - setting this up requires some serious technical knowledge, so you're gonna have to get your hands dirty and learn it the hard way. Also, of course you're going to have to pay for web hosting, but I pray you already new that!

Here is a list of the 6 free things that you can use to set up the ultimate web presence and build your career with.



1. Wordpress CMS (Content Management System)
A website used to be built by writing a bunch of html from scratch as "static" pages. Anyone who's serious about the web knows this is not acceptable nowadays. What you need is something easy to update, and that's where the Wordpress CMS comes in.

It's open source (i.e.: FREE), and can be installed in about an hour after you read through some very nerdy and techie things. Don't be afraid. There are plenty of documentation that will walk you through it, and once it's installed, building your website content will be a breeze.

Wordpress is essentially a blogging platform, but it's capabilities are almost endless. You can also build regular pages, update the blog regularly, and use it to connect with your fans.

2. Theme Design
You'll notice when you install Wordpress that is has a default theme and design, and is rather boring. The great thing about using Wordpress is the community of wonderful designers who create FREE themes that are easy to install, and can quickly take your design from boring to snazzy with a click of the mouse. For those who want to get really dirty, you can hack and alter your theme with custom graphics (all ya need to do is learn a little PHP and CSS) and you'll have a new custom site in no time.

3. Search & Social Optimization
Think it can't get any better then this? It does. In addition to the wonderful theme building community, there are also hundreds of plugins that you can install to make your new Wordpress site do different things. Want to be sure your tags are properly optimized for search engines? Need to add social media buttons? How about a contact form or a site map? No matter what capabilities you want your website to have, chances are there's a free plugin out there that can help make it happen.

4. Download Store
Speaking of plugins, what if you wanted to sell your music directly from your website without using any other service or sharing any of the profits? Why does a visitor need to go somewhere else to perform a simple task like downloading a song? Now worries, once you install the Instinct E-Commerce plugin, not only can you sell t-shirts and other merch, you can also set up a digital download store. Automate it so people can buy your mp3's while you sleep!

5. Music Player & Email List Management
So now you've got a state-of-the-art website built with a cool design and digital download store. What else could help provide for the ultimate user experience? This is where ReverbNation comes in. Use their awesome music players to give new visitors a chance to listen to your tunes before purchasing - or give a track or two away in exchange for their email address. Then use their Fan Reach service to manage your list (one of your most important assets). Everything is tracked - every listen, every download, every fan acquisition, so you can see how you're doing, what's working, etc.

6. Site Analytics
In addition to those ReverbNation stats, you're also going to need a basic stats package for you to see how your website is doing. While you hosting provider should have some, you'll want to compare it to your Google Analytics account, which is obviously free and easy to set-up. After installation, you can see where your traffic is coming from, what people are looking at, and how any marketing efforts are affecting interaction.

Trust me, if you build a website using all these free tools and software, you'll have a machine working for you; it doesn't stop there though! Connect the site to all those other tools you've been using (links to Facebook & MySpace, iTunes buttons, Flickr & YouTube widgets) and you'll have a one-stop shop for everything you (and your fans) need! Now just start generating great blog content, networking with others on the web to get some press, and keep making good music, and you'll be able to see your steady growth using real business analytics along the way!

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About the author:
Eric Hebert is a self-proclaimed online media "mogul", having over 5 years experience marketing on the web. While maintaining and serving business clients in areas such as search engine and social media marketing, content development, blogging, and other marketing and branding techniques, Eric has built a name for himself using these methods to help artists and musicians grasp the web and the potential it has to build their careers.

In early 2007 Eric launched Evolvor.com, a site dedicated to providing tips on how to use the web to market music in addition to exploring the rock music scene and the "evolution of music discovery" in the new digital music industry.