I don’t want to alarm you, but I’m going to sing. I’m not much of a singer, be it choir, karaoke or shower.
My last performance was ‘Look at me, I’m Sandra Dee’ from Grease for a musical audition at the Girl Guides. I didn’t have the fullest understanding of what the song meant, nor did I get the part. Double blow.
But a few readers may want a wee croon and have no idea where to begin, so I’ll give it a go.
This adventure takes me to the bottom floor of a music shop. The session is in a small room with a piano – it looks like it can barely contain us, let alone our booming tones. There are 20 participants and everyone is wonderfully friendly, a mix of newbies and regulars.
The workshop is led by vocal coach, Julie, a lower-register singer who confesses to sounding like a cat on the high notes.
She gets us going and builds our confidence with some warm-ups. We start off with some humming, some lee-lee-la la las and some octave singing.
The next exercise is more challenging: a hearty inhale followed by a long hisssss, like the rainmaker percussion stick you used to play at school. My record stands at a sub-par 15 seconds, despite being quite athletic. One guy went on for a good 40 seconds.
What song did you sing?
This week’s tune – chosen by regular, Rob – is a woefully underrated disco ditty.
We had a go at singing the first verse and a shrieking roadblock came into view. I can sense you mouthing it in your heads. Then wincing.
Julie comes to the rescue with suggestions of building up the vocal climb more gradually, peaking at a lower note. It sounds much better.
In a group of 20 in can be difficult to hear yourself sing, so we’re split into lads and lassies for different verses. Once we’ve got that down we’re broken down into smaller mixed-sex groups with the same verse splits.
One common problem that Julie finds is that people don’t sing with their mouths wide open enough. So, it’s a case of getting past those Wallace & Gromit teeth to really let those notes escape. It can feel comical when you first try it, but it really works.
After we’ve all sung in smaller groups, we wind down (and then up, and then down again) with a siren vocal exercise. You start off on a central note and rollercoaster your way up and then back down. Julie helps by gesturing her right arm upwards, crooked like a ballerina on a barre. She squats a little as she lowers her arm to physically guide our voices. She finishes by encouraging us to gently sing our words to help the cool down.
I left the session feeling physically – and somehow spiritually – lighter. I won’t be joining a barbershop quartet, but I am certain of one thing: everyone is smiling.
I went to Julie’s vocal class at Schott Music London in Soho which I found through Meetup. Each larger group class is £5. Have a look at BBC Sing to find performing groups.
I want to start singing
Julie (on the right) tells us more about why you should air out those lungs and have a warble.
Why should people try singing?
I think a lot of people used to sing when they were kids then people told them not to. I often hear that story.
I encourage people to sing when they can. You often hear about the music therapy they do in hospitals. It helps patients become more positive. I was chatting to someone at the workshop today who said they hadn’t sung since they were a child because someone said they weren’t very good – and they believed it. They said singing felt so good, they could sense themselves smiling.
Singing in a group does something to people because you’re all involved in creating that sound. You make a connection. People keep coming back to the workshop because they make friends and it really makes their day. Older people used to come and have a Saturday afternoon out.
How do people who haven’t sung since childhood get into singing?
It depends what they’re looking for. Some people love choirs. It’s a good way to start because a lot of people are scared to sing by themselves and hear their own voice.
Some people love karaoke, some go to Meetups, others like to sing at home.
If you want to start singing and don’t know where to start, you’ll want to learn some techniques. One-on-one teaching is great because you get to focus on your own voice, but it’s quite expensive.
What challenges do new singers face?
The biggest thing is hearing their own voice. A lot of people are afraid of it. When I do smaller groups, people have the most nerves around singing by themselves. They hear their own voice, then they start trembling and breathing out of place.
The other issue – and it’s the same with anything to do with arts – is not being too hard on yourself. People hear themselves and go: “Oh, I’m rubbish”. You have to get over that. I always say in lessons that everyone has a different voice. It makes people in the class feel more relaxed.
What helps to improve technique?
Swimming helps with the breathing side of things. When I was singing as a teenager, I used to swim and I’d feel such a difference. As a swimmer, you control your breathing when you’re in the water – especially when you’re underwater for a long time. Because I was singing, I managed to swim underwater for a minute without changing anything about my technique.
Any sport is good. When you’re singing, you’re using your whole body and using all these muscles. Whenever you’re doing ab exercises, you feel it. You’re sweating because you’re using them. The sportier you are, the more it’ll help because you have control over your breathing and knowledge of your body.
Meditation and yoga help as well – it’s all about concentration on the breathing.
What common problems do beginners struggle with?
One thing I’ve noticed with breathing is that the shoulders go up and down. They sing high notes and raise their head and sing low and lower their head which constricts breathing. The best thing to do is stay level. As for your posture, open everything up: Superman posture!
As I’ve mentioned, you really need to open your mouth. No opera singers sing with a small opening! The mirror is a great tool, although people hate it. Sing in front of a mirror and watch yourself.
When I say to students to sing opening their mouth, they say: “I am opening my mouth!” I ask them to do it in front of a mirror and they realise they’re not doing it. Keep yourself in check or put your fingers in your mouth so you can see.
What about practical considerations, like the cost of equipment?
Cost-wise, it’s £30-£50 an hour for a good singing teacher. If you want to sing by yourself, you can just download a piano app onto your iPad. You can find instrumental versions of songs everywhere these days, so you don’t need anyone to play. There’s not that much cost involved.
I think the most difficult thing is finding a place to practice. As a singer, an artist or athlete, you have to practice to improve. And unfortunately, with singing you have to make noise. In the beginning you have to do a lot of exercises to get better. If you’re practicing the end range, it’s not always going to sound great in the beginning. Trying to figure out the space in your mouth, how you support your voice.
If you have neighbours everywhere and you come home after work, the last thing people want to hear at 8pm is someone practicing. Personally, like most people, I’m very aware of my own voice – I don’t want people to hear me. If I had a sound-proof box in my house, I’d sing all the time! But again, you have to get over that.
What voice exercises can you do at home?
A good one is humming. It will allow you to go up and down and as soon as you’ve reached your limit and it hurts, you know when to stop. It warms you up.
When we start to sing, we tend to start at a certain note and then go down and up. We don’t go on one note; we practice the whole range. The higher and lower you go, the more you’ll notice the different positions in your mouth and different placements. It helps you to feel your own range based on what’s going on inside.
You can go through notes on the piano, sing intervals. Sing a line of a song, going up half a note each time.
Talking through songs for rhythm helps as a lot of people struggle with rhythm. Often when you learn a song you have to break it down – go for a melody without the lyrics.
With lyrics you’ve got all these vowels and consonants which make it harder to sing it properly. A lot of people aren’t English-speaking or it’s not their first language, so they struggle. It helps them to just say the words. Alternatively, I’ll just tend to clap and say the words on one note, just to get the rhythm in. Once you’re comfortable, put it all together and sing the song.
If you’re struggling with a song, pick the fragment that you’re having trouble with, take it all apart and see where the issue is.
Let me guide you through some exercises:
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