-Soundcheck.
Check one, check two.
[DRUMROLL]
[APPLAUSE AND CHEERS]
-Hi.
My name is Dr. Dan.
Welcome to another Voice Essentials Quick Tip.
We've all heard the saying "the show must go on."
But sometimes the show going on means
that you're going to be singing with a sore, tired, fatigued
voice.
So how do we go about looking after our voice
when it's not feeling its best?
Well, there are a range of things
you can be doing-- practical things that will help the voice
to sing through those times when the voice doesn't feel 100%.
So let's talk about what you do before you
commence your singing.
Make sure that you're warming the voice up.
You should be doing this regularly, anyway,
but warming up the voice becomes really of paramount importance
the moment your voice starts to feel fatigued and tired.
You need to prep it for use.
Of course you can be using the "Dr. Dan's Voice Essentials"
CD to do that.
You can download that from iTunes
or get it from Djarts' online store.
You might like to complete your warm-ups using a siren.
[SIREN SOUND]
It works the voice through the whole range,
stretching it right out.
But it does it in a manner-- when we use an "ng",
it does it in a manner that brings the vocal folds together
in a really nice massaging way and really
helps to prep the voice.
During the gig, there are range of things
that you can be doing to look after your sore or tired voice
throughout the set or multiple sets.
First of all, make sure you've got good foldback.
That is, you want the voice to sit just
in front of the rest of the instrumentation
in the mix coming up at you from the foldback.
If possible, try to invest in some in-ear monitors.
They are a godsend for vocalists.
You can also ask the person working the foldback
to just tweak the queue.
And you want a lift between the two and three K mark.
Lift that so the voice really has
a sense of presence in the mix.
And that'll actually help you to ease back in the way
you're using your voice.
Finally what you want to do is ask for a wet monitor.
A wet monitor is having effects come through the foldback
wedge.
Now some vocalists really balk at this.
They think that having a clean sound in their monitor
is going to be best.
And for some it is personal taste.
But I've personally found that when
we've got a little bit of effects, a little bit
of reverb coming through the monitor mix,
then that actually helps us as singers
to not have to work so hard to create presence and resonance.
And we can just sit back a little bit more,
and it just helps the voice throughout the set.
At the end of the gig, you want to make
sure you're bringing the muscles back
to a place of muscular rest.
Firstly in order to do that, you need to employ-- regardless
of whether your voice is feeling fatigued, tired, or sore--
you need to employ Cool Downs.
Cool downs help to work the lactic acid out
of your muscles, making sure they're
ready to go another night of singing.
You might like to also try steaming, making sure
that you're replenishing the hydration
levels through the vocal tract and helping
to soothe the voice by virtue of the moist, hot, damp air.
Here's a little product that I've
been selling to my students for a number of years now,
called Entertainer's Secret.
This aloe vera/glycerine product has been proven to actually
help soothe the voice.
A couple of squirts of this onto the back of the throat
helps to replenish and work the mucosal layer in such a way
that it just helps to bring that voice, again,
back to that sense of rest.
Finally-- and this is the one I want
to really encourage you to do-- employ
what's called the Titze straw.
Yes, you did hear me correctly, the Titze straw.
As you'll see, I've linked directly
to Professor Titze's example of how to do this.
But I just wanted to show you, what
we do with this is we blow-- these are called stirring
straws-- and we blow through these in such a way
as to create a back pressure that really
helps to cause the vocal folds to come together really evenly.
[HUMMING THROUGH STRAW]
And what this is doing is just making sure all of your sound
is going through the straw.
When you first start to do this, make
sure no sound is going through your nose as you do this.
And you can do this using the straw,
using Dr. Dan's Voice Essential exercises.
Then you can finish off by doing your national anthem.
Mine is the Australian.
[HUMMING AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL ANTHEM]
You're going to find that that's going
to be really soothing in helping your voice,
bring it back to that point of rest.
I hope once again these tips have been helpful.
As you continue to sing, be very careful in singing
with a tired or fatigued voice.
There is a limit to which the human voice is capable of,
and sometimes it's actually better
not to sing than to make sure the show goes on.
As always, don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube
channel, which you can see the link down there
on the bottom of the page.
I hope you've enjoyed another Dr. Dan's Voice Essentials
Quick Tip.