[0:00]Whenever you sing high notes, you always sound like you're screaming, you always sound like you're straining, and you get vocal fatigue really fast. Today, we're going to fix it. What's up, you guys? My name is Lydia Caesar, your new vocal bestie, and today we are going to learn how to breathe properly while you sing. Learning how to properly breathe while you sing is the key to pretty much everything when it comes to vocal performance. Being able to reach higher notes, being able to hold notes and sustain them for longer, better vocal agility, of course, not losing your voice as quickly when you sing. It is the most important tool that you will have in your vocalists toolbox, learning proper breathing technique. We've always heard so many different terms, sing from your diaphragm, don't sing from your nose, use proper support. But what does all this really mean? My goal is to always just make things really, really simple and not complicate things. I feel like a lot of times people who teach voice can complicate things with terms and stuff like that, and I think that this is the simplest way that I'm going to explain to you right now, how to use your core to produce better vocal performance. There's a lot of arguments around the diaphragm because it's an involuntary muscle, so you can't actually control it. So listen, let's just throw the word diaphragm away, and let's just go with core, okay? We're going to use your core, which consists of this entire midsection, okay? All the way even to your back. This is where we want our support to come from when we sing. What does support mean? Support basically means the foundation from where your vocals are going to be produced. So what I want you to do is put your hand here, keep your hand here when you do it. You feel all that vibration, right? Your larynx is right here. So this is where people tend to focus when it comes time to sing, and they place more strain and tension on the neck area. When this is the area that really needs to be the most relaxed. Because we want the air to flow freely through this area right here. So we don't want it to be constricted or tense or tight, we want it to be loose and relaxed. And I think a lot of times what gets in our way as vocalists is how tense we are. So I really want you to focus on relaxing your body when you sing. Even maybe doing some great stretches to warm up your body before you even start, okay? And I'll do another video about stretches and like prepping before you sing, but right now we're going to just focus more on breathing. So that's the first thing, don't fall, don't put your focus here, we want to put our focus here. When it comes to support, this is where we want all of our vocal support to take place, right in the middle of our body. Think about it, it's the biggest part, right? This is really small and tight already. We want to keep that loose and natural and we want to focus our support here. So it's mental, when you sing, a lot of it is mental, you have to think. This is where your focus should be, so that's the first thing is rewiring your brain. Take all of the thought process out of this area and move it here. Okay, that's first. The second thing that I want you to do is just cough. And I want you to be standing for this exercise, I'm sitting, but I want you to stand, okay? So place your hand right on your core and just just cough.
[3:51]Okay? What do you feel when you cough? You feel some kind of tension happening in this core area, right? You feel it like you feel it tighten up, right? Your body is literally wired to support itself when you are putting a lot of strain on your voice, right? So when you cough, you're making sound, it's audible, so you're actually using your voice when you cough. And it's such a intense and powerful punch that your core automatically tightens to support that. Next thing I want you to do is laugh.
[4:32]Same hand on your core forcefully laugh. Same thing, right? Your core automatically puts itself in position to support that. Have you ever heard the term like I laugh until my stomach hurt, right? You're laughing so much and so hard that your core is automatically engaging. Your brain is saying, okay, this person is putting forth a lot out of their mouth, out of their larynx, their voice box, they are like really, really pushing it out and exerting a lot. What am I going to do to help support this? My body is going to automatically put my core into place to make sure that it's supporting all of that activity, all of that movement, and that's why you have that phrase, I laugh till my belly hurt. The laugh comes from deep down, it's not just coming from here. The laugh's not starting here, it's starting down here. So when I realized this, I came up with a technique because this is where the support naturally happens. When we cough, when we laugh, so, we need to just use that and apply it to our voice when we sing, okay? So I came up with an exercise that I call ha ha ha. The first two ha's that you do, I want them to be punchy. Ha, ha, and then the third one, I want you to sustain.
[6:08]What is the point of this? The first two ha's are designed. When you do those punchy ha's, your core is going to automatically engage just like when you laugh or when you cough, okay? So I want the first two to be very staccato, staccato means short. And what your body naturally does when you do those first two ha's, right, keep your hand here. I want you to purposefully make your body feel that feeling with the first two ha's, and capture that same feeling for the third ha as your breath continues to flow, okay? So, ha, ha, then I want you to that engagement that happened on those first two, force that engagement on the third one. You will feel your belly jumping on the first two ha's. The whole midsection. You can see mine.
[7:09]It's like your whole midsection just automatically engages for those first two. But if I were to sing and just do, that same engagement may not happen if I'm not focused or thinking about it, right? Especially if I haven't been taught to use that core support, I'm going to just sing how it feels natural. And a lot of times when we get into higher notes, more belting notes, more sustained notes, when we want our voice to be able to perform for us for the long term, that can be harmful when we're not focusing on here, we're focusing on here, because that's what our mind tells us to do. This is where the sound's coming from. So our brain is like, focus here, sis, focus here, bro. No, focus here, okay? So the exercise is ha, ha, then I want you to that engagement that happened on those first two. Force that engagement on the third one. Hold it and press that air forward. I want there to be a consistent air flow. Something I want you to think about, imagine there is a big red balloon inside your body. Whatever color you want to choose, I choose a color so that it can be very visual, okay? When you breathe in, that belly fills with air. Then, using that same technique that we just used with our core, I want you to breathe out, but intentionally engage that core to push the balloon and squeeze it down, all the air out of it. The air from that balloon is going to shoot up out of your lungs, make your vocal cords vibrate, and the sound is going to flow from your larynx, okay? So, think about it while doing, ha, ha, ha, ha. A nice core engaged ha, okay? This is an exercise that you can do in the car, you could do it in the shower, you could do it while you're washing dishes. I want you to focus though, on those first two ha's, punch them out so your core naturally engages, and then feel that feeling from the punches, from the punchiness, from those staccato notes, and activate that same feeling into your core when you sustain and sing the long note. Once you get this and you feel it, that's the way you need to breathe when you sing every single note with that core engagement completely activated. Let's put this to work. Let's use one of my songs, I have a song called St. Louis, and one of the phrases in the song is pretty universal and simple, I love you. So I'm going to sing it two ways. Another reason why using your core and breathing from your entire midsection is so important is because it doesn't just help us with, you know, keep our voices intact, keep a healthy voice, because what I will tell you is, when you sing and strain and push and just lean here for a long period of time, you may not notice any vocal damage right away. Sometimes it takes years of singing wrong and straining and not using your core as the foundation for your for your notes, that later on, maybe five, even 10, 15 years later, you may develop nodes or polyps on your chords from vocal fatigue because our vocal folds are very delicate. They are thin, and it's just just like anything else, how we get calluses on our hands when we do a lot of working out or heavy lifting, you can get calluses on your vocal folds from leaning on them and just pressing on them without the proper foundation and without the proper support. So it's important to learn these techniques, not just because it's going to make the notes sound better, right? You're going to get a nice, more full, robust sound when you use your core, but also for the long term of your vocal health, okay? So, so I'm going to sing the melody, I of of of I love you from my song, St. Louis two ways. The first way, I'm going to do my best to just sing it without really engaging my core. Okay? Versus.
[11:37]Now the second way, not only does it sound more full and more robust, it sounds cleaner, it sounds more polished. It sounds like a singer with experience versus a singer without experience, and it's really just a simple nuance, right? One way, I'm just throwing caution to the wind, and I'm just kind of straining and reaching. Just kind of like wishing and hoping, grasping, grasping at straws. So rather than putting no thought into it at all. Not only does the second way sound more full and more robust, but it also sounds more clean and more polished. It sounds more vocally intentional, like a professional, like someone who is on stage actually doing the work versus just kind of like stumbling through and trying to figure it out. Now, what I will say is that if you've been singing your whole life just the way, you know, that you naturally sing, you strain from here, you push here. It is definitely difficult to undo. So that's why I think that the exercise is so important so that that feeling of singing from your core and from, you know, all here, your core, your back. Using your whole middle to really fuel the note starts to feel natural. You want it to start to feel second nature, because when you get on stage, you're not, what I don't want is for you to be thinking so hard that now like, you're not in the moment. Your performance becomes compromised because you're you're too much in your head. When you practice, like practice makes perfect, I like to say like practice makes permanent, because a lot of our vocal performance should feel natural and free flowing. And we want it to just become a permanent part of what we do as vocalists, as opposed to something that we have to think to implement, okay? So practice your ha ha's, you will start to notice an immense difference in your vocal performance when you practice like this at home, when you practice like this in your private space, when you, you know, you can make the mistakes when you're all alone, really do the work as to what this should feel like and hear the difference. Once you start to hear the difference, you will have some breakthroughs on your own at home and you're going to be like, wow, implementing this really does make a difference. Just become more aware of it when you're at home, private and practicing, so that those instincts just automatically kick in when you're on stage.
[14:30]Now you can start having better vocal performances, you can start controlling your voice a lot better, you can start putting forth those high, really powerful, belty songs, without putting so much strain on your vocal folds, really learning how to connect and support from your core. Just all around better vocal performance without putting so much strain right here. Hope this helped. If you enjoyed this video, please like, comment, subscribe, share it with somebody who you think needs to learn some great vocal techniques and let me know what you want to see next or what you want to learn and I'll do my best to help. Have an amazing day and go in love and light.
