The Vocal Point: How to care for and ‘tone up’ your voice

What’s going on?

In order to structure a great voice care routine as a solution, first we need to understand what is causing the problem. Is it voice fatigue? Is your voice ‘out of shape’? Are other life factors affecting your vocal quality? Let’s talk about these key issues in turn and start with our voice quality changing as we age.

Why does our voice change as we get older?

Main causes :

As we get older, our larynx, vocal cords and other tissues connected to voice-production age.

• The vocal chords can stiffen and get a little thinner; they lose their elasticity and moisture.
• The larynx drops a little bit in the neck and there is an increase to the production of certain minerals which also causes a greater stiffness.
• In women, hormone changes cause a change to the shape and flexibility of the vocal chords. They might swell or stiffen more.
• As with other parts of the body, such as the knees and ankles, ligaments, cartilage and tissue supporting things like the vocal chords in our neck lose elasticity.

So what effect do these changes have on our voice?

• Our voices can sound lower in pitch.
• rougher or breathier in tone.
• When we try and reach higher notes it is thinner and ‘reedy’.
• When used more than usual we can become hoarse much quicker and it can even sound a bit ‘crackly’.

In some people these age-related voice changes may not occur until much later in life and yet in others it can begin when they reach their fifties. Why is this?

Well, just as in other aspects of our body’s strength and condition, vocal health comes down to what daily or regular routines we establish for ourselves, what foods we eat and even how much rest we get.

Regular cardio exercise such as running, swimming or cycling is good for our hearts, lungs and circulation to name but a few benefits; likewise, there are exercises we can do in relation to our voices that will maintain its health and stamina for longer.

Delivering the Message to you Loud and Clear

What should a good daily exercise routine look like?

A 15 minute daily workout will gradually strengthen and improve your voice and its capabilities. I could go into such detail here and in fact it could easily turn into a series of blogs but the purpose of this one is to give you some general pointers that will start you on the path to great vocal health.

If you’d like a more detailed routine or advice on specific exercises, do contact me and I’d be happy to help.

1. Always start with a ‘body’ warm up – gently stretching your neck, shoulders, back and chest.

a. Tip ear to shoulder slowly, each side and repeat.

b. Look over your shoulder each side, repeat.

c. Rotate your shoulders both forwards and backwards.

d. Pull your shoulders right back, pushing your chest out then draw them forwards to make your chest concave and repeat.

e. Let your shoulders drop as if someone were pulling an invisible thread from the top of your head.

2. Move on to your face and give a little attention to your jaw, lips and tongue.

a. Open your mouth and place a finger either side, just below your ears in a small dip or hole that forms there. Gently make small circles here and rub as you slowly open and close your jaw.

b. Relax your jaw so that your mouth is slightly open and your teeth are not quite together. Slide your bottom jaw to one side, hold it for a few seconds and then slide it across to the other side. Repeat a few times.

c. Pucker your lips as tight as possible and then stretch your mouth out wide in a huge grin and repeat several times.

d. Set your teeth together and pull back your lips, showing your teeth, then open your mouth and pull your lips over your teeth, covering them, repeat a couple of times.

e. The tongue is a muscle and should be trained/worked on just as you would your abdominals or hamstrings! Open your mouth and putting your tongue on your top lip. Now simply say la-la-la a few times.

f. Place your tongue in the roof of your mouth and let the air pass between the two as you say an rrrrrr vibrating sound like an aeroplane or motorbike.

g. Tongue twisters! These are fantastic for making your tongue move around quickly. A few tongue twisters will warm up the tongue and help prevent you tripping over your words as you speak. A variety will help you cover a range of letter groups and sounds and might include such classics as: Peter Piper, Betty Botter or She sells sea shells.

3. Breathing – did you know an average 80 year old will have taken around 700 million breaths in their lifetime!

Pretty impressive – so we better make sure we are maximising our breathing potential and doing it right. Here are 2 great exercises you can practice:

a. Take in a deep breath, hold it and gradually release it to help stretch your lung capacity as well as circulate more oxygen around the body. Sometimes called the box technique, you can build this into the following: breathe in for a count of 4, hold for 4, release for 4, hold empty lungs for 4 and then repeat. To increase this, just count slower – in other words stretch out the count of 4.

b. Alternative nostril breathing helps you to learn to control your breaths and can also reduce stress. This is sometimes referred to as Nadi Sodhana. Block your right nostril and breathe in through your left. Then block your left nostril and breathe out through the right. Then, in through the right, block it and breathe out through the left and so on.

4. Massage your larynx and vocal cords.

Just like any muscle in your body, they can feel tired or stiff at times and a gentle massage can improve circulation, relax them and ultimately improve your vocal tones.

Now we have physically warmed up all the relevant muscles and parts linked to our voices, we can concentrate on warming up the voice itself to produce a much fuller, smoother controlled sound.