Good Voice

This module can help any musician to pinpoint exactly what holds them back from having a good singing voice. By reading about each of 16 key factors you can determine which are most significant for your voice and learn practical exercises you can do to improve them.

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Here is a preview of one of the 16 keys in the Good Voice module.

Strong Support

Singers with a good voice have strong support for their singing.

One thing that can mark out a bad singer is that their voice seems weak or feeble. To sound like a good singer, you must have solid vocal support while singing. This allows you to produce good, clear tones that sound strong and don’t waver.

It also helps you produce a broad tone, rather than one which sounds thin and feeble. Although you might occasionally want to sing with a weaker-sounding voice to suit a particular song, a good singer must have a voice which is capable of producing a strong, broad tone.

Vocal support comes from a combination of good posture, proper breathing technique, and overall practice and development of your singing voice.

Common Pitfall

Even the most advanced singers sometimes do not effectively use their breath for vocal support. We think that just by breathing in as much air as possible, that will give us a “bank” of air to use. But, it’s not how much air you take in, it’s how you take it in and how you use it.

Quick Fix

Look in the mirror as you’re practicing. Are your shoulders moving up as you breath? Is your chest/sternum moving as your breath? Listen to your breaths. Can you hear a “gasping” sound as you breath in?

All of these things are clues that you are not breathing deeply, with your diaphragm. Try to monitor yourself so that nothing moves from the ribcage up.

Practice Exercise

To increase breath support and train your body to use the breath effectively, use the “sniff/puff” training exercise.

1. Take in air in 3 sets of 3 sniffs, until your lungs are so full you can’t possibly bring in any more air.
2. Then allow the air to naturally flow out to a “neutral lung position.” From there, do not inhale any air!
3. Instead, blow out the rest of the air from your lungs in 3 sets of 3 “puffs” (like you’re blowing out a candle in one puff of air), until your lungs are completely empty, and your abdominal muscles begin to contract.
4. Without gasping, simply open your mouth and allow your lungs to fill up again naturally. If you do this correctly, you should feel your abs release, and nothing will move from the rib cage up.

This exercise should be done daily to train the diaphragm.

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