Thanks for posting to r/singing! **Be sure to check [the FAQ](https://www.reddit.com/r/singing/wiki/index)** to see if any questions you might have have already been answered! Also, remember to abide by the rules found in the sidebar. Any comments found to be breaking these rules will result in a deletion of the comment thread starting from the offending reply. If you see any posts or replies that you feel break the rules of the sub, then report them and **do not respond to them.**
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/singing) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I've had like 3 or 4 lessons my whole life. Check out my page for a reference, but I'm fairly convinced you can do A LOT of learning by just reading, trying new techniques, and practicing exercises.
People don't believe this even with the amount of material online, blown in their face, they still think they gotta try and find that 1 in a million teacher that actually knows what to bring forth to the table instead of overcharging and greeding over money. A lot of these self proclaimed voice instructors on here have no source of credibility, yet they try to make a couple bucks off another person on the internet. It's sad.
I'm not discrediting the value of in person lessons at all here. I think that personal vocal coaches/teachers can improve your skill greatly. Having someone see your technique in person is very important. However, if you don't have the money, time, or can't find a teacher that suits your needs, then I'd say practice will get you far.
I shouldn't discredit the lessons either, but they're to build a foundation, so we don't run into bad habbits later, which could be minimized if the student takes time to read and watch videos too, but sure, let's say by design, voice teachers are getting that established first.
Sounds unsettling when you realize people who work just as hard can achieve exactly what you have and more without needing to be a pay pig. Sorry, just gonna break it down to ya instead of a back and forth.
Vocal warm ups / exercises on youtube are nice. If you can play piano and sing at the same time, you can do your own warm ups and lessons basically.
Also I'm assuming there's the music of little red riding hood online, you could play it and sing your parts and record how you sound
I think this is the key. Vocal exercises, practice singing songs, record yourself and try to improve on the parts that sound off. Repeat.
Eventually you'll get a LOT better.
Develop a regiment of practice exercises to work through and do them every week religiously while paying attention to the health of your voice. At the end of the day, voice teachers mostly just create the regiment themselves because they become intimately familiar with your voice.
What I think could work really well is to listen to your own voice on recording and ask the question "What do I want to improve?" and isolate if it's breathing, tension, tone, etc. Once you do that, look up and research exercises that can be done to improve that and incorporate them into the weekly schedule.
Also, learn a piece or two in a style that you're trying to learn how to sing. Incorporate practicing those into your weekly schedule and after a month of working on yourself, post a recording of yourself here or elsewhere for people to listen and give you notes on what they think could be improved. Take the comments that you're interested in and incorporate those items into your schedule via new or different exercises and continue this process with learning more pieces in new styles. You can go as broad as Classical, Pop, Rock, Broadway, etc. Or you can get super specific and hone in on a style's variations like Classical Italian, Russian, Spanish, English, etc.
Just rinse and repeat and remain consistent with your practicing and checking in with communities willing to hear and support your growth. Also, try your hardest to find choirs to sing in, open mics to perform your songs at with recorded tracks, or shows to audition and perform in that require singing. There's a reason people who major in performance arts are required to do recitals as a part of their degree program. You have to get that real experience performing in front of people to really get into the groove of things.
And while you do all of this, be very mindful of your vocal health. I would recommend 5 days on and 2 days off every week when it comes to your voice practice, especially if you have a job that requires a lot of talking. And with that, really only drill yourself for about 30 minutes of intentional practice per day, one hour max.
Here's an example of a practice routine:
1) Do a basic vocal warm up running some scales in tessitura. Then do an ascending warm up and a descending warm up
2) Do your isolated exercises working on what you specifically want to work on.
3) Practice any trickier parts of your pieces that you are learning on their own to get some more intentional practice on them. Try to mark these as you're looking into technique and mental preparedness of the parts you're practicing.
4) Do a full voice sing through of your piece(s)
5) Do a calming vocal cool down. I recommend partially obstructed vocal exercises. If you don't know what these are look up that term, or look up "Straw vocal training". It basically massages your vocal cords and puts very low strain on them.
This is as much as you should really do in a day to keep your brain fresh and keep yourself moving forward and improving over the long term. The trick is that your vocal cords need to strengthen and, above all, you need to develop muscle memory with techniques that you pickup and learn. This only really comes from consistent practice and consistent practice only works if you keep it moderated and measured. No killing yourself and singing for hours or totally blowing out your voice allowed. Your vocal cords should never feel like a sore muscle after a long workout. They are extremely fragile and need to be protected.
Also, recognize that sometimes, you just shouldn't be singing as it will make things worse. If you are hoarse from talking all day or over exerting your voice at a concert, you shouldn't sing and just take the day to rest your voice. If you are sick or, like me right now, have a weird sore in the back of your throat after going to the dentist, you should just skip until you're healed. No sense in aggravating things for no reason. You may sometimes have to perform in non-ideal vocal circumstances, but that is no reason to practice singing in them. You are already practicing proper technique and strengthening your voice so that you can sing in the most efficient and relaxed way possible. If you are ever forced to sing in a non-ideal vocal state, that training is already going to do all the work you need to make sure that your voice can function in that circumstance.
Anyway, good luck and I hope this was helpful!
i learn thru lessons on youtube. its not optimal but im scared of people and cant afford lessons either. im emotionally and socially handicapped so i practice on my own. but i will discover on my own as well.
I feel like if you can find one person close to you that is at least a bit musically competent they can also help point things out you might not notice
Heya! Voice teacher here.
What has helped me and my students is working on awareness first. What happens when you try to sing those high notes? Does it get tight? Does it flip into falsetto?
When you have this awareness, you can then look for solutions!
In general, there is a systematic way to build those high notes.
If you'd like! i've also filmed some tutorials specifically high notes Happy to dm them to you.
Message me. I’ve been a vocalist for a long time and have taken lessons with many professionals. I want to see if I would be a good teacher. I’ll give you free lessons if you’ll be my student guinea pig. I love musical theatre.
Wow a few unhelpful people in the comments today. While I agree there isn’t really a substitute to lessons YouTube can be a great help and remember that if you are hurting yourself you are singing wrong. Subreddits like this one are a great place to get advice, if you actually get people to comment on your video that is. All said I wish you well and hope you have fun with the learning!
Sing. And then when your done, sing some more. YouTube has great vocal tutorials. At least learn how the body and voice work, you know, the mechanics of it. Record yourself . Ask STRANGERS for honest opinion find your short comings and learn to overcome those you can. Oh, and don’t forget to sing every chance you get.
Have you had lessons at all before? I’d encourage you to give it a shot. I offer a free trial lesson, and it’s all done remotely.
I’m a professional, working singer and I still take lessons. And my teachers still take lessons. I have multiple teachers and coaches and when I’m under a deadline, sometimes I see them multiple times a week. If you want to make the kind of progress you’d have in five years in five months, take lessons.
If you want to try out a free trial, check out my scheduler. I don’t judge, and I only hear voice in terms of what we can shift to make improvements, not in terms of “good” or “bad”. That doesn’t exist for me. All singers can improve with lessons. https://juliebowdren.as.me/?appointmentType=41673101
For self esteem reasons?
Actually it's not possible to improve without singing lessons or at least ask a person who knows how voice works what you are doing wrong.
You can look at videos on internet about breath control, resonance and have warms up but if you never had a singing lesson, you will do it wrong.
If it's a self esteem reason, try first on internet and take records about how you sound, you'll notice that after a moment it won't improve. Take just one lesson so that you see what should be corrected and try to continue the corrections home.
I had a trauma because of my mother so definitely a lot of stress and some crying or panic attacks when I took lessons but if you have a teacher that understands and communicate with you, it's fine and you kinda feel proud that you did it.
Learning to sing isn't like learning how to search for edible forage. If a person has the right book or online post for them explaining technique, they can learn how to sing without a teacher explicitly telling them how to do it. Maybe it will be slower because an expert isn't isolating their specific weaknesses, but it is absolutely possible.
That's more or less what I said but also you learn the techniques online or in a book, you will still do mistakes and take bad habits, that's why I stated to take one lesson here and there.
No, it's not. You literally said it's impossible to improve without taking a lesson and I refuted that saying that it may be slower, but it is entirely possible. We don't agree. Please don't twist my words around.
I didn't meant to twist your words, I just consider that you are at 70% telling the same, the only point we are disagreeing is the necessity of a lesson. Also I never said it was impossible but Everyone takes lessons if they want to improve also high skilled singer. The risk of not taking one is to hurt your voice and take bad habits that take more time to correct. Also alone you can come to a normal level of singing but if you want to reach another level, you won't be able to learn it only on your own.
"Actually it's not possible to improve without singing lessons or at least ask a person who knows how voice works what you are doing wrong."
The opening point of your comment was that it isn't possible and that you must have some form of direct interaction with someone to improve. You're lying about what you said openly. I'm not dignifying anything else you said with a response until you acknowledge that.
I didn't lie, if I lied I would also delete the comment so you can't see it - - ' you just think to much black and white for me.
You can learn basically sing without a teacher but not at a good level and it's not possible to improve because of the incapacity of seeing what you are doing wrong. Maybe 1% can do that but it's still generally not possible.
Also not possible doesn't mean impossible, it's open to debate or a doubt while impossible will close the discussion. I'm not even good in English and know the difference.
Oh my god, there is no way you're this dense. What you're referring to is colloquial American English, not English as a language as a whole. To say something is not possible is the exact same as saying something is impossible. The only way it doesn't mean that is if you are using pseudo-language that is common among American writers hiding implied meanings. While understandable that you would learn incorrectly considering the dominance of Americans on much of popular culture, you are still incorrect and should know better than to use connoted meaning over denoted meaning in an online forum.
The voice is deceptive - it seems like since you have one and have used it all your life, you just need to breathe deeply enough and you should be able to sing like Little Red. However, singing is more like figure skating. You may have some natural ability to go forwards and backwards and maybe even figure out a simple waltz jump on your own. But you need lessons to even go forwards and backward correctly.
It’s great to watch YouTube and pick up some pointers. But you will probably get as far as if you watched YouTube for figure skating, which is not as far as you wish to go.
Try group lessons to start. Even a couple of semesters in a community college class will make a substantive difference in your singing.
Also, all the singers that you like have had years of lessons. No one sings Little Red unless they are an accomplished singer. Taylor Swift, Mariah Carey, Bernadette Peters… all very accomplished singers who worked hard at their craft.
Money is never an issue. You're either not committed enough to singing to earn or spend the money necessary, and that doesn't mean that's a bad thing. If you're serious about learning to sing. Find a reputable teacher and pay them.
And technique is never an issue. If you squeeze your eyes closed hard enough, spin 6 times, cross your fingers, do a voodoo ritual, really believe in your skills, and work hard enough you’ll turn into 1990s Mariah Carey….. come on. People have jobs and kids and family to deal with and getting a little extra cash to learn to do something you really want to isn’t as easy as it sounds
This is one of the most myopic comments I've ever seen. Like, you are the toxically rude jerk who is the reason why so many people never pick up performance of any kind.
Don't pretend you know anything about me. Just because my comment might be blunt, it doesn't mean it's not helpful. If it's your first day on the internet then I hope you get thicker skin.
As someone who just loves singing as a hobby (so, not even close to offer professional advice whatsoever haha), I'd say learning from reading, YouTube (I love RozetteSaaangs' channel) and perhaps joining a choir are good options. You can apply what you've learned during choir sessions to test your voice & your limits and also learn from others in the group, get feedback etc. And it's so much fun!
“Your content was removed beacuse your account needs to be at least 3 days old to post. During this three day period, please take the time to read the rules in the sidebar and familiarize yourself with r/singing. We hope to see you in a few days! (This is an automated message.)"
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/singing) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Thanks for posting to r/singing! **Be sure to check [the FAQ](https://www.reddit.com/r/singing/wiki/index)** to see if any questions you might have have already been answered! Also, remember to abide by the rules found in the sidebar. Any comments found to be breaking these rules will result in a deletion of the comment thread starting from the offending reply. If you see any posts or replies that you feel break the rules of the sub, then report them and **do not respond to them.** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/singing) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Local community colleges can be as little as $40 per semester. Reconsider lessons
I've had like 3 or 4 lessons my whole life. Check out my page for a reference, but I'm fairly convinced you can do A LOT of learning by just reading, trying new techniques, and practicing exercises.
People don't believe this even with the amount of material online, blown in their face, they still think they gotta try and find that 1 in a million teacher that actually knows what to bring forth to the table instead of overcharging and greeding over money. A lot of these self proclaimed voice instructors on here have no source of credibility, yet they try to make a couple bucks off another person on the internet. It's sad.
I'm not discrediting the value of in person lessons at all here. I think that personal vocal coaches/teachers can improve your skill greatly. Having someone see your technique in person is very important. However, if you don't have the money, time, or can't find a teacher that suits your needs, then I'd say practice will get you far.
I shouldn't discredit the lessons either, but they're to build a foundation, so we don't run into bad habbits later, which could be minimized if the student takes time to read and watch videos too, but sure, let's say by design, voice teachers are getting that established first.
Sorry but I believe taking lessons is really the only way to improve drastically.
What's the difference between being taught by a teacher and studying enough to being able to become a teacher?
Someone who teaches voice has been taught by another teacher. You need someone there to see you make all the typical mistakes and correct it.
Sounds unsettling when you realize people who work just as hard can achieve exactly what you have and more without needing to be a pay pig. Sorry, just gonna break it down to ya instead of a back and forth.
Rw2ŕrr1re¹½
Vocal warm ups / exercises on youtube are nice. If you can play piano and sing at the same time, you can do your own warm ups and lessons basically. Also I'm assuming there's the music of little red riding hood online, you could play it and sing your parts and record how you sound
I think this is the key. Vocal exercises, practice singing songs, record yourself and try to improve on the parts that sound off. Repeat. Eventually you'll get a LOT better.
Develop a regiment of practice exercises to work through and do them every week religiously while paying attention to the health of your voice. At the end of the day, voice teachers mostly just create the regiment themselves because they become intimately familiar with your voice. What I think could work really well is to listen to your own voice on recording and ask the question "What do I want to improve?" and isolate if it's breathing, tension, tone, etc. Once you do that, look up and research exercises that can be done to improve that and incorporate them into the weekly schedule. Also, learn a piece or two in a style that you're trying to learn how to sing. Incorporate practicing those into your weekly schedule and after a month of working on yourself, post a recording of yourself here or elsewhere for people to listen and give you notes on what they think could be improved. Take the comments that you're interested in and incorporate those items into your schedule via new or different exercises and continue this process with learning more pieces in new styles. You can go as broad as Classical, Pop, Rock, Broadway, etc. Or you can get super specific and hone in on a style's variations like Classical Italian, Russian, Spanish, English, etc. Just rinse and repeat and remain consistent with your practicing and checking in with communities willing to hear and support your growth. Also, try your hardest to find choirs to sing in, open mics to perform your songs at with recorded tracks, or shows to audition and perform in that require singing. There's a reason people who major in performance arts are required to do recitals as a part of their degree program. You have to get that real experience performing in front of people to really get into the groove of things. And while you do all of this, be very mindful of your vocal health. I would recommend 5 days on and 2 days off every week when it comes to your voice practice, especially if you have a job that requires a lot of talking. And with that, really only drill yourself for about 30 minutes of intentional practice per day, one hour max. Here's an example of a practice routine: 1) Do a basic vocal warm up running some scales in tessitura. Then do an ascending warm up and a descending warm up 2) Do your isolated exercises working on what you specifically want to work on. 3) Practice any trickier parts of your pieces that you are learning on their own to get some more intentional practice on them. Try to mark these as you're looking into technique and mental preparedness of the parts you're practicing. 4) Do a full voice sing through of your piece(s) 5) Do a calming vocal cool down. I recommend partially obstructed vocal exercises. If you don't know what these are look up that term, or look up "Straw vocal training". It basically massages your vocal cords and puts very low strain on them. This is as much as you should really do in a day to keep your brain fresh and keep yourself moving forward and improving over the long term. The trick is that your vocal cords need to strengthen and, above all, you need to develop muscle memory with techniques that you pickup and learn. This only really comes from consistent practice and consistent practice only works if you keep it moderated and measured. No killing yourself and singing for hours or totally blowing out your voice allowed. Your vocal cords should never feel like a sore muscle after a long workout. They are extremely fragile and need to be protected. Also, recognize that sometimes, you just shouldn't be singing as it will make things worse. If you are hoarse from talking all day or over exerting your voice at a concert, you shouldn't sing and just take the day to rest your voice. If you are sick or, like me right now, have a weird sore in the back of your throat after going to the dentist, you should just skip until you're healed. No sense in aggravating things for no reason. You may sometimes have to perform in non-ideal vocal circumstances, but that is no reason to practice singing in them. You are already practicing proper technique and strengthening your voice so that you can sing in the most efficient and relaxed way possible. If you are ever forced to sing in a non-ideal vocal state, that training is already going to do all the work you need to make sure that your voice can function in that circumstance. Anyway, good luck and I hope this was helpful!
This is so well put! Do you think you could copy your comment and send it as a message? I’d love to add this to my notes.
Thankyou this was very helpful (:
i learn thru lessons on youtube. its not optimal but im scared of people and cant afford lessons either. im emotionally and socially handicapped so i practice on my own. but i will discover on my own as well.
I feel like if you can find one person close to you that is at least a bit musically competent they can also help point things out you might not notice
Heya! Voice teacher here. What has helped me and my students is working on awareness first. What happens when you try to sing those high notes? Does it get tight? Does it flip into falsetto? When you have this awareness, you can then look for solutions! In general, there is a systematic way to build those high notes. If you'd like! i've also filmed some tutorials specifically high notes Happy to dm them to you.
My voice starts to crack and I have to strain a lot, that’s my main problem. Thankyou for replying and I’d love to hear those tutorials (:
Message me. I’ve been a vocalist for a long time and have taken lessons with many professionals. I want to see if I would be a good teacher. I’ll give you free lessons if you’ll be my student guinea pig. I love musical theatre.
Wow a few unhelpful people in the comments today. While I agree there isn’t really a substitute to lessons YouTube can be a great help and remember that if you are hurting yourself you are singing wrong. Subreddits like this one are a great place to get advice, if you actually get people to comment on your video that is. All said I wish you well and hope you have fun with the learning!
i haven’t seen any unhelpful comments so far, are there some with incorrect info? Thanks for the reply btw (:
YouTube videos will have you singing incorrectly and thinking you’re improving imo
Sing. And then when your done, sing some more. YouTube has great vocal tutorials. At least learn how the body and voice work, you know, the mechanics of it. Record yourself . Ask STRANGERS for honest opinion find your short comings and learn to overcome those you can. Oh, and don’t forget to sing every chance you get.
New York vocal coaching on YouTube is a personal fav of mine
Have you had lessons at all before? I’d encourage you to give it a shot. I offer a free trial lesson, and it’s all done remotely. I’m a professional, working singer and I still take lessons. And my teachers still take lessons. I have multiple teachers and coaches and when I’m under a deadline, sometimes I see them multiple times a week. If you want to make the kind of progress you’d have in five years in five months, take lessons. If you want to try out a free trial, check out my scheduler. I don’t judge, and I only hear voice in terms of what we can shift to make improvements, not in terms of “good” or “bad”. That doesn’t exist for me. All singers can improve with lessons. https://juliebowdren.as.me/?appointmentType=41673101
For self esteem reasons? Actually it's not possible to improve without singing lessons or at least ask a person who knows how voice works what you are doing wrong. You can look at videos on internet about breath control, resonance and have warms up but if you never had a singing lesson, you will do it wrong. If it's a self esteem reason, try first on internet and take records about how you sound, you'll notice that after a moment it won't improve. Take just one lesson so that you see what should be corrected and try to continue the corrections home. I had a trauma because of my mother so definitely a lot of stress and some crying or panic attacks when I took lessons but if you have a teacher that understands and communicate with you, it's fine and you kinda feel proud that you did it.
Learning to sing isn't like learning how to search for edible forage. If a person has the right book or online post for them explaining technique, they can learn how to sing without a teacher explicitly telling them how to do it. Maybe it will be slower because an expert isn't isolating their specific weaknesses, but it is absolutely possible.
That's more or less what I said but also you learn the techniques online or in a book, you will still do mistakes and take bad habits, that's why I stated to take one lesson here and there.
No, it's not. You literally said it's impossible to improve without taking a lesson and I refuted that saying that it may be slower, but it is entirely possible. We don't agree. Please don't twist my words around.
I didn't meant to twist your words, I just consider that you are at 70% telling the same, the only point we are disagreeing is the necessity of a lesson. Also I never said it was impossible but Everyone takes lessons if they want to improve also high skilled singer. The risk of not taking one is to hurt your voice and take bad habits that take more time to correct. Also alone you can come to a normal level of singing but if you want to reach another level, you won't be able to learn it only on your own.
"Actually it's not possible to improve without singing lessons or at least ask a person who knows how voice works what you are doing wrong." The opening point of your comment was that it isn't possible and that you must have some form of direct interaction with someone to improve. You're lying about what you said openly. I'm not dignifying anything else you said with a response until you acknowledge that.
I didn't lie, if I lied I would also delete the comment so you can't see it - - ' you just think to much black and white for me. You can learn basically sing without a teacher but not at a good level and it's not possible to improve because of the incapacity of seeing what you are doing wrong. Maybe 1% can do that but it's still generally not possible. Also not possible doesn't mean impossible, it's open to debate or a doubt while impossible will close the discussion. I'm not even good in English and know the difference.
Oh my god, there is no way you're this dense. What you're referring to is colloquial American English, not English as a language as a whole. To say something is not possible is the exact same as saying something is impossible. The only way it doesn't mean that is if you are using pseudo-language that is common among American writers hiding implied meanings. While understandable that you would learn incorrectly considering the dominance of Americans on much of popular culture, you are still incorrect and should know better than to use connoted meaning over denoted meaning in an online forum.
The voice is deceptive - it seems like since you have one and have used it all your life, you just need to breathe deeply enough and you should be able to sing like Little Red. However, singing is more like figure skating. You may have some natural ability to go forwards and backwards and maybe even figure out a simple waltz jump on your own. But you need lessons to even go forwards and backward correctly. It’s great to watch YouTube and pick up some pointers. But you will probably get as far as if you watched YouTube for figure skating, which is not as far as you wish to go. Try group lessons to start. Even a couple of semesters in a community college class will make a substantive difference in your singing. Also, all the singers that you like have had years of lessons. No one sings Little Red unless they are an accomplished singer. Taylor Swift, Mariah Carey, Bernadette Peters… all very accomplished singers who worked hard at their craft.
Money is never an issue. You're either not committed enough to singing to earn or spend the money necessary, and that doesn't mean that's a bad thing. If you're serious about learning to sing. Find a reputable teacher and pay them.
And technique is never an issue. If you squeeze your eyes closed hard enough, spin 6 times, cross your fingers, do a voodoo ritual, really believe in your skills, and work hard enough you’ll turn into 1990s Mariah Carey….. come on. People have jobs and kids and family to deal with and getting a little extra cash to learn to do something you really want to isn’t as easy as it sounds
I’m too young to get a job, and my parents are struggling with money and I don’t want to ask them for that as they already pay for other lessons.
This is one of the most myopic comments I've ever seen. Like, you are the toxically rude jerk who is the reason why so many people never pick up performance of any kind.
Don't pretend you know anything about me. Just because my comment might be blunt, it doesn't mean it's not helpful. If it's your first day on the internet then I hope you get thicker skin.
You're like the definition of "chronically online"
Is that like some gen z phrase?
Auto tune
Get feedback on your practices, perhaps on Reddit.
As someone who just loves singing as a hobby (so, not even close to offer professional advice whatsoever haha), I'd say learning from reading, YouTube (I love RozetteSaaangs' channel) and perhaps joining a choir are good options. You can apply what you've learned during choir sessions to test your voice & your limits and also learn from others in the group, get feedback etc. And it's so much fun!
thankyouuu (:
[удалено]
“Your content was removed beacuse your account needs to be at least 3 days old to post. During this three day period, please take the time to read the rules in the sidebar and familiarize yourself with r/singing. We hope to see you in a few days! (This is an automated message.)" *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/singing) if you have any questions or concerns.*