Practice does not always lead to perfection, but it always leads to better results! There are many practical ways to improve the quality of your voice. To do this, you need to learn how to breathe properly, avoid certain foods, and do special warm-up exercises before you start singing or giving a speech. You can't achieve success overnight, but with a lot of effort and some time, you can certainly improve the quality of your voice.

Steps

Part 1

Proper breathing and body position

Learn to breathe properly. To have a strong voice, you simply must be able to breathe correctly. The point is to breathe deeply.

Use your abdominal muscles. With proper breathing, the lower muscles (diaphragm) above your belly should move forward, making room for even more air. While singing (speech or just for exhalation) use these muscles to push the air out.

• Use the muscles above your lower back (around your kidneys) in exactly the same way to control your inhalation and exhalation.
• While tensing your abdominal muscles, try not to lean forward.

1. Learn to stand properly. Watch the position of your legs, knees, hips, abdomen, chest, shoulders, arms and head:

   Relax. When you get into the correct posture, make sure you are no longer tense. You should not feel any tension from sticking out your chest or keeping your back straight. Remember to relax the muscles in your face and neck.

Part 4

Lifestyle changes

Drink more water. Drink at least 8 glasses of water a day. This number may be higher if you exercise or live in a hot climate (i.e. sweat a lot).

Eat healthy food. Eating whole grains, fruits, and vegetables helps keep the lining of your throat healthy, which means your voice will also be healthy.

Relax. Stress affects everything negatively. Set aside time each day to do something that will help you relax. You can do yoga, meditation, go for a walk, watch your favorite series, read a good book or play a musical instrument.

Try not to scream. This is especially important if you have a gig coming up soon. Yelling can harm your voice and degrade its quality for the next few days.

Be patient. It may take some time to improve the quality of your voice. You will not get much improvement overnight, but after you warm up and learn how to breathe and keep your posture correctly, you will immediately feel something change in you.

• There is nothing wrong with doing everything gradually. First, learn to breathe deeply and stand properly. Once you've got that down, work on your mouth position and do some warm-up exercises.

1. Ask for help. If the quality of your voice has recently deteriorated, for example, the voice has become more raspy, deep or tense, this may indicate health problems. Just in case, consult a doctor to rule out the possibility of illness.

Part 5

Learn from others

Find a qualified teacher. A good teacher will be able to advise you on how to improve your voice. Find a teacher with a classical background, as this teacher will be familiar with a variety of styles.

Listen to professional singers and announcers. Watch how they control their breathing, volume, articulation, modulation, vocal habits, and sonority. If you like their style, try imitating it.

• Style imitation is a great way to learn how to sing because it forces you to do things you wouldn't normally do.

1. Watch professional singers and announcers. Pay attention to how they breathe and how they hold notes with their breath. Look at their posture and body language. Watch how they use their lips to articulate the sounds and words they sing.

   Don't ignore professionals you don't like. Think about why you don't like this or that singer or announcer. What do they do differently from others? Are they doing something wrong, or is it just not your style?

Breath. The voice helps a person to convey information, to express their emotions and feelings. Thanks to him, you can convince or touch the interlocutor, so it can be called the main tool of persuasion. But not everyone has a pleasant melodic voice that others would like, but it can always be developed, since the vocal cords are ordinary muscles. In this case, breathing comes to the fore, it is with its help that you can develop a voice. When it is not correct, and there is also muscle stiffness, this leads to distortion. To make your voice beautiful and give it velvety, you can use simple exercises. First you need to try to walk slowly and watch your breathing. So, inhalation-exhalation should be 2 steps long, but this interval will subsequently need to be increased to 10. In addition, the following exercise will help develop the vocal cords: you need to stand up correctly, spread your legs a little, and raise your arms above your head and close into a lock. Then you need to lean back a little, inhale more air through your nose and exhale slowly, leaning forward. During this exercise, you need to repeat various sounds: “i”, “u”, “e”, “a”, “o”.

Powerful voice. A beautiful voice also needs to be made strong, so it should also be trained, and for this you can take note of simple exercises. They must be performed in the morning, like exercises, and best of all in the bathroom directly in front of the mirror, they will add self-confidence and charge you with cheerfulness for the whole day. First you need to take a deep breath, then exhale, while breathing is enough. It should be noted that on each breath you need to pronounce the vowels, in exactly the same sequence in which they are given here: “iii”, “uh”, “aah”, “ooh”, “uuu”. This set is not accidental, absolutely all singers use it when singing. Such training allows them to hit high notes, since the ligaments always remain in good shape. Of course, households and neighbors may not like such a chant in the morning, so you should think about this issue in advance, it may make sense to put good soundproofing in the bathroom so as not to disturb anyone.

Singing voice. To develop a singing voice, a slightly different instruction is required, since you will need to learn how to control your vocal cords in order to change intonation and tonality in the process of singing a song. You will need to start every morning with breathing exercises: first you should take 7 full breaths through your nose and exhale rapidly through your mouth. In addition, you also need to do a warm-up of the mouth, by biting the tongue, cheeks, lips. After a feeling of relaxation comes, you can begin to perform exercises for the vocal cords. First of all, you should pronounce syllables in which there are voiced and deaf consonants, but diluted with one vowel. You should use these: pkto, pkti, pkta, pkte, pkty, (bdi, bde, bda, bdo, bdu), but if you don’t like them, you can come up with your own, write them down on a piece of paper and read them during training.

As exercises, vocal teachers advise reading tongue twisters, only at first it should be done slowly, clearly pronouncing all the letters, you can gradually speed up the pace, but at the same time, the distinctness of pronunciation should not be lost. As soon as you manage to cope with tongue twisters, you can read your favorite literary works. To develop your voice, you will need to train a lot, but there is no way to do it without difficulty, so you should be patient and not stop there.

Today, the success and future of a person often depend on the quality of articulation, therefore it is necessary to regularly train the speech muscles, to conduct classes to develop the correct pronunciation and diction become fundamental. As a rule, such exercises are carried out by children, starting from the smallest age. From infancy, experienced teachers and educators train the children's speech apparatus. Later, the speech therapist corrects the difference between deviation and complexity, but they arise due to insufficient training and muscle development.

Is it necessary for adults?

Speech muscles are the basis of our speech, the guarantee of its quality, attractiveness, the basis of the ability to render. Few people want to listen to a person who lisps, burrs or stutters. All these problems are in our mouths, and let such a literal statement scare no one. After all, a person who cannot fully and beautifully speak suffers from poor muscle development. For adults, this problem will become especially acute if the choice of profession falls on a teacher, announcer, actor, marketer.

Dreams of becoming a successful leader will sink into oblivion if the speech is incoherent and unattractive.

What to do?

Numerous special programs and exercises have been developed for the development of speech muscles. But the most important thing in this process is the regularity of training and the desire to achieve real results. Therefore, tongue twisters will only be the beginning of important exercises, because the course should begin with classes for the development of certain muscle groups. For example, stretching the lips with a tube and pronouncing the labial "O" or "U" will help in training the lower muscles, but if you pronounce poems and special phrases with the letter "E" and "E", the muscle tone will be provided to the cheeks.

Therefore, it is important that the exercises please. They need to be held in front of a mirror, and before starting, be sure to wash your hands to ensure hygiene. Then you should start with a little warm-up, like pulling and stretching the lips, stretching the tongue and others. It is enough to show your tongue in the mirror, smile, so that the speech muscles stretch a little.

To consolidate the result, do not forget about speech training, and therefore singing, pronunciation of complex words, tongue twisters and other exercises should become indispensable elements of classes.

It is advisable to work with professionals, however, even self-training of the speech apparatus and muscles will help get rid of many problems. Do not forget that such training is incredibly useful for women, because with constant exercises, the skin of the face remains young longer.

Not only opera singers, but also many public people whose activities are related to lecturing, teaching people, must perform special exercises daily to develop the vocal cords. This is breathing exercises, and acupressure, and chanting, aimed at warming up the vocal cords. An indispensable condition for the qualitative strengthening of the vocal cords is the systematic training. After all, training the vocal cords, like training the muscles of the body, is a very responsible event.

So, gymnastics for the vocal cords begins with the respiratory complex. First of all, it is worth learning that it is useful for the vocal cords to learn how to breathe in the stomach. This will help to save the throat in the future. Each exercise is performed while sitting, at least 12 times.

1. Deep breath in through the nose, exhale through the nose in three approaches.
2. Inhale deeply through the nose, exhale through the mouth. At the same time, we rub our hands as if we are trying warm them up.
3. Deep breath in through the nose, exhalation is like trying cool with breath hot tea.
4. Deep breath through the nose hissing breath.
5. Deep breath through the nose wheezing.

From a runny nose, the voice becomes muffled, coughing irritates the larynx, and sputum flowing into it causes inflammation. If the voice is hoarse, then the best thing for him is silence: constant irritation of the mucous membrane of the larynx increases inflammation and prevents the ligaments from recovering. Therefore, phoniatrists in many cases, when patients have voice problems, prescribe silence as a treatment regimen.

If this is not possible, it is necessary to try to reduce voice loads as much as possible. Do not whisper: this makes the vocal cords work with great effort. You just need to speak more quietly and calmly, and yet - less and less often.

Try to provide throat treatment during the day. Even if you go to work, take a bottle of disinfectant solution, anti-inflammatory tablets and lozenges with you. Ideally, if every hour or two you treat your throat with an antibacterial (gramicidin, furacillin, iodine and sea salt solution) and anti-inflammatory (propolis tincture, calendula, aloe juice) solution, alternating them. At night, it is good to lubricate the sore throat with olive or sea buckthorn oil, put an alcohol compress and keep warm.

And when the throat has already passed, it is useful to learn a simple rule for yourself: immediately after waking up, rinse your throat with a glass of boiled, slightly warm water. This helps to remove plaque from the mucosa of the throat and larynx, but does not disturb the healthy microflora that is present on this part of the mucosa and is very important for the normal functioning of the ligaments.

Commandment two: eliminate irritation of the larynx

The delicate folds of the larynx are adversely affected by spicy, too cold or hot food - it injures the mucous membrane. It is also undesirable to experience sudden changes in air temperature, especially when moving from a heated room to a cold one. Even with a healthy voice, it is recommended to be silent for about 15 minutes before going outside so that the ligaments calm down and cool down. And if you went outside in the cold season, then all conversations in the open air, especially damp and humid or in the cold, should be excluded. Be careful when talking on the phone. Doctors have found that such speech tires the vocal cords much more than direct communication.

The same effect can be "achieved" if you always speak loudly and sharply, with tension. Over time, callused growths - nodules - appear on the ligaments. They become a significant hindrance to the normal sound of the voice.

Commandment three: learn to breathe correctly during a conversation

To save your vocal cords, always start speaking on an exhalation. Otherwise, there may not be enough air to complete the phrase, and the ligaments will overstrain, compensating for this lack. When the lungs are filled with air, the words are pronounced sonorously and smoothly. The strength of the voice depends on the work of the lower respiratory organs, lungs, bronchi and trachea.

So that when you breathe you always have a supply of air, when you inhale, try to fill it not only with the chest, raising the upper ribs, but also with part of the abdominal cavity, working with the lower ribs, the abdominal wall and the diaphragm - the partition between the chest and abdominal cavities. If that doesn’t work, try simply “breathing with your belly,” where your belly fills with air when you inhale and deflates when you exhale. The diaphragm regulates the pressure under the vocal cords so they don't have to overexert themselves.

Commandment Four: Watch Your Speech

Change your intonation often during a conversation. A variety of voice modulations greatly decorate speech and give it expressiveness and emotional coloring. But the monotonous, monotonous narration, on the contrary, does not have a very good effect on the state of the voice. And if you have to “turn up the volume”, the ligaments become more and more tense and the voice loses its sonority.

Commandment Five: Exercise Your Voice

After a small set of air, a lingering consonant sound “m” or “n” is produced. It is directed upward into the nasal cavity. Fingers folded together are applied to both sides of the nose. You should feel vibration under them. Try also repeating the words “don-n-n” or “bom-m-m” through your nose. The sound should respond with vibrations in the region of the upper lip.

Then, exhaling the air, whole letter combinations are lingered: “mi-mi-mi”, “mo-mo-mo” or “ma-ma-ma”. That's what singers do when they sing. You can also say "no-na-but", "bee-ba-bo". In the future, using the sounds "m" or "n", you can hum whole melodies with your "nose".

To improve the sound of chest, low sounds, lower your head to your chest and, pressing your chin to it, say with a deep voice together with the exhalation: “o-o-o” or “ooo.” Pull the sound until you have enough breath. Place your hand on the top of your chest. You can lightly pat your hand. This will increase the vibration of the vocal cords and the strength of their vibrations.

You may not have time for daily phoniatric exercises. However, a few simple actions to strengthen the voice with which you can start the day are quite realistic.

Homeopathic otorhinolaryngologist Vladimir Orekhov advises every morning to start with the phrase: “You must speak not with your throat, but with your nose.” Try to pronounce these words slowly, breathing out slowly through your nose, so that your voice sounds a little nasal. The exercise can be repeated throughout the day - it relieves stress from the vocal cords well.

It has always been considered that talking and chewing at the same time is both ugly and dangerous, and contrary to good manners. However, the Austrian scientist Freschels developed a method for treating voice disorders that combines these two processes. He drew attention to the fact that during chewing, the ligaments relax, and thus it is easier to achieve natural sounding of the voice in those patients who, during a normal conversation, form an incorrect stereotype of speech movements. The Freschels method is used by many voice treatment specialists, but the Russian school of phoniatry does not consider it effective.

Our reference

Male voices are traditionally divided into high (tenors - from 128 to 512 Hz), medium (baritones - from 196 to 426 Hz) and low (bass - from 80 to 300 Hz). Women have higher voices, which is due to the peculiarities of the structure of their vocal cords (thinner and shorter in owners of high voices), as well as the level of hormones in the blood, thanks to which girls become women and boys become men.

Newest

An unusual way to restore the lost voice was invented in the USA. Recently, surgical tightening ... of the vocal cords has come into fashion here. The new-fangled operation, which costs $17,500, is especially popular with older people who think that their rough, dull voice over the years betrays their age.

By the way

Champions in voice loads are opera singers. The age of the vocalist is not long - 20-25 years. However, exceptions happen. Irina Arkhipova, Zurab Sotkilava, Evgeny Nesterenko, Iosif Kobzon are a vivid example of this. Experts associate their amazing stage longevity not only with the “correct” school of singing, but also with the competent use of the voice. On this account, scene professionals have their own unspoken code. It is strictly forbidden for a vocalist to sing when he has a cold, to smoke (due to this, his voice becomes rougher and loses its sonority), to overcool, to abuse alcohol and to talk loudly on the street after the performance, when the ligaments warmed up after active singing are most vulnerable. On the eve of the performance, it is also not recommended to indulge in gluttony (at the latest, 4 hours before the performance): a full stomach presses on the diaphragm and makes it impossible to hold the breath necessary for the singer. In fact, all vocalists go on stage half-starved.

The most difficult (in terms of saturation of sound and load on the vocal apparatus) are traditionally considered dramatic parts. For women - Turandot and To'sca from Puccini's operas of the same name. For men, Cavaradossi from Tosca and Herman from The Queen of Spades. In terms of the volume of work for the performers of the main roles, there are no harder performances than Othello, Cio-Cio-San and Boris Godunov.

Sometimes, due to prolonged hypothermia, screaming, a long performance, a sharp change in climate, the voice suddenly disappears or becomes hoarse. It usually happens unexpectedly, usually in the morning.
Content:

Causes and symptoms of inflammation of the vocal cords

Causes of inflammation of the ligaments:

• The vocal cords can become inflamed with laryngitis, tonsillitis, bronchitis. In this case, they become inflamed and swell, and the glottis, on the contrary, decreases and almost completely closes. The mucous surface of the larynx swells and dries up. There is a loss of voice.
• Loss of voice can occur if cold air is inhaled for a long time, especially if inhaled through the mouth, when drinking cold drinks, and when being in the cold for a long time.
• Inflammation and enlargement of the ligamentous tissue can be with various types of allergies, with viral infections, if you inhale irritants, such as tobacco smoke.
• Loss of voice can occur in people who have to talk or sing a lot: singers, teachers, speakers due to constant overstrain of the ligaments.
• The vocal cords are affected by smoking, drinking, dust, chemicals, and inhaling dry, hot air.

Symptoms may be different with different forms of exposure to the vocal cords. Different cases may have different symptoms. We can distinguish a group of symptoms common to all cases:

• hoarseness or completely lost voice;
• perspiration and dryness in the larynx;
• pain in the larynx when swallowing;
• throat red, swollen;
• plaque in the throat;

• dry ;
• possible rise in temperature;
• headache, weakness.

If the cause is a cold or a viral illness, other symptoms may also be present. In children, swelling of the throat can lead to difficulty breathing (false croup).

Treatment of inflammation of the vocal cords

• pharmaceutical preparations;
• physiotherapy;
• surgical intervention;
• treatment of the throat with medications, for example, lugol.

Treatment is usually carried out by an otolaryngologist, but it is also advisable to visit a phoniatrist, especially for people whose profession is related to singing or oratory.

Medication plays an important role in treatment. Use drugs that relieve inflammation and swelling. These can be antibiotics, antiviral drugs, corticosteroid aerosols.

For those who, by occupation, must sing or speak a lot, ligament problems can occur due to chronic overload and inflammation of the ligaments.

Often, on examination, specific "nodules" on the ligaments are revealed. Such nodules are treated by treating the nodules with special preparations. If they do not help, then surgery is necessary. If such a measure does not give a result, you will have to change the occupation.

That is why artists treat their voice so carefully: they do special exercises, avoid certain foods and drinks that irritate the vocal cords.

Given that the causes may be different, there may be different symptoms, so you should not treat yourself. Only a doctor can find the cause and prescribe the right treatment.

When there is no exacerbation, you need to follow the regime, do exercises for the voice, beware of irritating foods and drinks, drink warm milk with the addition of butter.

Folk methods of treatment

Alternative methods of treatment are used as an auxiliary treatment after consulting a doctor.

The first steps that can be taken in the treatment of the vocal cords are complete silence, warm drinking and rinsing with warm herbal decoctions (chamomile, sage) with soda solution. The following treatments are used:

• Method 1: boil potatoes in a saucepan and put mint leaves or chamomile in this water. Breathe over the steam for 10 minutes;
• Method 2: 2 tsp. onion husks pour 500 ml of boiling water, wait 20 minutes and gargle with infusion 3 rubles / day;
• Method 3: two tbsp. l. raspberry leaves, 2 tbsp. l. olive oil, 1 tsp. ginger pour 600 ml of boiling water and leave overnight in a thermos. Drink 2 tbsp. l. before meals 3 rubles / day;
• Method 4: Mix egg yolk and butter. Eat 1 tbsp. l. 3-4 rubles / day;
• Method 5: drink not very hot beer;

• Method 6: drink non-hot milk diluted with mineral water;
• Method 7: drink hot milk with honey in small sips. It is necessary to ensure that the milk is not hot, since honey loses its healing power in hot milk;
• Method 8: after eating, you should gargle with warm decoctions of herbs, such as chamomile, calendula, sage,;
• Method 9: grate the horseradish root on a fine grater and pour 200 ml of water. Add 1 tbsp. l. honey and drink every hour for 1 tsp. mixtures;
• method 10: mix 2 tbsp. l. raspberries and sunflower oil, 1 tsp. ginger (fresh) Pour the mixture with 400 ml of boiling water and soak for 12 hours. Drink 2 sips an hour before meals;
• Method 11: 1 cup of anise seeds pour 0.5 liters of water, stand for 15 minutes, cool and strain. Put 5 tbsp. l. lime honey and 2 tbsp. l. cognac. Drink every 30 min. 1 st. l.
• Method 12: put 3-4 drops of anise oil bought at a pharmacy on a piece of refined sugar and dissolve it.
• Method 13: after straining the ligaments while singing or talking for a long time, drink warm tea with lemon, with the addition of 1 tsp. cognac.
• Method 14: mix equal parts cognac, lemon juice, egg and honey, drink in one gulp.

Prevention of inflammation of the vocal cords

If the profession is closely related to the use of the vocal cords, you need to know what preventive measures exist for this problem. There are not many of them:

• avoid hypothermia;
• less contact with dust, aggressive chemicals;
• if you still have to be in dusty rooms and work with chemicals, then every day after work it is advisable to do;
• if by occupation you have to talk a lot, sing, then you must definitely give your voice a rest, if possible, keep silence: after every 2 hours of work, give one to two hours of rest.

• h / z nose inhale-exhale;
• inhale through the nose, exhale through the mouth;
• inhale through the mouth, exhale through the nose;
• inhale-exhale through the right half of the nose, then do the same through the left;
• inhale through one half of the nose, exhale through the other;
• inhale through the nose, long exhale through the nose with an effort at the end;
• inhale through the nose, exhale through slightly parted lips;
• inhale through the nose, exhale through the nose with jerks.

In addition to a set of exercises, you can regularly massage the front of the neck. This relieves tension in the neck muscles.

During the massage, the throat is stroked alternately with the left and right hands. Do it from top to bottom, reaching from the chin to the chest.

In addition, people for whom the vocal cords are a tool of labor should not walk quickly on frosty days, so as not to breathe through their mouths, they should not talk in the cold. If you just had to work with your voice (sing or talk a lot), you need to let your vocal cords rest for about 20 minutes, then you can only go outside in the cold season.

While watching the video, you will learn about the treatment of hoarseness.