Shouting for high notes might be holding you back from your full singing potential. In fact, many of the problems that we see everyday in lessons at Singing Success stem from singers using too much force to produce higher notes.
Singers often remark that without shouting they wouldn’t be able to sing the notes that are required of them. But that’s only true because they don’t know another way. In the long term, yelling for pitches will result in unwanted voice breaks, a lower range, and potentially vocal damage. There is a better way!
Here are the 3 Steps to Stop Shouting for High Notes
1. Don’t Spread Your Vowels
Shouting actually has less to do with volume than it does resonance placement. When a singer yells, their mouth spreads. This means they are using their mouth as the main resonator.
Try watching yourself in the mirror and check whether you’re widening your mouth. If so, try doing the opposite. Narrow your lips on high notes and you should notice that your voice doesn’t project sound as forcefully out of the mouth. It’s almost as if the sound stays more contained in the mouth (technically the pharynx).
Add 1-2 Octaves to Your Voice
Safely Hit High Notes With Ease
What if, instead of worrying and tensing up every time you have to sing a “high” note in a song… you could sing them with ease? What if instead of being controlled by the notes on a scale, you control them?
Many singers think that they are bound by the limited range of their voice. But here’s a secret…If you can make the sound, you can sing it!
Here’s What you’ll get With Range Builder
- Effective exercises to get you the range you want
- A comprehensive training plan that will help you add 1-2 octaves
- A comprehensive approach to safely “stretch the bottom and top of your voice
- Explanations and glossary of commonly used singing terms
2. Develop High Range Independence
Singers who habitually shout for high notes typically can’t start directly on high notes, especially softly. They have to ramp up to the pitch by scooping from the lower part of their range.
The muscles inside your larynx, aka the voice box, should reconfigure themselves for higher notes, but they often can’t because singers use too much force to get to those notes. In other words, shouting prevents the proper development of the muscles needed for high notes.
Start developing your higher range properly by attacking high notes directly with a soft head voice. The more you do this, the easier you’ll find that it becomes to attack high notes directly with more power.
3. Use Low Notes (Chest Voice) Properly
As described in the previous point, your voice is supposed to reconfigure itself when going from one part of your range to another. If you don’t sing your low notes properly, then the change needed for high notes wont occur. Instead, your voice will try to push chest voice higher and higher.
The proper way to sing melodies that go from low to high notes is to make your chest voice thinner as you ascend, that way the right muscles can take over for the high notes.
In other words, don’t let your voice get too heavy and loud when singing lower notes. You’ll be surprised how much easier your voice can ascend when you remove the extra effort on your low notes.
But what about vocal power?
Two of the three points in this article are about lightening up your voice so that it can go higher with more ease. This is will make singing powerful high notes significantly easier.
Here’s the simple strategy to implement: sing some vocal ease exercises before doing vocal power exercises in a warm up. That strategy is simple but profound in its effects!
When done properly, high notes don’t require a forceful attack to sound strong. As Brett Manning has repeatedly said, “singing high notes is more about coordination than strength.”
Benny Meza is a Master Associate at Brett Manning Studios in Nashville, TN. He’s taught over 7,000 vocal lessons and has worked with clients from Warner Music, RCA, Universal Music Group, and many others.
Book a Skype or In-Person lesson with Benny today!