The basics of singing

This blog will help to outline some basic tips to singing, so you can be as comfortable and happy as possible when giving it a go!

Singing is beautiful. It is an art form that anyone can give a go, without any prior experience, huge expendable income or time to spare. However, it’s not always easy to know where to start!

This blog will help to outline some basic tips to singing, so you can be as comfortable and happy as possible when giving it a go!

1. Breathing

Breathing is the beginning of singing. It’s the first step I learnt when I started singing lessons because it is the bread and butter of singing. Once you have the breath control sorted, the rest is a lot easier.

It is important to breathe using your diaphragm – so stick your tummy out! This allows you to take in more air and hold your breath for longer.

Breathing in the middle of arrangements means you have little time to breathe in, but far longer to breathe out. Take Canned Heat for example – That’s a fast arrangement! Some exercises to help control this are to:

• Breathe in for 4 seconds, hold for 4 seconds, breathe out slowly for 8 seconds.
• Breathe in for 4 seconds, hold for 4 seconds and slowly release your breath for as long as you can.
• Breathe in for 4 seconds, hold for 4 seconds, release your breath in small strong bits – by making a tts sound.

Give these a go: It should help with holding those longer notes and mean your voice is more powerful and less strained!

2. Warm up

Your diaphragm and lungs, just like your calves, are muscles. You wouldn’t go for a sprint without warming up your body beforehand. Singing is the same. By doing some basic vocal exercises to warm up the higher and lower parts of your voice, and some physical warm ups to move the other muscles used when singing, it can help to reduce the risk of damage to your voice when belting out an impressive note.

Here are some easy warm ups to do on your own!

• Tongue twisters – Think Peter Piper, the lips the teeth, cup of coffee, any of the famous tongue twisters that get your tongue working are great to get your lips used to singing! A famous tong twister is: Red lorry, yellow lorry – for a bonus challenge: try “red leather yellow leather” instead!
• The first line of “Over the rainbow” from the Wizard of Oz can cover a fair few notes!
• Singing simple songs like “Flowers and daffodils” (see below). You can even try singing it in a round with your friends!

3. Know how high or low your voice is

This can be difficult to know at the beginning, but after trying different parts, you should hopefully get an idea of what is comfortable for you to sing and what is more of a challenge. It’s important not to strain your voice, so if you feel like singing a particular note is difficult, leave it out!

You can read our blog on knowing which vocal part to sing here, however the basics are:

• Baritone: For you low singers, channelling your Rag ‘n’ Bone Man.
• Alto: The singers in the middle, like Lorde or Billie Eilish.
• Soprano: The high singers, like Adele or Ariana Grande!

Give each of them a go and see what you’re comfortable with.

4. Have fun!

Singing, like exercise, gives you endorphins, the happy hormone! The best way to have a good experience from singing is to just enjoy yourself and try not to be concerned about your abilities. Superchoir is a non-audition choir to provide joy to members of our online community, it’s not about whether you’re a good singer or not! Just relax as much as you can and sing your hearts out.

If you’d like to experience the fun of Superchoir, we have some taster sessions coming up in September! These are both for in person members and online members. Click here to sign up for one of the slots and to get involved: We’d love to see you there!