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Voice not improving


jimmyjames93

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I'm male, 20. I've been teaching myself how to sing for 2.5 years now and my voice has hardly improved. Getting a teacher is out of the question. I've made sure to use correct breathing and have read a lot about technique and excercises.

What am I doing wrong?

I talk in a soft voice could this be holding me back?

I practice about 4 hours a week, often I'm driving and cant be standing. Is this an issue?

My range is only about an octave and a bit and hasn't improved and when i try to reach higher notes my voice gets very strained.

Any ideas or pointers are appreciated :)

Thanks

Jim

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Bro.

 

In my opinion, the internet is quite an unhelpful teacher, because singing technique is internal muscle memory - you can't really show somebody how to do this or that. There are workarounds (example would be 'yawn and sing at the same time to achieve an open throat'), but they don't cover everything.

 

Is the reason for no lessons money or location? If it's location, you can get lessons over skype. If money, well, is there no friend or relative you have that could show you some stuff?

Have you looked through instruction videos on youtube?

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Thanks for the response.

Its a money problem at the moment. and yes ive watched lots of videos and listened to lots of cds from online because i know how important it is to use correct technique but maybe I just dont have the voice for it or something. Ive played 4 instruments over the last 15 years so I am musical but my voice just doesnt want to improve. I thought i would get the muscle memory if i kept practicing but im starting to give up a bit.

thanks again

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  • 2 weeks later...
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In my opinion, the internet is quite an unhelpful teacher, because singing technique is internal muscle memory - you can't really show somebody how to do this or that. There are workarounds (example would be 'yawn and sing at the same time to achieve an open throat'), but they don't cover everything.

 

this is spot on advice. the human voice is unique in one sense: it is the only musical instrument that's inside the body.

I play guitar and drums, and if i play a wrong note on the guitar, i can see which note i played wrong, and how far it is from the note i was supposed to play. If you sang a wrong note, you'll need the help of a guitar of piano to find that out. And you have to go by feel.

On a guitar, you simply move your fingers down or up the frets, a half step, whole step, whatever. With the voice, you try to sing  a higher note, but you don't really know what's happening. How much do the vocal chords close? how much vibration? you just have to feel the notes.

if you're on a tight budget, i highly recommend this webpage to get you started:

Learn to Sing

i am not selling anything there, everything is free info. Go to the free video where there's a guy teaching you how to smoothen out your registers using weird sounds. Get that down and i see no reason why you can't improve your singing. feel free to ask me anything. we need more singers around. good luck!

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You mentioned you're often driving when you practice.  Honestly, this sounds like it could be part of the problem.  Your posture's going to be compromised quite a bit, and it's hard to give the voice your full attention.  I would try to schedule a time that you can warm up your voice everyday.  That'd be your best bet.

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  • 4 weeks later...
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Obvously, what you are doing is not working, so it is time to try something else.

 

You need to train standing up. Sitting in a car is not an ideal position to be in because your daiphragm is not in the correct position due to the way the set is. Now, if you were sitting upright like on a drum throne or at a piano, that would be a different story.

 

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Have you worked on keeping a neutral larynx?

 

Swallow and feel your adam's apple climb all the way up in your throat, it tends to climb as you sing higher notes and if it's in that same position than those notes are going to be strained. Practice singing scales with different vowels while trying to keep your adams apple as steady as possible. Its going to shift a little but you don't want it to climb all the way up in your throat.

 

Also you can work in a bit of twang to ditch that choir voice you get as you sing high notes.

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The best thing would be to hire a vocal coach for you but it seems that you cannot afford this option but you can always choose to get lots of useful information from the internet. Regular practice would surely improve your voice, just keep on practicing and working hard and eventually it will pay off for you.

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  • 3 months later...
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I would seriously recommend you contact a voice coach. There are some excellent coaches out there who really know what they are talking about and will save you a lot of time and effort by answering your questions and putting you on the right track. Your specific issues and goals are going to be different so tailored feedback is essential. A good coach will be quite expensive but it's definitely worth the money even if it's just once for an hour. This journey will be very frustrating for you if you don't have any personal guidance, let alone the right guidance.

Good luck!

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