VOCLAS

I have a few question about voclas and how to improve it and train it.

First of all, how much can a voice be improved from the orginal, than how to train it up and where to find the info about training and how long does it take to get a decent voice.

I ain´t got no plans to become a singer but I want to improve my voice so that I can be a background singer in my band. Also I feel like I have the feel but just can´t express it right so I guess with some practice I might would be a good b-ground singer.

You will improve as long as you practice. I found recording my self singing very helpful though not to say painful at first. This can show you what works and what doesn’t. I am constantly surprised as a lot of the stuff I thought would sound great really sounds week and visa versa. Also, the more you do it the better at it you become. Do you sing along whilst playing the guitar ? That is a good starting point.

Every thing "Dr_simon" said .

Also try singing scales along with your guitars, then sing a long with melody lines , just remember not to SHRED ! :p

Singing has always come naturally to me, I had an OK voice to begin with and basically i learned to sing by imatating others like Brian Wilson, Jeff Buckley and more recently Coldplay - hitting high notes and controlling your voice there is what matters. I still havent nailed it yet, and I hae a sore throat now so I cant really practice, but I dont think Im far off.

your voice has to be treated like every other instrument. with respect, and care. i´m sure that if every vocalist would practice as much and as hard as all the other instrumentalists, there would be HEAPS of real great voices out there. Almost everyone can develop a good voice. its alot about the right breathing technique, articulation, etc. having at least a bit of professional advice for the start woud be good, for the voice is a very fragile instument. if you train it wrong or learn it wrong, you might not have your voice long enuff to get famous with it.

Before you sing, dont drink a lot of sugary stuff like pop or juice or even beer. Milk is even bad because of the mucus. What all this stuff does is coat your throat and mess up your singing ability. This is bad enough if your trying to practise singing, but even worse on a gig.
One cool thing my band's vocalist does is have a glass of hot water and honey with some lemon or lime juice in it (straight from the fruit, no sugar added). These are all great for your voice, I even had a glass just for fun and it really made a difference just in the way I spoke (I dont sing, I just wanted to try a glass).
Anyway, we do a lot of AC/DC kind of stuff, so she drinks this stuff whenever her voice gets strained, and poof, its all good.

Ive heard tea and honey is good - may not be true though

A good way to practice controlling your breatheing is whistling, its musical too

As long as there is no sugar in the tea.

Robert Plant (Led Zeppelin) helped my friend, he would sit and listen to him and then try and copy his sounds without saying the words, and now he is one of the best singers in the school!

i guess the worst thing you can do is trying to sing like some one else. apart form the fact that this certain someone might be singing in registers that are simply too high or too deep for your voice, and therefore ruining it, it will ake you just a thin copy.

You see - what made those dudes famous was that they used their own voice, and not mimicing someone else. this is extremely important when singing, for everyone´s voice sounds pretty different. its not like on a guitar, or a piano where they all sound more or less the same.
Its as if you would try to play contrabass with a violin or vice versa. just be yourself.

There is alot of good advice here, especially the lemon and warm water thing. That is a good way to clear out the throat so you get the full effect of the voice. But if your voice tends to get weaker, you should stop. The voice is very fragile and you don't want to wear it out. Here's some clues if your voice has had enough.

1. You voice becomes raspy sounding. This is mostly for those who scream alot, if your throat becomes raspy then your putting to much pressure on the vocal chords when you scream. Very Bad cause you're thinning out the vocal chords, and that's how you damage your voice. Eventually you will lose it.

2. You throat or chest begins to feel winded and you can barely talk. The muscles required to produce the voice are tired. Give them a break, if you are recording on a schedule usually 15-20 minutes is enough time to give it a break.

My Theory teacher was also the choral teacher as well, and he gave me some pointers. Here are some of the things he said.

When you sing, sing from your diaphram not your throat. To do this all you do is tighten your chest when you sing. This will keep you in pitch, rather than swinging around a note. And also it will take alot of pressure off the vocal chords. If you notice how you hear certain singers doing a vibrato effect when they sing a pitch, this is from them learning to control the diaphram. Try this... put your hand right below the strenum (the flat plate of bone that protects the heart.) Sing any pitch and vibrate your hand on your chest. There's the vibrato effect. It takes time to master it, you should consult a vocal trainer. I'm not all that sure about how to accomplish that, to me it comes naturally. I dont know.

Another Misconception about singing, is the harder you sing the better and more powerful your voice will sound. Truth is the harder you sing, the more damage your doing and the weaker your going to sound. The voice is very fragile, so it must be treated delicately. The point is to control the voice to produce a solid pitch and not a bunch of overtones and cracking. ESPECIALLY WHEN RECORDING! LIVE you get into the music too much to worry about it, but still you should learn to control it. When a good singer sings, he/she is using the same amount of vocal as if he/she was just talking but there singing a pitch. Even in the low registers and high registers. If you are feeling your vocal chords vibrate when singing low, or when you sing higher notes you feel like you have to push. You are escaping your vocal range, and your causing damage.

To increase Vocal articulation, learn to sing in key. Just like when you learn to play guitar, you have to learn the scales. Difference is that you have to tune your voice to hit each pitch correctly. Nothing sounds worse than someone who can't sing in key or worse correct pitch. So to do this, you need something to sing along with. Whatever instrument you play, play the lowest note on that instrument that you can sing comfortable. Sing along with the note your playing on the instrument, and try to sing it as accurately as possible. Don't be a fanatic, no instrument is perfectly in tune so your voice isnt going to be either. Just sing in tune with it, but make sure your not singing a note flat or a note sharp. Your accuracy will improve over time. Once you find the lowest note in Your Range, play the major scale of that key, and sing each note up and down the scale. This will be the basis for learning how to sing, practice this regularly and in no time your singing will improve. Another thing, just use the major key for now, I wouldn't start with some weird scale with a bunch of accidentals cause your building a foundation with the Major scale. Minor scale is ok too.

Once you become comfortabe with that scale, which usually doesn't take long. Start using the keys that you use most in your songs. Keep them in the Major/Minor scales, I know songs have accidentals in them. And the song may not actually be in a Major or Minor key, but once you have that foundation. The accidentals will come naturally, just by you knowing the actual key the song is in and knowing it's sound. Most Important!! Just use your natural voice, it's the one that will give you the best sound!

Damn man, you really know a lot. I´ll try that thing with scales and sing and not overdoing it, when I feel comfortable with one tone, I´ll move to another. Now it might be hard to train by myself but if you want you can mail some tips to me along the way.

It´s fun to sing and especially if you can sing pretty good. I like guitar a lot but singin´ is always an amazing bonus. I always liked singers who have somthing special in theyr voice and most of these singers can be found in 70-80´s popular bands like Plant, Osbourne, Lee Rooth, A. Cooper, S. Tyler, Dickinson, A. Rose and Freddy Mercury (probably the greatest) and I always found power metal singers pretty boring. I mean there´s nothing special with theyr voice except that they can sing damn high but it gets kind of boring after a while.

Funny thing is that I and my friend did a record for our musical teacher where we record some Guns, Maiden, Metallica and Kiss stuff and I sang on most songs and my teacher was especially satisfied by the orginality in my voice and that I didn´t try to copy Axl our Bruce but just did it my way (like Sid V.) Not that I have a good voice at all, it sucks actually but there´s might be some hope with some practice.

i tried singing once. my dog barked at me.