Advanced Singing Lessons - What Causes Vocal Fatigue and Strain?

http://www.aussievocalcoach.com ----- Free Beginner and Advanced Vocal Routines Hi my name is Ian Castle and welcome to episode 5 of my video series Ask Aussie where I answer questions sent in by my subscribers. This question comes from Physixger "How quickly do/should people's voices show signs of fatigue (in terms of slight vocal fold swelling) on average when practicing or in choir rehearsals? How did the time you could practice change over the development of your voice?" Before I answer your questions I think it would be beneficial to talk about what causes vocal fatigue. Firstly volume and how it affects the vocal folds. If you are singing too loud for an extended period your voice will show signs of fatigue quite quickly. This is common in choir rehearsals as you may be struggling to hear your voice above the collective sound and as a result you will sing louder putting excessive pressure on the vocal folds. Everyone is different but 30 minutes of this type of singing will likely result in some swelling due to the folds slapping together with prolonged force. The other type of fatigue is muscular. Like any muscles in the body the internal muscles of the larynx that control the lengthening of the vocal folds can tire. When this occurs the body compensates by recruiting larger muscles that are external to the larynx, the muscles we can see tensing up. This results in a rigid position of the throat which is quickly followed by a decrease in range and vocal quality. Muscle tension is usually the result of singing too high for long periods of time. 30 minutes would certainly show signs of fatigue. When your vocal development advances to the point where you have an efficient combination of breath pressure and internal muscle strength you should be able to sing for an hour or more without fatigue. This will depend on the type of singing you are doing. An hour of singing high belty notes will be tiring for anyone. It's not like going to the gym where the mentality is to work so hard that everything hurts, a walk in crawl out approach. I believe practicing singing at any level should be done in an intermittent way. Regular breaks of a couple of minutes will help to relieve any slight tension that might creep in. Use these breaks to perform stretching exercises, take a sip of water or a hit of vocal spray. I hope that helps you Physixger. If anyone else would like me to record a video on a specific topic make sure you are subscribed to this channel as I will post a message asking for your ideas weekly. If you got some value out of this lesson please hit the like button and leave me a comment. Bye for now.