What is a safe vocal practice?

• Learning to sing from the muscles in your body not the muscles in your throat. If the throat closes when you sing then the vocal folds rub together and can cause nodules (calluses) on the folds. The folds can also kink (distort) through the pressure exerted on them. If the singing resembles hard shouting, sounds husky, is overly nasal with a pressure on the throat, tires easily or feels red or tight after singing, these could be signs of strain.
• Learning how to train your breathing to support the voice. By understanding how effective breathing works, the voice develops more tone, consistency, agility and clarity. We want all our singers to develop a practice that will help throughout their lives, not just when singing. We teach how to recognise the ‘fight or flight’ reflex that can affect performance, auditions, interviews and coping with difficult situations on and off stage.
• Learning how to listen to yourself and develop the awareness of what is happening. By learning to monitor the physicality of singing and how you are with the workings of the instrument, a young singer develops an ability to trust their own response, get feedback and adjust accordingly. Learning to master an instrument that is essentially your own is an empowering tool throughout adolescence and beyond.

Professional singers have often been referred to Sandra Smith by speech therapy departments to correct inadequate technique that has caused them physical problems and loss of work. Sandra’s aim is to get them out singing again as soon as possible – but safely this time!

singing and breathing lessons and courses will help you:

• Check you are using your voice correctly and safely
• Check you are breathing properly to support your voice
• Improve your posture