Posts Tagged intermediate

Exploring Lower Range

Posted by earmstro in Voice, Warm-ups, intermediate on April 21st, 2009

For this step in the Intermediate Warm-up Series, we’ll be working our way down in your range, warming up the middle of your voice, down to the depths. As always, you should work with gentle ease in this exploration, not pushing or forcing your voice as your work your way down.

At the heart of this step is a gentle, sliding sigh.

[If you don't have much experience with voice work, you'll need to take an extra step here, and visit the Sighing Down page for instructions on how to breathe and sigh from your core, rather than from your chest. This is an essential bit of information, and if you don't have it, off you go now, and come back when you've done it. Off you go now!]

If you’ve just come back, or if you already knew how to sigh from your core, let’s get back to that sigh. The idea in this step of the warm-up is to sigh downward, starting from somewhere around the middle of your range. If you’d like to follow along with some pitches, so that you’re sure to work through your full range, follow along with this audio file. The idea is to slide/glissando your sigh between the two pitches, which are an octave apart. Start on the high pitch, and slide down through your range to the lower note.

Let’s start out with a hum, sliding down on /mmmmm/. Then we’ll open up the sound on “huh,” (IPA [hʌ]) and finally we’ll try it out on “hey,” (IPA [heɪ].)

As always, our goal isn’t lovely singing. The goal is to feel our way through the sounds, vibrating the sound as best we can. You want to feel the sound in your face, throat, and as we go lower, in your chest. As you slide downward, you should feel the sensation of the vibration moving downward, too. It’s great if you can think of this as an additive process, trying to maintain the sensation you have in your face as you add the vibrations in the lower part of your body.

If you’re new to this, you may need to go slower than the recording. You can follow the recording if you hit the pause button and give yourself time to slide down through the octave. The point is to make it smooth, not jumpy or uneven. For some people, sliding through the pitches is very hard, because they want to jump from the higher pitch to the lower pitch. Perhaps it might be helpful to think of this as a siren, rather than like singing notes. Remember to sigh, rather than sing. If you don’t hit the “note” at the bottom of the octave, it doesn’t matter. This isn’t a test!

One last thing: on a sustained sigh like this, it can be easy to become obsessed with the sound of your voice, rather than the feeling of it, or an idea of what you might be saying with the sigh. Give yourself an image, think a thought, release how you’re feeling through the sigh, so that you put part of yourself into the sound. In other words, say something.

  • This post is also available in a simpler,condensed form audio file, so you can practice the exercise without any explanation.

 

Next Step: Jaw Swinging

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Dabs of Sound

Posted by earmstro in Voice, Warm-ups, intermediate on April 21st, 2009

Now that you're aware of how your breath is working today, let's connect with the vibrations of your voice on the most basic level. The goal here is to connect with your impulse to make sound, to find the simplest voiced noise possible. Before we begin, a work of warning: if you overthink this, it will be very challenging to find this very simple sound. Trust that you know your voice—you've been using it your whole life! This is easy, and it's important that you remember that through the process of this exploration.

Stand, sit or lie in a comfortable position, with your body is alignment. Close your eyes, and feel your breath in your core, with its action moving your guts as breath comes in and goes out. You want to be sure to feel that simple, unmanipulated action before we go on. Relax your jaw, and feel the temperature of the air passing over your lips and tongue — it should feel cool coming in, and warm going out. Visualize the air as it passes into your core, and becomes warm inside. Feel the warm air leaving your body, as it warms the roof of your mouth. There is no need to sustain breath at this point. Let your breath be as basic as possible, allowing yourself to only breathe the breath your need, rather than exploring a sustained breath. It should be very short.

The Colour in your Core

Now, imagine a colour. Any colour, your favourite, or even one you hate. The important thing is that you should be able to see it clearly with your mind's eye. If you are having a hard time coming up with one, open your eyes for a moment and notice the most brightly coloured object in the room, and use that. Now, image that colour in your belly. Imagine that with every breath, you're dipping down into the colour that is in your gut, stirring the colour, as if it were paint. Let's imagine that that paint were sound, waiting to be shared with the world. It's important that you take a moment to value that paint, or that thought of paint. See the colour clearly, and with each breath dip down into it, stirr it up. If, in the process of this exercise, you find that your impulse causes the colour change, go with it. There is no right colour, and forcing your colour to remain the same through the exercise will only stifle your impulse, not foster its growth.

Now it's time to share your paint-thought with the world. There's no need at this point to spray the paint, to splash it, the spill it. That will come later. At this point, we merely want to reveal the colour we feel inside ourselves to the world through a very simple sound, the sound "huh" (that's [hʌ] in IPA.) Imagine that you are using sound as your paint brush to dab the colour in your gut on the canvas of the air. With each dab, explore the feeling of the colour. Where does it vibrate in you? How does the image of the colour in your gut travel up from inside, and out through your relaxed jaw, over your relaxed tongue, into the world? Let each little [hʌ] be an exploration of that colour, of you in the world, of your experience of breath, sound and vibration.

Colour Your World

It's time to open your eyes. Find the image of your colour, and then slowly, as you continue to dab the colour on your short [hʌ], blink your eyes back into the space you're in. As you share your colour with this landscape (as opposed to your inner one), imagine dabbing little blobs of colour on the objects and people around you. Remember to keep your jaw relaxed as you follow your impulse. How does this make you feel? What thoughts do you have? There is no right answer, other than to have thought, to respond to the situation (including its absurdity).

Take your time with this. At this point, it's important to allow this impulsive sound room to grow from a simple dab into a smear, a swipe, a stroke of paint-thought. Allow the sound room to extend now, in a sigh-like manner. Let the painting-voicing be in response not only to the colour in your gut, but also to the world you're painting. Don't be afraid to paint anything with your imagination. Paint people, furniture, stuff you can see out the window. Your imagination is the only limit. Let the sound be expressive of your inner life, your emotional word, your impulsive thoughts.

Next Step: Exploring Lower Range

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Roll-Down

Posted by earmstro in Voice, Warm-ups, intermediate on April 21st, 2009

This exercise is a great way to check in with your body and voice, and helps to mix things up, so that you’re exploring voice outside of the ‘box’ of your habits. The Roll-Down, or “spine roll” is one of those theatre exercises that most actors have done at some point in their lives — for some actors, they’ve probably done these more than they ever imagined possible! In this precursor to the Intermediate Warm-up Series, I’ll talk you through the process of rolling down through your spine, and then we’ll add a little voice to the process.

Start at the Top

Before we begin, check in that you are standing tall, with your feet hip width apart, shoulders wide in front and back and with your pelvis balanced in line with your ankles. Make sure that your knees are not locked! Take a moment to let your arms feel heavy, so that when you roll through your spine, your arms will hang off your torso like spaghetti. Finally, make sure that your jaw is dropped and that you’re breathing through your mouth.

Now, begin with your head, and let your skull tip forward on the very top vertebra. Slowly, very slowly, allow the vertebra of your neck to begin to curl forward, as your chin drops toward your chest. Keep your shoulders wide at this point, because we want to be sure that your NECK starts the roll-down before we begin to move into the vertebra of the upper back, where the shoulders are.

Once your head has dropped as far as it can toward your chest, take a moment for a breath, and see whether the exhalation will allow your head to drop just a wee bit further toward your chest.

Now slowly roll the rest of the way down your spine, trying as best you can to go vertebra by vertebra. When you find that your hamstrings are stressed out, you can release in your knees (a little), before your finish the roll-down. At a certain point, your spine will be curled forward, and you’ll begin to roll through your pelvis, essentially tilting your pelvis on your hip joints, until you are hanging upside-down.

When you’re upside-down, just enjoy letting your head hang off your neck, and your arms hang off your torso. Gently sway from side-to-side, then bounce gently through your knees, letting your spine bounce. Make sure there is no tension in your neck here. Try lifting your head gently by following your eyes along an imaginary phone that extends in front of you, up the wall, and then let your head drop away completely.

Going Up!

As you roll back up, start by rolling your pelvis, as if you were tucking your tail between your legs. As that’s happening, begin to lengthen your legs, so you straighten your knees. Then vertebra by vertebra, stack your spine back up. When you get to your shoulders, let them roll around to your back before your roll back up through your neck. As you slowly roll back up through your neck, take great care to only roll up to the point where your head rests on top of your neck spine — many people roll too far back up and end up with their neck collapsed to the back.

You can view a video of me demonstrating a spinal roll here:

Now try it again, only faster!

Explore this next roll-down by focusing on breath — 3 breaths down, 3 breaths back up. Start this roll-down by dropping your head toward your chest in one smooth, fluid motion. Then continue the roll-down rolling through your vertebra, releasing in your knees, until you hang upside-down, and then roll back up.

If you can do it in 3 breaths, try it in 2 and then later in 1. (That’s 1 down, and 1 back up.) When that’s easy, try it down and up in a single breath. Once you can do that with ease, try adding sound to this process…

Hummuh on the Roll

Similar to the Getting on Voice post, start the “hummmmmuh” sound (”hum”) and then drop your chin to your chest. Sustaining the hum, roll all the way down, and when you’re at the bottom, open your mouth and let the sound out. When you need more breath, relax your jaw open, let breath “fill up” to your pelvis, and then start the process again to roll back up: “hum” first, then once you’re on the /m/ sound, roll up until you begin to roll your head back onto the top of your neck spine, and then drop your jaw open, opening the sound up onto “uh.

Once that becomes second-nature, trying rolling down and up on a single “hummmuh.” Work your way through your range, as we do in Getting on Voice, going up semitone by semitone.

  • This post is also available in a condensed form, so once you understand the idea of rolling down and up through your spine, you can add it to your warm-up playlist.

 

NEXT STEP: Sustaining Breath

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Sustaining Breath

Posted by earmstro in Voice, Warm-ups, intermediate on April 21st, 2009

Be sure to begin with some physical warming up, whether it be some yoga stretches, a light jog around the room, some pliés, what have you, to get your body going. You should also start with some Roll-downs, if you haven't already.

We'll include a few roll-downs in this step of the warm-up, so be sure to learn how to do a roll-down before we start.

Begin by Noticing

Stand in alignment, with your feet, ankles and knees balanced one above the other, your knees unlocked, your shoulders wide across the back and front, your neck lengthening up, your jaw relaxed so you can easily breathe through your mouth. You can work with eyes open or closed on this one; closed eyes often allow people to check in with their inner life, while open eyes forces you to deal with your inner life and the real world at the same time (which is what you have to do an actor most of the time anyway…).

Notice your breath, what it wants to do. Don't do anything about it, just let it be. Feel how breath enters your mouth, floats over your tongue, turns the corner, and heads down into your body. Do all you can to avoid planning your breath. Let your breath take you, so that you follow your body's impulse to breathe, rather than making it do something else. You may notice that when you notice your breath, it is changed somewhat. There mere suggestion of thinking about your breath may cause it do change in response to that thought. If at all possible, explore the idea of not choosing to breathe, but allow breath to be entirely impulsive. In this way, conscious breathing becomes a process of getting out of the way of breath, rather than planning, or choosing to breathe. Give over to the breath impulse, and see where it takes you.

Resistance Isn't FFFutile

Once you're into this impulsive breath mode, on the next exhalation, bring your lower lip up to meet your upper teeth, so you end up making an /f/ sound. As you inhale, release the contact between lip and teeth to let the air in, and then on the outward flow of breath, reconnect to the /f/ posture of lip and teeth. The /f/ friction will give some resistance to the outward going breath, so that your breath will naturally begin to last a bit longer. As you do this, it's important not to force your breath into a rhythm. Continue to follow your impulse for breath. Expect there to be a short pause between the exhalation /f/ and the next breath-impulse .

As you become comfortable with the easy /f/ breath, begin to lengthen the /f/ sound with each breath. Let the change in length from one /f/ to the next be very slight. You want a very gradual shift, slowly letting the exhalation sustain further and further. By lengthening the /f/, your need for breath will become stronger over time, so that you will find your body craving more air on the inhalation (so you'll fill up more), and emptying yourself out as your exhale. As the /fffff/ gets longer and longer, the pause between exhalation and inhalation may begin to shorten as well. Don't make that happen, but if you notice it happening, that's ok. What's important here is to increase your need for air, while continuing to follow your impulse for breath.

Say Something

Acting is about communication. Anytime you make a sound in an exercise, whether it be a simple sigh, or a puff of air on /f/, or a articulation drill, be sure to communicate something to your someone. If you're alone, imagine someone. Or you could talk to the furniture. The one thing you mustn't do is talk to a mirror. This only helps to make your self-conscious, and aware of your outside appearance, and we care about your inner life. So be sure to connect with your thoughs, feelings and impulses as you make these sustained /fffff/ sounds.

At this point you might try "fuffing" your breath on several pulses per breath, as if you were speaking, with one pulse of air for every syllable. This is similar to what we did with the Taking-it-to-Text step of the Basic Warm-up Series, except that you're improvising what you're saying, not speaking a text.

Fuff'n'Roll

The last step of the process is to bring your body into the mix by doing a roll-down as you fuff. Start by taking 3 or 4 fuffing breaths to roll down, and then another 3 or 4 to come up. Gradually speed up the roll-down process until you're rolling down on one /f/, letting breath fill into your belly, and rolling back up on a second /f/. You can even try rolling down and up quickly on /f/. Here, let breath fill down into your belly and then drop your head and begin to /f/ simultaneously as your roll quickly through your spine, coming back up as you run out of air.

Next Step: Dabs of Sound

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