After surgery to fix injured vocal cords, singer Sam Smith is exercising his voice using a straw. The technique really helps protect vocal cords, according to U voice scientist Ingo R. Titze, executive director of the National Center for Voice and Speech. His research and his video demonstration of the vocal straw exercise have helped make it popular among professional singers.
Sam is using his in a rehabilitation capacity, but that’s only one of its uses. The reason the straw helps singers goes fairly deep into voice science, but in a terribly shallow nutshell:
a) It uses back pressure in the mouth to close your vocal cords properly, cleanly and efficiently
b) It helps your cords to vibrate without as much of the ‘bad’ impact associate with singin
c) It helps reduce the amount of breath pressure needed to create a sound, which also translates into efficiency
d) It helps singers to find and balance the muscle coordination needed for range and moving through ‘registers’
e) It helps to increase resonance in the voice, adding power to your sound without more muscular effort, and less strain all round.
For more info on the voice straw contact [email protected]
Or visit www.stuartclarke.co.nz for lessons on how to use it