Professional singers do vocal exercises very often, especially before an important recital. Great trumpet players rely on breathing properly, and—as yoga practitioners do—are usually aware of the way they breathe. If you speak with a radio DJ or a TV host you will notice that they speak loud at all times, not only in front of a camera or a microphone.
Do you follow some of the habits that these professions have? If you speak in public regularly, your answer should be “Yes.”
I confess that until not long ago, I felt this was not for me. That was before knowing about Roger Love.
I first learned about Roger Love late 2013. I tried his free online videos. I found them so useful and eye-opening that I decided to buy his method “Vocal Power.” Once I finished I gained lot of knowledge, and from that time to today, I’m putting in practice a lot of his advice. Motivational Speaker and Author Tony Robbins describes Roger Love as “an amazing vocal master.”
I would like to summarize what I learned from Roger Love about vocal power in four points that will be very beneficial for improving your speaking voice:
- Breathe properly
Every word we say starts with a breath. You as a speaker aren’t using all your power unless you do abdominal breathing. How is this done? Imagine you have a balloon on your belly. Fill it up with air. Breathe and exhale, over and over. Breathe into your nose while your mouth is closed. A common mistake is to unconsciously breathe through the mouth, which quickly dries our throats. Enrico Caruso, the best singer of all times, had such a strong breath that he often challenged someone to put their fist against Caruso’s belly. When Caruso breathed, he always moved the other person’s fist backwards.
- Speak louder
Very often, people let their voice drop from a nice sound (like a tuned instrument) to a weak, nasal or harsh sound. It usually occurs when we are a bit out of our comfort zone, and it’s unconscious. Also, after years of the phenomenon of communicating by sending texts, people are speaking with lack of volume. As a speaker, the best thing you can do is to force yourself to speak louder at all times. Can you imagine Tony Robbins speaking weak or nasally? Probably you can’t.
- Add more melody
Melody allows you to be perceived more vital, energetic and helps you to transfer emotions more easily. Additionally, if you always speak with a same monotonous pattern, your audience’s minds will think that they know what you’re going to say next, and will stop paying attention. Adding melody is the #1 way to move people emotionally. The key to speak with more melody is: whenever you speak, don’t produce more than 3 words in the same note before going to another note. It sounds easy, but it takes practice. Record yourself, practice over and over, and force yourself to go up and down on the scale. Radio DJs are great examples of voices with melody.
- Do vocal exercises
Your voice becomes an instrument, beautiful and tuned, but only if your work on it. Make some vocal exercises part of your daily routine. Roger Love said that vocal exercises are the analogy of a runner who stretches before running a race. A professional Olympic athlete would never run a race before stretching. You cannot warm up your voice just by speaking. That’s why you need to do vocal exercises every day, for at least 5 to 10 minutes.
Breathing properly, speaking louder, adding more melody and doing vocal exercises. Only after listening to Roger Love’s advice I was convinced of this, and it became part of my routine.
If you speak in public, ignore this at your own peril. Instead, I’d love for you to join me on this road to vocal mastery. To get started now, go here.
-Oscar
Related: How to Perfect Your Speaking Voice
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