More on vocal practicing

I would like to continue my last entry on vocalizing. In my experience, as I said, it is of utmost importance that professional singers continue to practice, even when they have heavy schedules. At the Hamburg State Opera, where I was engaged for 9 years, I noticed that the singers engaged there - either as ensemble members or guest artists - hardly practiced when they had free time. To my knowledge, a perfect example of discipline was James King. I sang the Dyer’s Wife in Frau ohne Schatten with James King as Emperor and was absolutely amazed at how young his voice sounded although he was nearing the end of his career. The voice still sounded brilliant and youthful.

James King and I would meet almost every afternoon in the hallway of the practice rooms. It was really very amusing. He would say, “Brenda, are you here again?” And I would answer, “Are you here again, too?” And we would laugh. Hard work and discipline seemed to be our bond - almost our secret.
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• Author and date: Brenda Roberts (2009-03-29)
• Permalink: More on vocal practicing
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Practice and Vocal Gymnastic

I have been asked so often by students how long they should practice a day. Let us be clear on this issue: vocalizing is vitally important to the health of the vocal mechanism and longevity of the voice.
Through vocalization, singing becomes automatic. Maria Callas said that she practiced 12 hours daily. That may be somewhat exaggerated. However, a singer who is doing an opera production can be rehearsing easily that amount of time per day for 4 to 6 weeks. Therefore, it is important the vocal production be effortless, not difficult and not tiring to the voice. It is of utmost importance that a professional singer continues to practice and adequately warms-up the voice before rehearsals and performances.

I believe that every student must find out for himself how much time he should invest in practice units so that a constant development of his voice and its vocal possibilities result. In any case, at least 2 hours a day - and that is probably too little! One should have a long warm-up phase, adequate work on vocalizations, including work on consonants, vowels and their clarity, range of the voice with the goal of expanding the range and balancing registers, optimal tone resonance, and diverse technical aspects such as mastering ornamentations (trillers, mordents, etc.), coloratura, etc. This requires time, concentration and discipline!
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• Author and date: Brenda Roberts (2009-03-08)
• Permalink: Practice and Vocal Gymnastic
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