Vocal warm ups for podcasters, audiobooks and video content creators

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Today we're gonna go through how to warm up your vocals.

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For recording, so this is for actually podcasters more than anyone else, or

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people that are doing voiceovers for audio books and things like that.

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This is not vocal warmups for singers, although we could

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do that at a different time.

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This is mostly just for people who really don't warm up properly before

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they start talking, and it impacts the way they actually sound when they

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do start recording their podcasts.

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And videos and audio books and all those things.

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I've had a lot of people that comment on YouTube videos and when I have

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consults with people as well where they're like, Ugh, I really struggle to

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listen to myself and when I'm editing, if I edit myself, I've got all these

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like weird little sounds and I've.

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Clearing my throat all the time and I've got this, all these like gross

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sounds, there are a lot of things that you can do to actually fix

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that before you start recording.

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Meaning that in post-production you don't have to do so much and you

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will actually sound a lot better.

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So we're gonna go through a few things that you can do to help yourself

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improve in this area and give a much better delivery of the content.

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That you're trying to produce.

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So first of all, when you start to record or just before you start

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to record, I want you to breathe.

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And the reason why I want you to breathe is because a lot of the time, once you hit

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that record button, you're like so amped up and excited, or you're nervous and

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then you're talking too quickly because you wanna get all these words out and

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you're just, you're just not breathing.

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Like now you can hear, I'm talking fast as an example for you.

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If you take the time before you start and you do some deep breathing,

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you're going to have a much more pleasurable experience in that

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first few, um, moments of recording.

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So I want you to put your feet on the floor.

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You can stand up if you'd like, but if you wanna sit down, that's fine.

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I like to sit at the front of my chair so that my back is straight.

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And this is something that I learned from the days when I was in choirs and I would

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always be sitting at the front of chairs.

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I feel like I can never sit at the back of a chair now because I

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was in choirs for so many years.

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So sit at the front of the chair so that your feet touch the floor.

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Once your feet are in the right position there and your back is straight, I want

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you to breathe in through your nose.

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A big deep breath in through your nose

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and then out,

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okay?

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I want you to do three of those.

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So big deep breath in through your nose.

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Now, what I want you to do as well is focus on what your shoulders are doing.

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If your shoulders are rising, it means that you're not breathing deeply,

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you're actually breathing shallow.

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So I want you to keep your shoulders down, breathe from your belly

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in through your nose, and the focus is using your diaphragm.

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So you breathe in through the nose.

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You're keeping these shoulders down, and your belly should

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actually be the thing that expands.

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Okay, and then hold that and then read out.

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So three times belly breathing, feet on the floor, close your eyes.

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Once you've done three of those belly breaths, you're going to

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feel more relaxed, straight up.

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And that's the first thing that you need to do.

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Find a way to stay calm and relax just before you hit record.

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'cause that's when most of the energy, the excitement, the nervousness really is.

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Okay?

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So once you've done that, now the next thing I want you to do is kind of silly.

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All right.

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It is silly.

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You are gonna feel like a big dumb idiot, and that's okay.

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You need to, okay.

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This is about warming up your actual vocal chords.

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So if you don't do this and you go from typing away and and preparing

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your script and whatever, and then you go to record like your video or your

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audio and you don't do any of these warmups, then you're going to have more

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instances of this, these sounds and this needing to clear your throat and then.

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All this extra saliva and things that I was talking about at the beginning.

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If you warm up your vocal cords first, you will have a much cleaner,

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crisper sound to your voice.

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Okay?

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I want you to do this exercise, so you're making your lips do this thing.

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This is a breathing exercise as well as a vocal exercise in one.

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You breathe in through your nose, then you blow out as slowly as you can.

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Through this thing while also doing a scale, a like siren as they say,

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you breathe it through your nose.

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This is an example, breathing through your nose, okay?

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And then

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do that.

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Okay, so a couple of times and.

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Each time some, maybe the first time you do it, you'll be a bit like,

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and then you'll conk out.

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Like you won't be able to keep going.

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The lips won't keep moving.

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That's just breath control.

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You haven't been able to control the breath enough to keep the

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movement going through the lips.

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Uh.

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As well as doing the siren, so you'll get better at it.

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And in fact, when I was doing, uh, vocal teaching for people, this would

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be one of the skills that I would help them develop and I'd actually

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time them to see how long they could go without having to take a breath.

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So.

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I could just keep going, right?

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So I want you to do that a few times and you'll feel silly.

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You'll feel like an idiot, and you'll feel like just a big, dumb, stupid head.

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And that's okay.

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I really want you to do it because it warms you up here.

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The second thing I want you to do is a projection activity.

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And this also, uh, is a bit of breath control and things in it too.

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But I want you, and I'll have to sit back a bit so that I don't overwhelm

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the microphone here, but I want you to actually go, ha ha ha ha hot ha

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quite loud, so that you can get a sense of what your voice can actually do.

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Uh, so I'll give you an example.

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Ha.

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Ha.

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Ha ha ha.

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Okay, so that was probably still really loud because I have done.

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Vocal projection exercises for a long time, and I did musical theater, and

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you learn how to project your voice.

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Uh, that is the next one.

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So firstly, that thing then secondly, ha ha ha ha ha ha, do that a bunch of times.

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And then I want you to get rid of the boom, but now do a siren without the boom.

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So now you're going, ah,

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like you just.

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You're such an idiot at this point.

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You feel like such a silly person.

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I look ridiculous.

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I'm fine with that.

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Okay.

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It's fine.

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Don't worry.

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You will be doing it in the privacy of your own situation.

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You won't be showing other people like I am right now.

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These are the things that I do for you.

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Okay, so we do.

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Ah,

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these sort of going all the way through your vocal range so that this feels warm.

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And I don't want you to like, you don't have to go really loud on that

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siren, but it's more about, ah, it's just relaxing your actual vocal chords.

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Once you do those exercises, then you'll start to feel a lot more warmed up.

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The next thing I want you to do is actually a tongue.

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Twister, the tongue twister prepares your voice and your mouth for actually moving.

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So the tongue twister that we're gonna use today is just red leather, yellow

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leather, red leather, yellow leather.

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What we're doing here is trying to help you with your pronunciation

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and getting all those syllables out.

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Okay.

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Red leather, yellow leather.

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And what you're trying to do with that is actually get faster, but

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still be able to tell that you're saying red leather, yellow leather.

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So red leather, yellow leather, red leather, yellow

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leather, red leather, you know?

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And that's, it's hard to do.

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Red leather, yellow leather, red leather, yellow leather,

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red leather, yellow leather.

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Keep going as fast as you can and do that a little bit and move

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your mouth around just a lot.

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Red leather, yellow leather.

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The more you do that, then you've relaxed your actual facial muscles as well, so

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that when you go to speak and do the audio recording or whatever it is, the

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video recording, your voice is prepped.

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That's the first thing.

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Your voice needs to be prepped before you record anything, so

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you need to be relaxed and chill.

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Do your breathing, and maybe after these vocal exercises, you're a bit hyped up,

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maybe you need to do your breaths again.

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And then once you've done those things, then you are ready to actually record.

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The other little things that I would say is, and I know you've probably

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heard this from other people as well, is don't have milk or cheese before

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you start recording or chocolate because it gunks the throat up.

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So avoid things that can feel like it makes your throat.

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Gunky.

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If you have a cold, I would recommend holding off until you don't have one.

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If you have a sinus situation, then I would again, would advise against

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recording, uh, until that is cleared up.

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But if you have to, even these vocal exercises will help that

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not be so much of a trouble because it's relaxing everything.

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The next thing to do, especially in those, you know, those little.

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Those kind of sounds.

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It's okay if you have them.

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You, you may potentially have them when you start recording.

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Just pause when you have one.

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Okay?

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So don't try and rush through the little clicky awkwardness that you're feeling.

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Have it happen.

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And then just pause.

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Okay.

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Need to swallow, pause.

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And then rego, like, go again.

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The more you try and half clear the throat, the worse it is, and if you

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can avoid at all costs, also going that, that's a really bad thing

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to do for your throat, I know that from doing it myself, it, it really

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starts to grate on your throat.

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Uh, so try and avoid that as well if you have that urge to clear your throat.

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Swallow So.

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Okay, swallow, reassess.

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From there, then the actual voice will sound a lot better.

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The other thing that you can do and make sure that you do

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do is have some water on hand,

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sipping water, so not having a big chunk of water, but

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sipping water as you go along.

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And again, pausing, take a sip, keep going, is also going to help improve the

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quality of how your actual voice sounds.

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So those are the tips for how to actually improve the sound of your voice, how

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to prep your voice for recording.

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In the next video, I'm gonna go through how you sound overall in your recordings.

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So where people talk about, they talk too fast.

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Or they feel like they're too nasally or they sound really

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boring and they're monotone.

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There are so many things that you can do to actually improve the quality of your

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voice and also just how you sound overall.

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Making it sound more like you, more like how you want to sound.

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Those are all things that we will go into in the next one.