1. Developing Your Voice
Relaxation

2. Vocabulary Relaxation: freedom from all bodily tensions
Posture: how you sit and stand

3. Why Posture?
To achieve maximum performance in the way you breathe, you need to create as much space as possible in your lungs for air. More on this later!

4. Why Relaxation?
Gives you physical and mental control and focus on stage
Improves posture (essential for controlled breathing)
Improves the sound of your voice
Makes your movements smoother on stage

5. Let’s Relax! Facial Massage Sleepy Time! Smile/Frown
Massage your face, and completely relax your facial muscles
Sleepy Time!
Yawn several times to relax the jaw.
Smile/Frown
Smile in an exaggerated manner several times to stretch and relax your facial muscles. Repeat, using a frown instead of a smile.

6. Let’s Relax Even More! Body Parts in Motion: Shoulder shrugs
Shoulder rolls forward/backward
Head rolls forward/backward
Arm swings forward/backward
Waist stretches left/right
Massage neck and shoulders
Leg swings forward/backward
Foot stretches up/down
Massage feet and hands

7. Hit the Floor! Lay on the floor and listen to music
Away With Tension – Tighten/Relax
Musical Relaxation – Relax head to toe

8. Developing Your Voice
Breathing

9. Vocabulary
Breathing: the necessary process of inhaling and exhaling air to live
Diaphragm: the muscle located between the abdomen and the rib cage
Breath control: the amount of force you use in inhaling and exhaling

10. Don’t I Already Know How to Breathe?
Onstage you need to inhale more deeply than you do in regular breathing. Why?
Build volume (be louder)!
Vary your vocal sounds
Don’t run out of breath
Don’t strain your voice

11. Why Controlled Breathing?
In the beginning….
you feel awkward and unnatural on stage
you find yourself running out of breath after a few lines
After you learn controlled breathing…
You will have developed an effective voice on stage
You will have the support you need to get you through performances
You will have more natural body movements
You will have more energy on stage

12. Breathing With Your Diaphragm
Babies are born using their diaphragms
As you get older, your diaphragm gets lazy!

13. Breathing With Your Diaphragm

14. Work That Diaphragm! Book Rest
Air Release – Breathe deeply and inhale slowly. Hold your breath and release air slowly, counting Repeat, and see how well you can control your breathing as you say the numbers.
Ha, Ha, Ha! – Inhale, hold breath for 10 counts, exhale to the sound of “ha.”
Ah! – Inhale, hold for 10 counts, exhale on the sound of “Ah...”

15. Work That Diaphragm!
Snake – inhale as if you were about to speak, exhale and make the sound of a snake.
Pucker Up – pucker your lips, hold your finger in front of your lips. Quickly inhale, blow out air. Concentrate on producing a steady, smooth stream of air each time you do it. Feel the difference on your finger when there is a change in the stream of air.

16. Work That Diaphragm! Phrases – Slowly inhale. Practice phrases:
Good morning
Good luck
Break a leg
Nice day
Good show
Thank you
Poetry Reading – see how far you can get without taking a breath (see next slide)

17. Life’s Not Been the Same in My Family
1) Life’s not been the same in my family Since the day that the new baby came, My parents completely ignore me, They scarcely remember my name. 2) The baby gets all their attention, “Oh, isn’t she precious!” they croon, They think she looks like an angel, I think she resembles a prune. 3) They’re thrilled when she giggles and gurgles, “She burped!” they exclaimed with delight, They don’t even mind when she wakes us With deafening screams in the night. 4) They seem to believe she’s a treasure, There’s simply no way I agree, I wish she’d stop being a baby And start being older than me.

18. Developing Your Voice
How You Speak

19. Vocabulary
Articulation: the shaping and molding of sounds into syllables.
Pronunciation: the way sounds or syllables that represent a word are said and stressed according to the proper notation found in the dictionary.
Diction: a person’s pronunciation of words, choice of words, and manner in which the person expresses himself or herself.

20. Articulation Practice
Rubber baby buggy bumpers (repeat).
She sat upon the balcony mimicking him hiccupping and welcoming him in.
Red leather, yellow leather (repeat)
He thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts.
Unique New York (repeat).

21. Vocal Warm-Up (articulate!)
What a tadoo to die today at a minute or two til two.
A thing distinctly hard to say, but harder still to do.
We’ll beat a tattoo at twenty til two and a rat-a-tat- tat-a-tat two.
And the dragon will come when he hears the drum
At a minute or two til two today,
At a minute or two til two.

22. Pronunciation Quiz How do you say…? Antarctic Jewelry Ask Library
Cavalry
Mayonnaise
Candidate
Miniature
Clothes
Nuclear
Escape
Probably
Espresso
Sherbet
Especially
Supposedly

23. Pronunciation Practice
Go through the handout and make sure we pronounce everything correctly.

24. Diction
Your diction is simply your choice of words. There is no single, correct diction in the English language; instead, you choose different words or phrases for different contexts:
To a friend: “I screwed up.”
To a child: “I made a boo-boo.”
To your boss: “I made an error.”
3rd period

25. Developing Your Voice
How You Sound

26. Vocabulary Volume: how loudly or softly a person speaks.
Rate: the speed at which someone speaks.
Projection: the placement and delivery of voice elements used effectively in communicating to an audience.
1st / 8th periods

27. Vocal Warm-Up (vary your volume and rate!)
What a tadoo to die today at a minute or two til two.
A thing distinctly hard to say, but harder still to do.
We’ll beat a tattoo at twenty til two and a rat-a-tat- tat-a-tat two.
And the dragon will come when he hears the drum
At a minute or two til two today,
At a minute or two til two.

28. More Vocabulary Pitch: the musical tone of the voice
Inflection: the rising and falling of pitch; adds meaning, color and rhythm to spoken words
Flexibility: the process of varying inflections of the voice
Quality: the voice element that makes one person sound different from everyone else

29. Vocal Warm-Up (vary your pitch and inflection!)
What a tadoo to die today at a minute or two til two.
A thing distinctly hard to say, but harder still to do.
We’ll beat a tattoo at twenty til two and a rat-a-tat- tat-a-tat two.
And the dragon will come when he hears the drum
At a minute or two til two today,
At a minute or two til two.

30. Vocal Cords in Action

31. Last of the Vocabulary!
Dialect: a pronunciation of words from different languages blended together to form a distinct language for a group of people.
Accent: the manner in which people speak and the way words are pronounced in different parts of the world.

32. Learn Vocal Warm-Up #2 (from The Mikado by W. S. Gilbert)
To sit in solemn silence on a dull, dark dock In a pestilential prison with a life long lock Awaiting the sensation of a short, sharp shock From a cheap and chippy chopper on a big, black block. A big black block, a short, sharp shock

33. Learn Vocal Warm-Up #3
Bobby Bibbit Bought a Bat Bobby Bibbit Bought a Ball With that Bat Bob Banged the Ball Banged the Ball against the Wall

34. Group Vocal Assignment
Choose one of the warm-ups to perform for the class to perform in a creative way. You will be graded as a group on your:
Pronunciation (5pts)
Rate (5pts)
Articulation (10pts)
Projection (10pts)
Inflection (5pts)
Performance Creativity (10pts)
Memorization (5pts)