12 The Art of Singing Vowels

In this lesson, you’ll learn important (life-changing?!) strategies and techniques for singing vowels, both to strengthen your resonance and vocal stability, and to achieve different stylistic qualities in your voice. This will lay the groundwork for the next lesson on consonants!

See the lesson resources below to:

download the lesson notes (in Downloads tab)
download the vocal workout for offline use (in Downloads tab)

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Responses

sharminee September 6, 2022

Keeping my mouth narrow and dropping my jaw especially on my high notes that i’m struggling with really help me as I navigate vowel modification in songs. I can see why the practice of narrow mouths is so beneficial. I also think I may have to revisit this lesson a few times and consult the notes as there is so much to remember but SO useful. Haha!

Charmaine Brown September 8, 2022

Yes… definitely not a one time watch!

Joe Yaccarino June 12, 2022

Hi there, amazing work on this course and extremely helpful! Question is, I see EE modifies to IH early in the video but then you have it modify back from IH to EE later on? If EE is constricting why would I change the IH? Can you clarify?

Charmaine Brown June 20, 2022

Hey! Great question! The answer is—they are BOTH constricting in ways, and both helpful to the other in ways! The EE vowel tends to have too closed of a mouth (so it gets tight/strained), so aiming to have a slightly more open IH-shaped mouth, but still sing the EE sound… is what works well for that one.

The IH vowel tends to have too open of a mouth shape, so singers tend to push chest voice (causing tension/strain), so aiming to have a slightly more closed EE-shaped mouth, but still sing the IH sound… is what works there! Hopefully that makes sense!

Tricia Gallagher December 10, 2021

Should the moon/no long scale exercises sound brassy/nasal or flute like? I’ve been doing them both ways with positioning my soft palate low vs high but wasn’t sure which was the goal. Thank you

Charmaine Brown December 15, 2021

For the MOOM scale, ideally we want to use more of the flute/low larynx/slightly dopey sound, and the NO works best when we engage pharyngeal to give it more of a brassy/nasal sound.

Stephanie Cessna October 1, 2021

Charmaine, this gives me so much hope! I can hear what a difference these exercises and vowel shapes make. It’s a lot of mental gymnastics, but after doing them for a couple weeks I feel it’s starting to click!

Charmaine Brown October 1, 2021

Wow fantastic! I’m so glad to hear it!

Paul_Snyder August 12, 2021

Should I be moving into head voice as the scales go higher in my range? I end up singing the scales in almost all head voice as they go higher.

Charmaine Brown August 14, 2021

Yes absolutely—we want to release into head voice as we sing higher. Ideally we want to still be holding onto some mix of resonance, so there’s not a flip/discrepancy in the tone, but don’t worry if that’s not sounding perfect yet—these lessons will help you master that!

1. Paul_Snyder August 23, 2021
  
  Thank you for clarifying, Charmaine! I don’t have a smooth transition into head voice yet (though it seems like certain vowels are more smooth than others). I went back and worked on the resonance lesson again.

12 The Art of Singing Vowels

Angels We Have Heard On High by James Chadwick

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