How To Get Your Voice Back To Where It Used To Be And Beyond
Apr 13, 2021
Do any of these sound like you?
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You felt like you were a pretty decent singer before, but you’ve been out of practice for a while now.
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You are a bit older and wonder if it’s even possible to get your voice back to where it once was.
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You are recovering from vocal fatigue, overuse, or a vocal injury in the past.
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You are looking for a way to maintain and improve your voice
I’ve helped a ton of singers with this exact thing. In fact, I actually have an episode over this with Star Singer Green Room member, Deborah. She is a seasoned singer doing amazing things, so check out her episode where we go through her journey!
Let’s start out with the facts:
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The voice is in it’s prime between the ages of 35-45.. MUCH later than a ton of other things.
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Your body is your instrument - “you don’t use it you lose it.”
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You can train your vocal muscle groups just like any other muscle that you would train at a gym.
First, let’s look at the BIG picture, then we’ll get super specific about exactly what we would do if we were working together inside my program, The Star Singer Green Room or in 1:1 lessons.
How To Get Your Voice Back - The Big Picture
1. Just start singing
If you want to get your voice back to where it used to be, the first thing is to just start singing again! You don’t have to do it to improve, to judge yourself, get a benchmark or anything. Just start singing and see if it’s something you still enjoy doing.
2. Decide
Once you start singing, decide where you want to go next. Is it for your own enjoyment? Is it for healing or therapy for yourself or others? Is it a hobby? Is it to make money?
If singing is something you want to do professionally, it’s time to figure out the best plan of action. You want to start taking it more seriously by seeking guidance, working with a voice teacher or vocal coach, or starting a program, so that you can start seeing improvement and feel your best when performing.
3. Figure out your plan of action.
If you want to improve, but your plan is to just keep doing what you’re doing, that won’t work! So come up with a plan of action. Maybe that’s deciding if you want guidance or not. Do you want a voice teacher? Do you want a vocal coach? Do you want a step-by-step program? Figure out how you work best, and base your plan off of that.
4. Make a commitment.
If you decide to start lessons with a voice teacher, commit to thirty days with that teacher. Go in with an open mind, remembering that the most important thing is to make sure that they are the right fit. Don’t expect instant results!
How To Get Your Voice Back - The Specifics
1. Just start singing
First, you need to decide if singing is something that you are serious about improving or if you want to just do it for your own fun and enjoyment. Once you decide that, you can start working on your plan of action.
2. Plan of action
Once you decide that you are serious about your singing, it’s time to find some guidance and make a plan of action. Figure out which is best for you - should you sign up for 1:1 lessons, check in with a vocal coach once a month, buy a course, or be active in a program?
A lot of singers assume that 1:1 voice lessons yield better results, but that’s not always true! It’s all about how you learn. If you have the best intentions and big dreams but often find yourself getting overwhelmed and needing someone to tell you what to do and help you stay on track, then 1:1 voice lessons may be the best plan for you.
If you are self motivated and self disciplined but don’t know exactly what to practice, then I would recommend something like the Star Singer Green Room. Here, you can do your own thing and go at your own pace, but when you have a challenge, you can ask and get some guidance!
3. Commit
In my programs, the commitment is built in for you! When you become a member of the Star Singer Green Room, you are committed for 12 months. If you are in 1:1 voice lessons with me, the commitment is 2 months.
Commitment is huge. It is one of the #1 things that can either hold singers back or help them to improve drastically. That is why I build it into all of my programs! When you know you are committed to something, you are SO much more likely to take action and do it.
4. Do the work
All it takes is 10-15 minutes of training per day, 3-4x a week. That’s it!
The first thing I recommend when learning how to get your voice back, and this is what I do with all of my singers, is the strong singing foundation.
How To Get Your Voice Back - Strong singing foundation
So many singers that I talk to do not know how to release their voice. This is so important because it helps to eliminate all kinds of problems, like pitch issues, vocal tone challenges, voice cracking, overuse… it’s going to eliminate all of that.
The very first thing I work on with my singers is timing of the breath. You don’t need to know how to breathe or not to breathe with your diaphragm - I have a whole episode on exactly why - or how to breathe technically, or how to take in more air, until you know how to use the air that you already have.
So many singers are so pitch centered thanks to our music culture and reality TV shows, but focusing on this makes you nervous, tightens everything up, and makes it so hard to control your singing! In reality, the most important thing to focus on is rhythm! When you can command the rhythm and use the momentum of the song, you can free up your voice and that is a major step in how to get your voice back.
The next big thing we focus on in the strong singing foundation is airflow. Air pressure and air flow are two completely different things. When your voice isn’t coming out the way that you want it to, your instinct often tells you that you are breathy and need to push harder. Your instinct is correct, but your solution is wrong. Pushing harder is only going to create more pressure and tension. Air flow is going to help the vocal cords resonate freely, give you more core sound, give you more control over the breath, and that is exactly where you need to start to train your breath.
So how do we do this? Lip buzzes! These are a great way to evaluate your airflow. If you aren’t able to start the buzz, can’t sing all the way through, feel tightness, there’s something wrong. Lip buzzes are great because they leave little breadcrumb clues to help you figure out what is going wrong.
When you are figuring out how to get your voice back, you are dealing with the past and your ideas and judgements about yourself in the past. And these deeply rooted ideas and judgements are not something that I’d recommend you work through alone. When you invest in a voice teacher or a program, you are not just investing in voice lessons,, you are also investing in guidance, accountability, confidence, and actual improvement.
Now, if you are singing for fun, for your own enjoyment and healing and it gives you joy just to sing and you feel great about it... awesome. Just keep doing what you are doing!
But if you are serious about improving and you find yourself feeling overwhelmed or overanalyzing, judging, and want some guidance and accountability, please feel free to reach out to me via DM on Instagram @TiffanyVanBoxtel or check out my FREE training over how to sing like a paid professional in one year without boring or pointless vocal warmups. I’m going to show you how to get over those negative thoughts and how to get your voice back!
