Elizabeth Tait OB Ch. 11 Summary

Summary: A daily routine of vocalization is essential to making progress and keeping a healthy voice throughout your life.  Since your body is different everyday, your voice will feel differently everday.  Therefore it is important to start afresh with vocalization every morning, don't rely on what happened the night before.  There are certain principles that should be a part of every day's practice:

loosening the body

body alignment

think sound, and let sound happen

gently warm the voice with automatic pitch

split up practice into small segments

focus on filling in weak areas, not practicing strengths

Oren then gives his step-by-step process to learn music:
1. Study Rhythm
2. Study Intervals
3. Sing on neutral syllable like "la"
4. Read as a poem
5. Words in rhythm
6. Sing words on pitches, no dynamics
7. Study expression markings
8. Make it a work of art!
Mental preparation is the key to prepared singing.
Key Terms:
Key Concepts: The practice that seems to yield greater end results is practice that involves more mental activity than vocal activity.
Making Connections: I have been wanting a good reference for practice habits and ideas for a while, and this is it!  Sometimes I get stuck in the practice room, and referring to this chapter will be very helpful.