How to Practice Singing: Why the Weekend-Warrior Approach Isn’t All Bad

I’ve always believed that singing even just a little bit each day is better than singing only a couple times a week for a long time.  This certainly felt true when I was learning to play drums and guitar:  if I practiced even 15 or 20 minutes in a day, I could feel an improvement the next day.  This is because of how the brain turns short-term experiences into long-term memory overnight.

Recently, though, I have changed my mind about the benefits of singing for just 15-20 minutes a day.  I even changed my singing schedule to be only two or three times a week, two hours each time.

Why?

Well, let’s go back to the jogging/sprinting analogy again.  If you are trying to be a sprinter, but all you do is jog a few laps around the track every day, how much faster are you ever going to get?  

Right.

Sure, jogging is a little better than not even getting off your butt at all.  But are you really using that time to get where you want to go?  Probably not.

You haven’t practiced singing while warmed up.   

You’ve practiced warming up.  

…

The practice rule that has NOT changed is this:  Practice Things Right.  That means: 

• When you are learning something new, practice until you get it right, and then keep practicing it right!
• When you are changing a bad habit, practice until you get it right, and then keep practicing it right!
• When you are having trouble with something, slow it down until you can do it right, and then keep practicing it right!

So if you want to practice singing free and easy and connected, do your warmups until you’re free and easy and connected, and then practice singing that way for a good long while, so that you get in the habit of always singing that way.  Over time, it’ll take you less warmup time to get to that easy place.

(c) 2010 Adrienne Osborn

Adrienne Osborn is a vocalist and performance coach based in Colorado.   For more free articles and tips, visit https://PerformanceHigh.net.