Worship Arts July August September 2022

Dealing specifically with wobbles

A wobble (slow and wide vibrato) is the result of initiating vocal sound right in the voice box, rather than allowing the upward air flow to natu rally pull the vocal folds together to create sound. Strong personalities often end up with wobble concerns, due to pushing too hard and holding themselves too rigidly. • Use much more air flow to initiate vocal sound, putting a hand lightly on the throat as a reminder not to initiate from there.

• Check spinal alignment and remind singers that there is no set singers’ posture, but rather a sense of perpetual lengthening and fluidity of motion. • Breathe as if through upper teeth, as if the air flow moves along the roof of your mouth, and then send the sound back out in the same trajec tory, without jamming the larynx down, which often results in wobbles. • Relax and enjoy your singing!

Some points about warming up senior singers

• Warm-ups should most often use closed vowels such as oh, oo, and aw, which helps senior sing ers transition between registers. • The two most important goals of warming up seniors are posture and maximum air flow, instead of initiating in the voice box and feeling a physical connection between the torso and voice.

• Use warm-ups that are simple to remember and expressive, ones that sound like the real music your singers came to sing. Then use these warm ups to remind the singers of fundamental vocal and physical concepts. • Warm-ups for seniors should use sustained, le gato singing, and seldom staccato singing, which often results in cutting down the air flow. Useful for all ages I n summary, the truth is that these fundamental vo cal and physical concepts are useful for choirs of all ages, but if these revived vocal and physical habits can become the default habits of your senior singers, they will achieve and retain a younger sound! More in-depth discussions about senior singers and choirs will be part of my forthcoming book Reconsider ing “Too Old to Sing”: Can Singing Skills Be Revived? (GIA). Included will be a discussion of why senior choirs are important, the most effective warm-ups for senior choirs, when to use them and how to sing them well, the most common vocal concerns of senior singers and their solutions, how to place senior singers into vo cal sections, how to choose or adapt appropriate music for senior choirs, and much more accessible and useful information. Contributing to this new book will be Dr. Helen Kemp. For more specific information about the funda mental ideas and concepts mentioned in this article, see my book The Choral Challenge: Practical Paths to Solv ing Problems, published by GIA (item #G-6776, ISBN:

978-1-57999-703-8). I also urge you to visit my website, www.michaelkemp.org, especially the section called “Choir Talk: Clear Answers that Boost Quality,” which is an interactive blog in which submitted choir director and singer questions are answered. Join the crusade and email your questions to kempanswers@gmail.com. Reprinted from WorshipArts September-October 2012

The late MICHAEL KEMP, conduc tor, clinician, author, music educator, church musician, and composer, was the founding conductor of two prominent adult community ensembles in the Philadelphia

area. After 30 years directing significant church music programs in Texas, Tennessee, New Jersey, and Penn sylvania, Michael became the Choral and Orchestral Director for Germantown Academy, Ft. Washington, PA. An internationally respected clinician for five decades, he conducted and lectured in over 350 workshops and festivals in almost every state and Canadian province. His compositions are in Augsburg and Choristers Guild catalogs.

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