After many years of studying singing and not being satisfied with the result, I found myself in Rome, studying with a teacher there. One of the exercises she gave me when I first started with her was using a candle to build breath power and consistency. (This same exercise is described by Rise Stevens in Great Singers on Great Singing
After several months of slow progress, I had a long discussion with my aunt which basically boiled down to, “you think you know everything but if you really want to become a professional singer you’d better start practicing more and do what your teacher tells you to do.” So I started doing the candle exercise every day. At that point if my teacher had told me that to learn to sing I had to stand on my head and wiggle my toes for 15 minutes a day I would have tried it.
After about a week my teacher asked me what was going on. She thought I sounded better than ever, like a different person. I told her I finally started doing the candle exercise. That was the beginning of my learning to sing properly.
Years later, I think back on this turning point and identify two key points. One is it was the beginning of really concerted, daily practice for me. To learn to sing we have to figure our voices out on our own and the only way to do this is to practice every day. The second key point is we need to let go of our egos and do what a trusted guide tells us to do.
Interestingly, I have told this story to my students and choirs, and most of them go through a similar experience. A student will make great progress one month and I’ll talk to them about it only to have them tell me that they finally started doing the candle exercise. My favorite is a choir member who studies with someone else came to me one day and said she’d started doing the candle exercise and a few weeks later her teacher said she sounded like a different person. That’s a powerful exercise! Or maybe it’s just a great barometer of our maturity as students…
thanks for this article and your writing,
there are usefull informations to go on building the instrument
(of course i made similar experiences with practissing, breathing exercises especially).
I wanted to ask you if you could describe the exercise, i would be glad if i could make it a part of my daily routine.
kind regards
lena
Thanks for reading! I’m glad you find my posts useful.
Here is how you do the exercise. Light a candle and place it anywhere from 15 to 45 or more cm away from you, at the level of your mouth while standing. Closer will work more on breath control, while farther will work more on breath power. I start students at about 20-30 cm.
Light the candle, take a deep breath as you would for singing a long phrase, and blow on the flame without blowing it out. Purse your lips naturally like for a spoken “u” and avoid tension and high pressure. This should be a relaxing exercise. Try to make the flame flicker but not go out for the entire length of the breath. If it goes out you aren’t suspending the breath enough (using your inspiratory muscles) while if it doesn’t flicker you aren’t compressing the breath enough. Vary the distance.
By proper breath I mean zero shoulder movement, not even 1/2 cm, a well expanded ribcage, especially feeling a stretch in your middle and lower back, and a low released abdomen. Don’t flex your abdominal muscles when breathing in, rather let them expand out as a consequence of your lungs filling. For high pressure activities, like a very far away candle or a sung high note, you will feel the need for abdominal flexing when exhaling.
wow, thanks a lot
I will practice this. tried it yesterday and noticed when i sang later, that i could concentrate better on breath consistancy and longer phrases.
see you!
lena
(*sighs* I’m so glad that there is music and singing in this life)