Students at BAST enjoying voice and movement exercises
As I write this long overdue post I am in an apartment in Byron Bay, Australia. I have just finished running a five day intensive diploma in voice therapy in Brisbane, drove to Byron and spent a long but enjoyable day today playing and choosing crystal bowls for the next group of students that I will be teaching in a couple of weeks time. I love my work, I wouldn’t want to do anything else but at times we all need an energy boost!
It’s late as I write this so I’m going to be chilling out now, but first thing in the morning I will start my day with the sumo breath exercise which is excellent for getting things going, removing stale air from the lungs and giving me a much needed oxygen boost!
After that I will spend a few minutes toning (a vocal technique where you sing one tone for a long period of time) using a high pitch ‘eee’ sound. High pitch sounds have a higher frequency, and therefore a faster sound wave than low pitch sounds. We find high sounds more stimulating because it seems to us as though time passes more quickly when we listen to faster sound frequencies than when we listen to slow ones. I know it sounds strange but it’s down to the way the cognitively process sound in the brain, so the best way to get a quick fix is to sing a high pitch sound. An ‘eee’ sound is a really good one to use because it concentrates the sound vibrations into the head – try this experiment. Put your hand on your head sing a high-pitched ‘eee’ sound followed by an ‘ahh’ sound keeping your hand on your head. Did you notice that the vibrations disappeared from your head when you sang the ‘ahh’ sound?
Concentrating the sound vibrations into your head in this way really stimulates the mind, try it and let me know how you feel. Just a few minutes in the morning will really set you up for the day!
