VO-BB - 20 YEARS OLD!

[Moosevoice]

Looking for some voice health tips.
After a morning (6am on) of talking with wife/kids, auditioning, more life stuff that involves talking, my voice gets pretty burned out/raspy by 1/2pm.

What do you do to help your voice stay healthy? Protection tips? Strengthening exercies?

Keep it sounding at 2pm how it sounded at 9am.

Some background: Not doing any yelling. I drink a few cups of coffee but rehydrate with water soon after
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[George]

The amount of caffeine necessary to actually have a dehydrating impact is pretty large so that's not going to have too much of an impact on it. More info here: https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/nutrition-and-healthy-eating/expert-answers/caffeinated-drinks/faq-20057965

For me, regular hydration throughout the day is about the only thing that works. When mine gets real bad - like the cold I'm in the middle of - it's hot Throat Coat tea with copious amounts of honey and lemon juice sipped on all day. If it's -real- bad, I add fresh sliced ginger into it.

For strengthening, much has been said about lightly doing sirens through the aperture of a very small straw. Hype or not, it works. At least for a variety of professional singers who swear by it and singing coaches who suggest it. (disclaimer: i am not a physician. i just repeat things i hear)

[Bob Bergen]

If you are working and auditioning that much, then you need to keep quiet during the day between work and auditions. Reserve your voice for career. I also suggest you go to an ENT and have things checked out to make sure your vocal issues aren't physical. Working from home brings with it challenges, one of which is vocal distractions. You need to treat the home as if it were an outside office. Family just has to understand you need to keep your voice to career until the end of the workday.

Now, I also cannot relate as I rarely if ever get vocally burnt out. And I do a lot of work everyday. But every "body" is different.

[todd ellis]

i can typically do long pharma/medical narrations all day long - as much as 9,000 - 10,000 words per day in addition to yelling at neighborhood kids to be quiet & get off my lawn. i drink room temperature water with lemon pretty much all day.

a few years ago it was MAYBE 6,000 words --- a few years before that like 4,000 --- so, i think to some degree, it's like any other muscle --- use it and it will get stronger?*


*todd is not a doctor nor an expert on anything.
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"i know philip banks": todd ellis
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[Moosevoice]

[tokyofan]

Now that I'm over 50 I find I need to warm-up my voice a lot more or it starts to sound raspy, strained, and somewhat effortful. I enrolled in a Vocal Freedom course that is cram-full of useful exercises for maintaining, relaxing, and strengthening the voice.
What works for me:
*Nasal irrigation (neti-pot or other sinus rinse)
*Using a nebulizer for 5+ min every morning. This hydrates the vocal folds faster and more directly than steam or drinking water.
*Straw phonation (plenty of YouTube videos on this) for relaxing/strengthening
*Humming
*Tongue/Lip trills
*Laryngeal massage
*"Diction" a which is a vocal warm-up produced by Elaine Clark

Anyone else feel they need to do more as they get older?
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[Bruce]