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Keeping Your Voice Healthy - aimed at theatre students and professionals.

  1.  Make sure your technique is secure. Wherever possible, study with an accredited voice teacher; and follow their advice. They will line you up with that secure technique and make sure you speak/sing on it. They can also head off any bad habits. 

  2.  Always prepare your body and your voice before speaking or singing. You may feel that you don't need to; and will hear fellow performers insist they just open their mouths and it all works. I'd always err on the side of caution. 

  3.  You are either using your voice in a thoughtful manner, or you're silent. 

  4.  Better still, you're asleep. 

  5.  Stop clearing your throat. 

  6.  Accept nerves, rather than displace, disguise or tamper with them.  

  7.  Eat healthily - never a main meal within five hours of going to bed - have a bottle of water practically grafted onto your palm, drink alcohol sparingly, don't smoke.

  8.  Remedies for stress include: cold showers, aerobic exercise, meditation, sex, lavender.        

  9.  I agree with Lady Boxe, The Diary of a Provincial Lady, that the saline-douche habit needs to be fully reinstated.  Unless you have glue-ear, or similar.  

  10.  Cloves are antibacterial.  I suck one morning and evening.  

  11.  Don't eat Vocalzones/Lockets/Fisherman's Friends or similar. 

  12.  Keep your feet warm and dry, and your head cool. Wrap up when leaving a warm rehearsal studio or backstage area to go out into the cold.  Don't let rain soak you to the skin.  

  13.  Colds' season starts when the central heating does.  Counteract the drying effects of the central heating with bowls of water near radiators or wet towels hung over doors.  If you wake up with a dry throat, dunk a sponge in boiling water and hold it to your mouth before starting on your voice work.  

  14.  If you catch cold, first and foremost keep it to yourself.  Don't take over-the-counter drugs to disguise its symptoms.  You're meant to have a temperature, soreness, aches, etc. They are signs your body is expelling the virus. A few times a day inhale nearly boiling water - no need, actually, to put anything in it - but stay silent and indoors for at least two hours afterward.  Otherwise, rest  as much as you can and entertain yourself. Read my blog. Watch Judge Judy.  I would say you can speak and sing if you have to unless your cords are waterlogged.  Keep an eye out for the cold persisting or dropping to your chest, as then you may need to see a doctor.  

15.  Never read your reviews.  

 
  
  
  

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