In 28 years I’ve tried so many warm-ups! At conferences and festivals I write down everyone’s warm-ups and try many of them with my choirs as I work to cover all of the important aspects necessary for building our best choral sound and keep it interesting and fun for the singers. We spend about 20 minutes warming up in each rehearsal but here is the tried and true one we begin our warm-up time with. It teaches tone for our youngest singers and helps to center the tone for our more experienced singers. Singing with a very hooty “ooh” (like an owl) we sing half notes, Hoo 5-3, Hoo 5-3, and then quarter notes Hoo 5-4-3-2-1. Everyone is instructed to sound like a hooty owl and breathe before each “Hoo”. Leading with the back of the hand and bending at the elbow, everyone tosses the sound forward at each ”Hoo”. We repeat in an ascending pattern. With this exercise, we’re getting the breath moving to float a beautiful “ooh” vowel. The descending interval is great for keeping the voice relaxed and open. All of our choristers start with this warm-up when they begin in the choir at age 8 and continue singing this through their senior year.
(“My Go-To Warm-Up” features a favorite warm-up used by those choirs who have been selected to perform during the 2015 ACDA National Conference.)
Melissa Dawn Pear says
Jesse Rogers says
John Newell says
Roy Hoobler says