Why is warming up important?
I have many students and know fellow actor/singers who neglect their warm ups and I never understood why. Then I realized, maybe they aren’t totally sure of their purpose and benefits; so let me share!
Dancers stretch their bodies before class or performances, runners stretch before and after races, weight lifters stretch to avoid muscle tightness after a tough workout, it makes sense then that singers would do the same. Singer stretch in the form of warm ups. Warm ups gently get your vocal cords moving and coming together, they get your diaphragm engaged for healthy breathing/sound production, and they increase vocal cord flexibility. Not only are warm ups essential to healthy singing, they are the primary time to work on your vocal technique.
When you skip your warm ups and go straight on stage for a show, you are doing yourself and your audience a huge disservice. Athletes know the danger of pulling a muscle without proper warm ups, singers can do the same. Vocal injuries are common - why risk it? Plus, when you don’t warm up, your range is smaller because the muscles surrounding your vocal cords are cold - they simply don’t have the same range of motion, so your ability is limited. Your audiences deserve the level of performance that got you cast to begin with, not a half-sung limited performance because you couldn’t be bothered to spend 10 minutes preparing.
Warming up before you practice is equally as essential. The reason voice teachers start lessons with warm ups is to focus 100% on your technique and vocal health. We then take those skills and implement them into the songs you are learning to make you a better singer all around. When you are on your own and skip the warm ups, you won’t be able to work your technique on your songs as best as you can. You also make it more difficult to sing altogether, which can cause bad habits to form, and make your lessons about breaking your bad habits as opposed to learning new good ones and progressing.
tl;dr Warm ups are essential to being a good, healthy singer. Don’t skip them for any reason, it’s not worth it.
Happy singing friends!