How do you warm up for a music audition?

Host: How do you warm up for a music audition?

Jennifer Rutherford: Well every voice teacher is different but I like to start off with a little bit of relaxation because I firmly believe that tension is the number one enemy of the singer. In a performance situation when you get nervous it is important to remember how to relax. So if you practice relaxing, the theory is that in a tense situation, it will come back to you, you will remember how to relax. So I start with a simple exercise it is a dangle from the waist and breathing into the back and bringing the relaxation up with you as you slowly stand. Feel how heavy your hands are when you are down there and feel the joint spaces opening up. So let that heaviness work its way up through the elbows into the shoulders down into the neck and head. Take a big fill of relaxed air, deep into the back and hold it for a second, now release, releasing any tension with the breath. Do that one more time please, fill into the back and hold it. Now stand up slowly, stacking your vertebrate one on top of the other, release the air as you come up and bring that relaxation up with you. Of course you have to fix your hair then. Then we move into some loose and free vocalizations involving the whole range and after that we will do some arpeggios, scales, regular vocalizing that most voice teachers will do and I have some special ones that I do in particular but every voice teacher is different.