Is Belting Dangerous??

How often have you heard that belting can hurt your voice? It’s not the best rep for this beautiful, emotional voice quality and doesn’t necessarily put our minds where it needs to be. I’m not sure why this lie is out there, just because belting is a powerful, often louder, sound. If you yell all day long, yes, that would be tiring for your voice. But that is not belting, that is just yelling for a long time.. 😅

Like any voice quality, you want healthy technique and when you do belting right - it can have a rehabilitating effect on your voice! I’ll dive more into that another time.

There are many parts to consider for a sustainable, healthy belting technique. That’s why I created my course “Breaking Down The Belt”, to give singers all the tools and strategies they need to create their dream belt without just aiming for a louder, fuller sound and fall into bad habits of pushing air, closing the throat or running out of range. 

Here are three out of many things to consider for a healthy belt!

1. Cricoid tilt. Yes, I go on and on about this but without this action happening inside of your larynx, there won’t be any belting happening. The research is unclear if it’s really the Cricoid cartilage tilting, the Thyroid cartilage rocking back, or maybe both of those movements, but saying Cricoid tilt - all those actions is what I mean 🙂 When you nail this, your sound becomes fuller, louder and more powerful, but with less effort at the vocal folds. It’s a calling sound. It’s what we most often inherently do when we shout for joy, call on someone across the street or warn someone of danger. 
   
   
2. Anchor. Everything that needs to be done for this high intensity sound is not easy. Why not let all the muscles help the other muscles to do their work? I love the simple analogy I learned in my first Estill Voice Training course, that if you are writing your name on a piece of paper, you will lay down your hand on the table to get support and stability. It will be a very messy handwriting holding your hand up in the air and trying to write.. You have muscles in your head, neck, torso and throughout your whole body who can help you optimize your belt.
   
   
3. Diction. What we do at the front of the vocal tract highly impacts what happens further down in your vocal tract. By working with your lips, tongue and being aware of all the sounds you're making to make them more efficient and often act as a pressure chamber in the mouth, will help you get an even more powerful and intelligible sound. That means more rest for your vocal folds once again! 

What can I say, this is just the beginning but I love what belting technique has given me for all the styles and sounds I want to make. If you are curious about the system I teach - learn more about "Breaking Down The Belt" here!