Today’s exercise is a quick way to get your resonance buzzing away at the start of your warm-up sequence. It’s an easy one-and-done exercise that you can do throughout your range. Enjoy!
How to do the VVVooo Exercise
Begin by making a resonant, buzzy “VVV” sound. Place the upper teeth gently against the inner rim of the lower lip and buzz. Avoid a big overbite, tense lips, or hard pressure – you should feel very little resistance against your airflow, and it should be quite easy to make a buzzy sound.
Practice sliding that buzz up and down throughout the range. It is common for the buzz to thin out as you go upward in pitch – the solution is more airflow, not harder pressure between the teeth and lip, so be sure you’re not muscling your way into the higher register.
Once you’re comfortable with the mechanics of this “VVV”, move on to the full exercise:
Slide up a fifth on “VVV”, then back down on “ooo”. That’s it! Here are some optimization tips:
Be sure you’re really buzzing the top note (Sol) on “VVV” before you open into the vowel. If you allow a resonance bald spot to develop there, you won’t get the resonance benefit of the V consonant.
When you open from the consonant into the vowel, try to maintain the open-ness of the resonance. Pay close attention to what you’re feeling, and maintain every element of buzz when you move from “VVV” into “ooo.” In my face, this feels like opening upward instead of downward, or keeping the resonance open instead of allowing it to close.
Let me know your questions in the comments below, and thanks for practicing!
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