Every actor has been there. Hearing your voice back in a recording and thinking “is that actually what I sound like?” Or maybe your acting coach has told you that your vocal technique could use some work. It can be confronting to feel like one of our most important tools of expression, our vocal power, is not where we want it to be. But just like a musician can improve by practicing technique, an actor can train their voice to become clearer and more expressive. No matter where your voice is starting from it’s possible to make massive improvements!
There are three elements that lead to real improvement for actors. The first is releasing unhelpful habits and tension. The second is training the parts of your body that produce speech: your breath, muscles and articulators. The last is building vocal flexibility and responsiveness, enabling your voice to express thoughts and feelings fully.
Working on these three simple elements will unlock new levels for your voice and help you massively improve your acting. Here’s how.
How Does the Voice Work for Actors?
The key to understanding your voice as an actor is to think of your voice as the music that the instrument of your body makes. In the same way that all instruments have a power source, like a guitar needs a string to be plucked or a piano needs a key to be struck, the voice’s power source is the breath.
The foundation of all vocalisation is the breath. The vocal cords then shape that breath, the body amplifies it with its resonators, and the articulators shape the sound. When all of these elements are working in harmony, an actor has full access to their vocal expression. Exactly what we want!
Frequently Asked Questions
Is It Possible to Improve Your Voice as an Actor?
Just like guitar players can get better at playing guitar, actors can absolutely improve their ability to use and produce their voice. Voice training is vital in learning to ‘play’ the instrument of your voice.
The trainable aspects of an actors voice include:
- Vocal Quality. Overall clarity, resonance and expression of the voice.
- Flexibility. Ability to use the different qualities of your voice.
- Pitch. How high or low a voice can go.
- Pace. The speed the words are spoken.
- Volume. The strength of sound.
- Articulation. The precision of sound.
Now that we know that improving our voice is possible, the question becomes “How do we do it?” Actors train their voice by engaging in structured practice around four main areas of vocal production. The most commonly trained areas are:
- Breath
- Alignment and relaxation
- Resonance
- Articulation
Below, we go into detail about what actors need to know about these key areas to improve their voice.
What Actors Need to Know About Breath
The breath is the foundation of all vocal performance. It provides the basis for a balanced and relaxed body and allows vocal production to come from a place of ease. Breath support allows us to be heard, even when we’re speaking softly. It also allows us to generate immense power with our voices safely.
However, many actors don’t understand how to properly use their breath, or the role their breath plays in producing sound. Understanding the role of the breath is crucial for actors.
Why Actors Need to Do Breathing Exercises
Breathing is something a lot of people take for granted. We do it all day, every day, after all! Usually, breath is controlled by the autonomic nervous system, and because it happens automatically we don’t often think about it!
But to improve your voice, it’s essential to become aware of the breath and engage in exercises to improve your breathing capacity. By becoming aware and regularly doing exercises that improve breathing technique, actors can improve their vocal quality immensely.
Why is the Diaphragm Important for Actors?
The idea of ‘the diaphragm’ has entered popular culture so much that it has become almost a cliche. The teacher in the movie yells to their voice students, “Breathe with your diaphragm!!!” But, understanding it is actually vital for actors. Training ourselves to breathe diaphragmatically is one of the main ways we can improve our breath capacity.
The diaphragm is a muscle, and like any muscle it strengthens with proper exercise.
What Do Actors Need to Know About the Diaphragm?
Before we dive into the breathing exercises, we need a quick anatomy lesson to understand how our breathing actually works. I promise it won’t take long!
Essentially, our lungs react to air pressure changes. Air always moves from a place of higher pressure to lower pressure. When the air pressure in our lungs lowers as the lungs expand, air rushes in. When the lungs are full and the air pressure is higher, they release the breath.
The muscles that causes the lungs to expand and contract, creating these pressure changes, is called the diaphragm. This dome-like muscle lives under our lungs. When the diaphragm contracts, it creates that low air pressure system in the lungs. When the diaphragm relaxes, it pushes the lungs back up and expels the air.
What Breathing Exercises Should Actors Do?
Actors should work on habitually engaging in diaphragmatic breathing (also called belly breathing). Exercises for this can be found online, or follow along below.
Exercise to Strengthen Diaphragm
- Lie on your back with your knees bent and feet flat on the floor.
- Place one hand on your chest and one on your belly.
- Breath in through your nose.
- The hand on your chest should not move at all. Only the hand on your stomach should move with the breath.
- If you are struggling, visualise a ballon in your tummy, expanding as you breath in.
- Breath easily out through your mouth.
- Repeat 4-6 rounds each time you practice.
If you’re looking for more guidance on what exercises to do, access these ten essential vocal warm ups.
Why is Relaxation and Alignment Essential for Voice?
An actor’s awareness of their body is vital for producing their voice. The whole body is involved in vocal production. Unfortunately, poor posture can create tension and get in the way of great vocal production. Tightness kills vibrations, which are how sound is produced (more on this in the resonance section!)
Relaxation is important because it helps prevent injury and access the full range of vocal expression. If there is tension in the body, or alignment that introduces strain or tightness, the voice loses resonances and limits are imposed on the vocal production.
Furthermore, relaxing our muscles helps make sure that we don’t place the vocal folds under stress and cause injury to them. They are a sensitive part of our anatomy, and need to be protected!
The Body’s Role in Vocal Production
Everybody’s voice is different because the physical dimensions of our bodies change and shape the sound in unique ways. It’s pretty special stuff! While no two voices are the same, the same principles can be applied to help each actor access their unique expression.
By being fully present in both our mind and body, and working to increase our physical capacity for sound production, we can start to access our full vocal potential.
Posture and Alignment for Better Voice
Actors should strive very easy, aligned positions from which to move and speak. It’s not just about the diaphragm. Ribs that are able to swing freely. Strong core and back muscles, that remain relaxed and adaptable, all are essential for great vocal production!
An aligned and balanced posture helps us produce our voice to its full expression. The Alexander Technique focuses on this alignment, and is a great form of movement training for actors.
If you’re just starting out with vocal training, working on the floor and using the pull of gravity can help actors work from a place of alignment and relaxation.
How Does Resonance Improve Your Voice?
In order to create sound, the breath and vocal cords work together to create vibrations. Those vibrations then resonate throughout the body. Sound isn’t just heard, it can actually be felt in and around the body.
Feeling the vibrations physically, and moving the sound around the body, are key ways that actors manipulate their voices. Connecting with the sensation of resonance and continuing to practice allows actors to improve their voice exponentially!
How Do I Connect to Vocal Resonance?
First, understand that the skeleton is a conductor for the vibrations that create your voice. The vibrations are then amplified through the resonators. The resonating spaces include:
- Chest
- Pharynx
- Mouth
- Cheeks
- Nose
These resonating spaces amplify and enhance sound. Think about a choir singing in a beautiful cathedral, and how those sounds fill the space and sound beautiful. Now compare that with a small carpeted room. Not quite as nice, is it?
An awareness of resonance brings out tonal possibilities and variations in warmth or brightness, essential for developing vocal power and range. I once had a voice teacher share an anecdote of beginning to work with an opera singer whose voice was so resonant she could feel it in his shins! The possibilities for creating sounds with the whole body are endless.
Working regularly with different resonators can open up exciting new vocal qualities.
What is Articulation?
The sound of our voice is shaped by what we call the ‘articulators’. An actor needs to have control over their articulators to improve their voice. The articulators are the:
- Jaw
- Lips
- Mouth
- Teeth
- Tongue.
These work together to rapidly change and shift, and regular practice will increase your articulatory agility. Here’s a fun tongue twister to try it out.
Articulatory agility
is developing the ability
to effortlessly and believably
utter clearly the most conceivably
convoluted consonant combos
in the world.
How Can Actors Improve Articulation?
The main levers an actor can pull when working on their articulation are placement and exercises to relax and strengthen the muscles. Focusing on a range of tongue movements helps to improve its overall flexibility in speech. The tongue is a muscle, and like doing bicep curls with strengthen your biceps, doing articulation work will strengthen your tongue. Cool!
The tongue is actually connected to the larynx, via the tongue root. The invisible part of the tongue that connects under your bottom teeth. Most voice training programs will get actors to release tongue tension through a series of exercises. A free back of the tongue leads to flexible and expressive movement in the front of the tongue, which often unlocks articulation ability.
This is why you often hear actors doing tongue twisters and relaxation exercises for the muscles in their face.
Accent Work and Articulation for Actors
The placement and manipulation of the articulators is what allows for the incredibly diverse range of sounds that make up speech and human expression. Different accents hold these articulators in different postures for different words and sounds, which is what creates the variation in sound!
Vocal Warm Ups and Physical Agility
Daily warm ups and vocal training are the best way that actors can improve their voice. It helps prevent injury, expand capacity, and deepen an actor’s connection to their own voice.
What Should a Regular Vocal Warmup Include?
A regular vocal warmup should cover all of the elements we covered above.
- Breath. Include exercises that help connect to diaphragm/belly breathing.
- Alignment. Muscle release and posture alignment to work from a place of relaxed readiness.
- Resonance. Resonance scan and moving onto voice with soft humming, feeling for vibration.
- Articulation. Working the articulators and moving onto text.
If you can do even five minutes of work on your voice each day, you’ll notice massive improvements within weeks! With a little bit of concentrated attention and effort, actors can greatly improve their vocal expression. If you need some scripts to practice with, be sure to check out our 101 free practice scripts for actors.
Have fun with it, enjoy the journey, and soon you’ll be charming the crowds with your honey tongued performances!
