Morning Voice = Hard to Sing in the Early Morning

Many of us wake up with atrocious breath and groggy voices. While I haven’t gotten to the point where my husband refuses to kiss me, he still comments about it. Not so attractive on many fronts.

It seems even worse when you have to wake up and cantor during an early Mass. I have personally sung at many an 8 AM Mass. I know churches who have Mass at 7 AM, though I’m not sure if they utilize cantors. If they do, God bless their voices that early in the morning.

Despite what anyone may think, it doesn’t take an overly special vocalist with a fantastic voice to sing that early in the morning. No matter how bad the voice starts off, there are tricks and tips to prepare every voice for singing.

Even in the early morning.

Why is My Voice Bad in the Morning?

Why exactly do our voices croak in the early morning when we try to sing?

When we sleep all night without talking, laughing or exercising our vocal folds, they stiffen up. In addition, if you sleep in a dry environment at night, your vocal folds will need plenty of hydrating before you try to sing.

According to Medical Daily’s article, a deeper voice in the morning indicates a good night’s rest. If that’s the case, hopefully all vocalists suffer from this the night before singing. A good night’s rest is one of the key components for singing well that day.

Other reasons you may have a “froggy” voice in the morning:

• Accumulations of fluids in your throat during the night
• A build-up of mucus in the vocal cords
• Breathing through your mouth during the night
• The slowing down of blood circulation
• Muscle tension
• Acid reflux

Yikes! That outlines a lot of reasons your voice could be not so stellar in the morning. I personally have suffered from one or more of these while preparing for an early morning singing.

Do not be discouraged. There are solutions to these problems and many things you can do to help or fix these early-morning travesties.

Let’s break down some of these methods and figure out what works best for you.

How To Sing Well in the Morning

The best way to combat early morning croaks is to slowly and gently warm your voice up in the morning. This will be in addition to the right foods and drinks.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of factors that go into creating the perfect morning singing voice.

Fortunately, you are ultimately in control of most of those factors.

How to help that morning voice? I will address this in the following segments:

• What to Eat Before Singing
• What to Drink Before Singing
• How Long to Warm Your Voice up in the Morning
• What Warmups to Use
• Example Morning Routine for Cantoring
• Other Tips to Preparing Your Morning Voice

Other resources for you to check out:

• How to Treat a Hoarse Voice
• Tips for Performing Early in the Morning

What to Eat Before Singing

For one, don’t eat late the night before, says this article. This would be anything you eat approximately 2 or fewer hours before bed. This might lead to indigestion, heartburn, or acid reflux, all things you don’t want to be dealing with for early morning singing.

So what foods are a no-no on the day of a performance?

Here’s what another article had to say, and I agree with all of it!

Do Not Eat:

• Any form of dairy whatsoever
• Processed sugar
• Caffeine (this includes chocolate, my friends!)
• Fried foods
• Butter
• Spicy Foods
• Nothing

You have to understand that partaking in foods like these will only result in a gross film on your vocal cords. This will keep them from vibrating freely and producing sound with ease. Or, as a side effect, those types of foods will affect how you feel because your stomach is struggling to digest and get rid of the saturated foods.

What’s the best practice for eating the morning of singing?

Here are a few suggestions on what to eat:

• Oatmeal with fruit
• Apples (always worked well for me, seemed it was my golden ticket some days to incredible vocal ease)
• Chicken or fish
• Dark leafy greens or sweet potatoes
• Nuts
• Peanut butter/honey (would be delicious in that oatmeal!)

I would go so far as to add eggs to that list. Do not fry them a bunch of oil;  instead, use a little olive oil.

They would be a perfect addition to your vocal-prepping breakfast.

Feel free to get as creative or non-creative as you like. Just make sure you eat something. 

What to Drink Before Singing

What you drink is even more important than what you eat. It has a huge impact on your vocal cords.

What not to drink:

• Coffee
• Tea
• Alcohol
• Ice Water

The reason we don’t drink the first three is because of the dehydrating effect caffeine and alcohol have on your voice.

If you think ice water wakes you up and cools your vocal cords, think again. The cold water will essentially freeze your vocal cords. This makes warming them up more difficult and lengthy in process.

What to drink:

• Warm water with a bit of lemon
• Room temp water
• Licorice root tea or a decaf tea with lemon and honey

These are all great alternatives to the aforementioned beverages.

In addition, I would always bring a bottle of room temperature water with you while you are singing to chase away any of those early morning croaks that might come back while singing.

How To Warm Your Voice Up Before Singing

There are a number of ways to warm up your voice.

Physical exercising and stretching is a fantastic way to get your body ready for singing.

Take deep, cleansing breaths in through your nose and exhale through your nose. Feel your midsection expand with the breath. Try to gently stretch your neck, back, and entire body while you breathe.

This will help wake your body up, bring blood circulation to all parts of your body, and increase the elasticity of your muscles.

Using physical movements should be the first way you warm your voice up. If the body is not ready to be warmed up, attempting to warm just a small part of the body up might be harmful.

For example, you can’t make a good cinnamon roll without first rolling out all of the dough, put in the right ingredients, and then gently rolling it back up. Only then you are able to cut smaller pieces and prepare for the finished product. (Does this analogy make sense? It did when I was writing it…)

Humming is a great low-key exercise to use when you are just waking up, or during a morning shower. The steam will help hydrate your vocal cords and prepare them for the stretching required of a vocalist.

I start with low humming. Once I feel comfortable with that, I go on to higher humming and eventually add vowels in place of my humming.

Slides will also be a benefit, as long as you do them gently and slowly.

For some easy warm-up examples, please check out 5 Simple Vocal Warmups.

How long do you have to practice singing?

You will need to warm-up or practice as long as you need to in order to feel adequately prepared for cantoring.

I recommend at least 10 minutes of slow, steady warm-up. You may start with something simple like humming and gradually add vowels and words to complete the set of warm-ups. It may be helpful to sing through the Psalm or Gospel Acclamation at the end of your warm-up to gauge how your vocal cords are doing.

Please don’t forget to add breathing and posture exercises into your practice.

When you don’t focus on the basics, they might get lost in translation and not work as well when you are actually singing.

Other Tips on Preparing Your Morning Voice

Here are other tips for singing well in the morning:

• Take a shower, the steam will help your vocal chords. Also, gently allow your voice to warm-up rather than talking right away. This will help you tremendously as you start your morning in preparation to sing.
• Be awake at least 2 hours before singing
• Going on a quick jog would be a great way to get your blood circulation flowing
• Drink at least 2 glasses of water (a squeeze of lemon never hurt, either)

In college, one of my music professors claimed that singing in the morning was all mental. When you wake up, if you are mentally ready to tackle the vocal task, your voice will follow suit.

I agree with this idea to an extent. Obviously, it helps to have the right mentality when arising to prepare for your vocal responsibility. However, that mentality is complete when you add the appropriate warm-ups, the right kinds of food and drink, and know your music material before you step up to the plate (so to speak).

Example Morning Routine For Early Cantoring

• Wake up at least an hour and a half before Mass
• Begin gently humming anything while getting ready for Mass or while preparing a light, healthy breakfast.
• Sip some warm tea or room temperature water. Drink at least 8 oz. of water or 4 oz of tea to get your chords nice and warm.
• Start warming up with low, slow tones, then graduate to higher, faster tones or songs (perhaps you could use the songs that you are to sing for Mass as a warmup, super easy way to do two things at once).
• Pray (over your meal, add something about being thankful for cantoring, ask for the Lord’s help and blessing over your duty, things like that to help you get in the right mindset for cantoring).
• Eat something that will fill you up, like protein. Avoid cheese/ milk/ yogurt, as these will coat your vocal chords and create phlegm.

Morning Voice, Anyone?

I certainly know that morning voice is a thing. Every singer is aware of it and takes every precaution to avoid performing during those early morning hours.

Some instances cannot be avoided. In those cases, use the appropriate techniques and cautions to prepare.

From your food choices to your exercise routine, from what you drink to how you vocalize, it all matters when preparing that morning voice.

Go forth, ye cantors, and sing that early morning Mass with ease, skill, and smooth vocal cords!

Related Articles:

10 Easy to Sing Catholic Hymns

Are you Scared to sing? 

5 Ways to Become a Better Vocalist Every Day

What not to do when losing your voice

9 Simple Tricks for Better Singing

8 Steps for Singing and Playing at the Same Time

Posture and Breathing Techniques for Singers