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No matter what style of singing it is, if you want to build your voice and keep it in shape, vocal exercises are paramount. Singing songs is not the same as exercising and will not build your voice. Let me say that again many performers don't realize this. Singing songs is not the same as exercising and will not build your voice. Singing songs with a group or along to another singers voice is only good for developing personal style. Why is this? Well when you sing your own songs you will be repeating any bad habits you currently have. And when you sing along to other singers voices you emulate them and if they are improperly trained as most singers are, you begin to reproduce their bad habits. And even if you have good technique, and all of the singers you try to emulate have good technique this is still not how to go about building your voice.
Why? Because songs stay within certain given pitches and repeat those pitches over and over. While this is good for developing muscle memory for a particular song if you intend to sing it with a group. It does nothing to expand your range. So, what do you do? Scales. As boring as these may be to some people this is the only way to effectively warm up, loosen, strengthen, and expand you singing voice. So without further ado here are explanations of the vocal exercises I have found to be the most beneficial.
Singing on pitch
Some people worry them selves to death over this when they start off. And unfortunately, some coaches have made the worry worse by constantly telling students they are off pitch. When you first start off of course you will miss a lot of notes. Don't worry at all about this, in the beginning the effect the exercises have on your voice are more important. My very first vocal lesson consisted of one hour of the vocal coach telling me I was off pitch anytime I tried to go anywhere above chest voice. Of course I was, at the time I had no idea how to shorten my vocal cords and go up in pitch comfortably! Pitch is something you should start to concern yourself with once you learn more control over the different aspects of your voice. As you go through the scales everyday singing on pitch or at least realizing that you are off pitch will come easily. Just pay attention to when the scale goes up and down, and make mental notes when you are off. But don't agonize over it. Within a given song almost no form of music hits as wide of a range of tones as scales do. You have to listen to the tones before you can hit them, absorbing the sound. When you are perfectly on pitch, it will sound to your ear as if the pitch coming from the scale and the pitch produced by you are one and the same.
Warm ups
Never, ever neglect the warm up portion of your singing workout or the warm up before a performance. The last thing you want to do is warm up in front of a crowd for the first three songs of a set. Singing is to talking what running is to walking. Just like an athlete you wouldn't start off your regime by going full on into the hardest part and expect a peak performance. Blood needs to be sent to the vital areas that you will ask more of in a few minutes. Warm ups are especially important when first starting out. You need keep your voice limber, and relaxed in order to make progress. Never force an exercise. If something hurts, stop altogether, wait fifteen minutes then begin your warm up again. If it keeps hurting stop for the day. It just may be that you are sick or that your cords are swollen from lack of proper sleep.
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