Want to Speak Better? Then Speak Like You Sing!

Ever notice that your singing voice sounds better than your speaking voice? It’s clearer, more resonant, and even holds up better than your speaking voice. In fact, you may have noticed that your speaking voice falls flat, feels rough or tired by day’s end, or sounds monotone.

This may be because we concentrate on how we sing, but most people don’t think about how they speak throughout the average day. We just talk without any mindfulness of skills. Many singers have taken singing lessons, sung in school chorus or their church choir, and have actually practiced and concentrated on making a good sound. But how many of us take speaking lessons? How many of us pay any mind to how our speaking voices feel and sound, until something goes wrong?

But…what if we could harness some of those singing skills while we’re speaking? What if we could apply some of that mindfulness to the way we talk? We could actually improve the way our speaking voice feels and sounds. It’s as easy as 1-2-3! And don’t worry: you don’t have to be a great singer to benefit from this simple 3-step method to speak like you sing. We made a quick video to guide you through the steps, but here they are, in detail:

STEP 1: SING THE SENTENCE

Take a simple sentence like, “That’s a really cute dog.” Let’s give it a tune, where the higher notes are the word or words that you consider to be the important words, or key words you want to emphasize, like “really” or “dog”. The arrows indicate the words that you might sing on higher notes. “That’s a ↑really cute ↑dog.” Listen to our example in our video.

STEP 2: SING-SONG THE SENTENCE

Next, sing-song the sentence with a melody similar to the melody in Step 1, just don’t sustain the notes. Let your voice go up and down some “hills” and “valleys”. Some people call this exaggerated speech, like reading to small children. The curved lines represent the voice sing-song-ing up and down. Also, listen to the example in our video.

STEP 3: SPEAK THE SENTENCE

Finally, speak the sentence with the same inflection shape and the same words emphasized, just not as high or as long as in the previous two steps. Listen to the example in our video.

Now your voice sounds expressive, energized, not flat or monotone, and we bet that with this added mindfulness, your voice won’t trail down into your throat or get tired.

Try this 3-step method to speak like you sing, and see if your speaking voice starts to sparkle and make some beautiful music!