I know this may sound stupid... but im really not too good at sight singing and would love to improve as it seems to be holding me back. I just dont see how people can do it unless thay have perfect pitch! Because how can u just look at say a D or an A and sing it! Any help or advice would be apriciated!

Singing just a single note on its own without any context is the hardest thing in the world. But fortunately most sight-singing doesn't require that.

There will generally be some context to what you're doing - an accompaniment with it, or an introduction or even a starting note given beforehand. These are the clues you use rather than relying on perfect pitch. Once you have one of these, you can work out the note sound you have to start with, and go from there.

Then the job boils down to identifying the interval the note you have to sing and the starting note or between the accompaniment and the note you have to sing, and using that to decide what sound you need to make, and then making it.

Singing intervals takes practice, and practice, and practice. I use Vaccai's Metodo Pratico to do my interval training - the first half of the book is a series of exercises to get one used to singing every type of interval.

The other thing one can do to improve one's sight-singing is to join a choir. It's a fun, sociable way of getting the practice you need to learn.

I'm currently in three choirs but for some reason i never seem to get used to how big the jump will sound! Do you recommend any books? It must take forever to learn how big a jump there is between all the different notes!!! This will probabely sound even more stupid but does for example a note say E on the treble clef soud different to the same note if a piece is in a different key?

Hi there

No it doesn't sound stupid - the context around a note always affects how it sounds, so yes, your E can sound different depending on which note your coming to it from and which note the other parts are singing.

The book I mentioned before is this one by Vaccai - the first half of the book is all about singing intervals.

And beyond that, I'm afraid the answer remains the same.....practice!

Best of luck

Katyjay

I have found that the best way is to sing numbers for the notes of the scale (wasn't there another thread all about this somewhere?) Start by singing a scale 1 to 8 and back again. Then try the arpeggio on 1,3,5,8. When you get the feel of these, try jumping around:1,5,3,5,1 etc. Then find a simple tune which you know and which moves by step and sing it to numbers (e.g. Good King Wenceslas would be: 1 1 1 2 1 1 5, 6 5 6 7 1 1). It really helps starting by putting the numbers to something you know. Then try finding something you don't know which moves by step, and sing that to numbers... slowly! It would help to have someone to listen to you, though, to tell you when you are going wrong. Otherwise you'll have to be constantly checking yourself against another instrument.

Some of the adults in my choir had no idea at all how to sight sing a couple of years ago - they told me it was completely impossible - and now they are getting quite good, but they still like to sing the numbers to start with!

I saw this exercise and tried it.
It's so cute and funny!
It works for me!
I enjoy it v much.
I'll teach my choir this trick.

For a worksheet on using Sight-singing Numbers (with some details of Kodaly sol-fa method too) - and a book recommendation, see:

http://forums.abrsm.org/index.php?showtopi...indpost&p=87796

DomRUK looking at this link back to the previous topic I couldnt see the book recommendation. Thanks

AGHHH ignore my message, I just spotted the book recommendation - somehow I was looking for a URL link not something in plain text and just missed it.

This worksheet is really useful thanks so much

Is this sight reading in a singing exam or is it for the aural tests. As people are coming out with singing in numbers, don't even try it. Use real solfa if anything. This is really good for sight singing as an aural test. As sight reading in a singing exam it might be different, and it's not my area. Sorry to invade the voice forum but singing in numbers is a definite no.

I tend to use a mixture of movable solfrege, and beginning of well-known tunes to assist in sight singing.

Where there is an accompaniment, I help by pointing out where the accompaniment and voice part co-incide pointing out that this is a place where you can correct yourself.

The biggest hurdle with sightsinging is the pupils themselves who convince themselves they cannot do it and this becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Trinity's Sound at Sight series (meant for their examinations) are excellent.

True - I was convinced I was pretty naff at sight-singing till I started having singing lessons and had to sight-sing things most lessons... to my surprise I found I'm pretty reasonable at it.

Why??? It's no different from using solfa - just means you don't have to learn the names first. Numbers are more logical.

I used to think I was really rubbish at sight singing, then realised in fact that what I was rubbish at was trusting my hearing of notes in my head. If I can stop myself from assuming I'm wrong, I can sing pretty well - any chance this might be your problem?

The other thing that's helped a lot, aside from choral singing, which is fab, is playing musical instruments.



I don't do either, tbh, I sing notes. But the person who is the very best sight singer in our choir uses intervals, as do many, many singers.

When teaching sight-singing I normally start with solfa as it helps orientate a tonal piece around the tonic note. However I do use the interval method to re-inforce eg. "My bonny lies over the ocean" is a Major sixth, "British Grenadiers" is a perfect 4th. It seems to work, and does not confuse my pupils. I learnt using intervals, and sitting next to good sight singers at my church choir. I certainly would not use numbers as I use numbers to reinforce pulse and rhythm.

I learned all those as a primary school child from my violin teacher - we were expected to be able to identify and reproduce intervals from the very start. I think that's why I'm not bad at sight-singing now despite having had very few singing lessons.

The advantage of learning a stringed instrument is that you have to be able to pitch intervals correctly so you putyour fingers on the strings in the right place. Although I don't play a stringed instrument [I contribute to viva strings as my son has started to learn the violin, and alot of the issues are more general anyway] I always think of them as very vocal, as like string players, singers have to learn to place their voice. we may not have four strings as guidelines, but aurally the demands are very similar.

Yes, I agree. I think they complement each other rather well I was fortunate to have a teacher at the start who was terribly keen on the aural approach to music and to playing the violin, so we were established in good habits early on.

Teach yourself sight-singing by learning the Sol-fa (doh, re, mi etc). It's old-fashioned now but there is no finer way to learn sigh-singing.

Doh - first degree of scale

Ray - second degree of scale

Mi - third degree of scale

Fah - fourth degree of scale

Soh - fifth degree of scale

Lah - sixth degree of scale

Teh - seventh degree of scale

(back to doh)


I used to sing: doh ray doh mi doh fah doh soh doh lah doh teh doh doh' doh (then do it backwards)

Get used to sing ray to lah, or mi to teh etc.

Write in the the sol-fa names under the notes you want to sigh-read to begin with to heop you.

I used to play the violin and found that I could get good intonation and play by ear from early on. However When i read the music i didnt think, "oh thats a D that goes here" i just looked at where it was on the stave and remebered that that went with a certain finger positioning! I think that has been unhelpful to my singing as if I had known that names of the notes i may have been able to associate them with intervals in sight singing ? Is this true, im taking up the saxophone next year do you think this may help. By the way thank you all for the information it's very usefull!

oh, also does anyone know of any good sites perhaps where you could find exersises to improve your sight singing. Maybe by seeing how big the jump is between different notes, it plays it for you and you practise. I think i saw a site like this one time but i cant remeber how to find it!

I just did a quick google search and found this:-

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/N...es/sitesing.htm

Looks interesting, now going to give it a go

You are better off with books. There are the Turnbull books for ABRSM, and "Sound at sight" for Trinity. SOund at sight is excellent whether or not you are doing Trinity exams.

I have 'Sound at Sight' - but it's a piano sight reading book. Is it available for Sight-Singing too?

For Sight-singing practice, I use Improve Your Sight-Singing by Paul Harris and Mike Brewer.