Well I guess the title says it all really!

I really really lack confidence when I have to sing anything so obviously aural parts of exams are a nighmare I would love be able to just confidently hold a simple tune - I'm not asking to be a fantastic opera singer or anything but I can't even join in singing Happy birthday for fear of being out of tune!!

So my question is what can I do to improve? Are there any exercises I could do to strengthen my voice. What normally happens is I struggle to find the starting note and I wobble around the notes until I manage to get the right one - Sounds really great I'm sure you can imagine

Please help me!

I know exactly how that feels!

But don’t despair; no-one has that bad an ear that they can’t ever do anything about it. When I was small, I had a badly perforated ear drum and it affected my ability to hear some of the higher notes… but I manage (albeit poorly!).

What you need to do is just practise a lot. Have you got a computer program that will help you? I use EarMaster, which takes you from a very basic level to a higher level. I don’t know about any other programs as I’m not very advanced in aural yet but I’m sure one of the others can recommend one!

It also sounds like you have very little confidence in your own ability. Don’t be afraid to join in with singing; if you enjoy singing it will show and will actually help you improve as you won’t be so tense. You could also find someone that you aren’t shy of singing in front of and mess around a bit; you might find that it also helps you relax a bit… most people are better than they think they are as well!

You can buy the aural in training practice cd's to accompany the grade you are doing. This would help as you can do it at your own pace and go over the same section as many times as you need to. The examiners are not looking for pitch perfect singing. They are more interested in your ability to recognise rhythms and tempi. Have you spoken with your tutor about this? Maybe he/she can give you time in your lessons just to go over the aural part of the exams. I do this with my students, as this is the part of the exam they worry about most.

If you play the piano, sit at the keyboard and play different notes at different intervals, singing them back as you do it. This helps in the exam if you need to sing back at different intervals. Start listening to the bass line in music too as when you progress to higher grades, you have the choice of singing the melody or bass lines.

Good luck!

I've said it before and I'll say it again. There is no such thing as 'I can't sing'. If you have a voice, you can sing, just like if you can mark with a pencil you can draw with some practise.

It really is practise, practise, practise, and don't give up when it doesn't work early on. You will get there, and remember they are not looking for super vocal quality, just that you can hold pitch. Solfa is a good tool if you have a teacher who knows about it, failing that just start with simple tunes and work up. Good luck.

I SO know what you mean. Yes, I admit, I sometimes mouth the words to Happy Birthday too (unless I've had a lot to drink then God help those around).

I posted a topic recently about this. In a perfect world, with unlimited time and money, I'd enrol in singing lessons using the solfa system. But alas, such is life, the examiner will simply end up with a very sore pair of ears when she's finished the aural section with me.

I have to admit, that I've been practising for at least 30 minutes for about 2 months, religiously, every day and progress has been very slight but there has been progress.

I have to say - this isn't true - because some people genuinely have no sense of pitch (amusics)

However - this is very rare, and someone who was amusic wouldn't have any pleasure in music or know whether they were out of tune or not/would be deeply unlikely to be learning to play an instrument. So don't despair!

Is there a choir or similar you could join? Something amateur and very much for fun. The best way to gain confidence is to do it, IMO, in a way that's fun and lets you make mistakes. Practice will help, even if progress is slow.

The very fact that you "I would love be able to just confidently hold a simple tune" is your biggest ally... you want to be able to do it.

If you've someone willing to help you, get them to sing notes that you can sing back - it's easier to start pitching from a voice than from a piano note.

I have a friend whose singing is truly awful - but even she can pitch back notes if I sing them to her, within her very limited range.

I just hate singing... but that's my opinion... I'm was forced to join my school choir... if that says it all!

Eureka! A soulmate!

My G1 examiner wrote on the exam sheet that I "varied in pitch quite considerably" But I still passed with a Merit so I don't think you need worry unduly.

A couple of years ago I went on a weekend course called "Singing for the Tone Deaf". It was brilliant! All the members of the course came out with so much confidence that we all wanted to go and join our nearest choir

What I learnt on that course, apart from confidence, is that some people have a more limited range than others. I think you can extend your range with practice, but you need to give it time and commitment.

Incidentally, one of the men on the course who thought he was "tone deaf" turned out to have a truly magnificent deep bass voice. But when singing in his church congregation, he'd been trying to match his pitch to the people around him, which obviously didn't work. He got the confidence to sing at his own level, and it sounded wonderful when put in harmony, rather than competing, with the higher pitches.

There's been another thread recently Grade 8 Aural, which has some very good advice for people at all levels who find it difficult - have a look at it if you haven't already done so.

This might sound silly, but have you tried singing loudly? I always find that I have more confidence if I just go for it and belt it out.... It sounds better too, surprisingly. More so on clarinet but I have applied this to singing successfullly as well! (And my pitching is pretty awful as well, I know what it is supposed to sound like, but can I sing it? No!)

That sounds excellent! Where was it, and who was the tutor? People with pitching problems often refer to themselves as being "tone deaf". As sarah-flute said tone deafness is extremely rare, but does exist. I'm told by someone who has met a person who is genuinely tone deaf that these people speak as if they were in fact deaf, without the normal speech inflections.

In some areas there are now "Can't sing choirs", to get people singing successfully when they are convinced they can't. There might be one in your area.

Most people who refer to themselves as "tone deaf" have normal voices and ears, but can't yet make the link between them properly. I call them "missing link singers". If someone tells you in normally inflected speech that they are tone deaf, you will be able to reassure them that they aren't!

The tutor was Roger Wilkes MA (Cantab), Bmus, Hon FGCM. At the time (2003), he was Director of Mostly Music and formerly Staff Tutor in Music at Manchester College of Adult Education.

The course was at a residential college called Higham Hall in the Lake District. It's a lovely place to spend a weekend - a beautiful old mansion in lovely grounds and the food is exquisite! The link to their web site is Higham Hall (home page). They have a lot of music-related courses coming up - if you want to go direct to the music courses, click on Higham Hall music courses. I see Roger Wilkes is doing a similar course to the one I went on, called "Carols with Confidence".

I know various other residential colleges around the country offer similar courses under different names - if anybody is particularly interested, feel free to send me a PM.

I won't claim to be tone deaf - but I am pretty deaf (about 30% of "normal" hearing) and I really struggle to sing - particulary in terms of how loud or quiet - Rosemary's advice is really good - I can sing loud, no problem - it's just having the confidence to do that in the exam... (and yes, I just ignore dynamics generally).

I have the same problem described by many people here - I just can't seem to pitch properly, I hear one note in my head and a different one comes out of my mouth.

Recently I've been looking into how I might be able to improve and have discovered the following courses that look as though they could help - they're at Morley College in Central London. I haven't attended any so I can't give an opinion on how useful they are yet, but I may make a start in Jan.

I can't seem to get the links to the courses from the address bar, but the main website is

www.morleycollege.ac.uk

If you go to the Course Search page and type in "Can't Sing Choir" you'll get a selection of short courses. There is also a one-day course in Jan called "Tone Deaf? No Way"

Wow thank you so much for all the replies!

Will definitely be trying some of your tips - Rosemary your probably right if I just belted it out it would be ok, its just having the confidence. Especially as people assume that because I'm musical (play clarinet and piano) I should have no problem singing so its especially embarassing when I know in my head what the tune is but it comes out all wrong!!!

To be honest its not even the aural that really bothers me - its such a small section in the exam I just bumble my way through, but I would just love to be able to sing well in general. You know when your talking about a song and someone asks you how it goes I can never sing it even if I know it well, just comes out all wrong

Can anyone tell me more about the Ear Master software - where can I get it and how much does it cost?

Very professional...

You can get an Ear Master demo for free which is quite useful

This is perhaps not the advice that you want to hear but how about taking a few lessons in singing? If you were poor at another skill and wished to improve you would probably do so. Why not give it a go? You might amaze yourself and produce a proper singing voice. Grade one challenge at it?

This is not a pitching problem. If you hear the right note in your head your pitching is fine. If the note you produce is something different the problem is one of technique, almost certainly caused by not taking enough breath and/or by constricting the flow of air out of your lungs (if there is tension anywhere between your diaphragm and your jaw the flow is being constricted and pitch is bound to suffer).

Taking singing lessons is an excellent idea as long as you have a teacher who knows about technique. Not all of them do.

My tip is sing along to any thing you hear - whether it be a tune on the radio or a show, tap the pulse ! sing to anything you hear! it helped me! i sing constantly now ( which is bad in exams and serious situations) !!! hehe