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How long should a singer (not a beginner but average) practice daily? How long do professional singers practice daily?

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  • I don't think asking about how much specific performers practise is quite on-topic here, though it might be on Music Fans.
    – user28
    Mar 27, 2016 at 6:45

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Depends on the style of singing.... If you want to sing rock and belt in your highest part of your register and need to sing into your passaggio it takes a lot of practice.. Its so easy to start "shouting" on the early notes of the passaggio.

For men this part of the voice is never used in daily talking etc.. So in order to get the delicate control of the muscles involved you need to do a lot of practice to be able to sing in you mix and headvoice with connected vocals chords (not falsetto) and keep a fairly constant volume level as you go up and down through your chest voice to your headvoice adn back into your chestvoice,,

THe control is also related to the correct airpressure.. Its a delicate balance.. to little support (air pressure) and your voice flips into falsetto, which is safe and will not harm your voice,, to much pressure and you start shouting, larynx will rise and you quickly feel vocal fatgigue...

I can recommend Kevin Richards on youtube.. He also will give lessons on skype.. HE is a deeper baritone and he demonstrates how he can go from C3 to C5 in connected mode (not falsetto) and maintain an even balance and volume.. This takes a lot of practice.. THere is no easy fix if you want to do good healthy singing in your highest range in a rock setting..

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Because singing is so physical, the answer to this is the same as for athletes who are training. You want to do enough singing that you can perform at the level you want to perform, but without burning out or getting injured.

If you don’t have a particular agenda such as upcoming live shows or recording sessions, then 30 minutes per day with a 2–3 days off per week is enough to stay in shape.

If you are going to be doing 2 hour live shows, then you want to build up your singing time day by day until you are comfortably doing 2 hour sessions. Same goes for whatever time and intensity that you need to sing for. You want to work up to it gradually to lessen the chance of injury. And you want to get lots of rest to let the voice recover to be ready for the next day.

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Even more important than "how long" you practice is how focused and deliberate you are while practicing. You can sing for hours a day just having fun singing along to songs or messing around and not gain any significant improvement. There is a lot more to practice than the length of time you spend practicing and even though I'm not a singer I have experienced this first hand as a musician.

You may have heard the saying "practice makes perfect", but I prefer the saying "practice makes permanent". HOW you practice is far more important because if you practice for hours and hours incorrectly then you will perform incorrectly and it will be that much harder to correct later. Improving your mindset regarding how you practice will make far more improvement in your singing than just increasing the time you spend on partially focused practicing.

Deliberate practice involves things like diagnosing your problem areas, practicing specific exercises that isolate your weak areas to make them stronger, actively paying attention to whether or not you are doing them correctly, paying close attention to your technique and whether you are tensed up or relaxed, etc. Doing simple and pointed exercises develop muscle memory so that eventually you don't have to think about it because your muscles know how to perform correctly. But it takes a lot of focus and effort to get to that point. Maybe even seek out a good vocal coach in your area as they will (hopefully) be better at diagnosing problem areas and have exercises for correcting them.

Another great method for diagnosing problems on your own is to record yourself (video if possible) and listen and watch yourself back. This will also allow you to pick out things you didn't catch while performing in the moment.

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  • I think the OP is asking for instance about whether "practicing for hours and hours a day" is sensible - I think you could run some risks doing this even with good warmup, just as if you tried to run a marathon when you started running!
    – Mr. Boy
    Mar 27, 2016 at 19:08
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I've been Professional singer over 30 years and I must say its not how long or how much you practice. It is more of what you are practicing. My favorite vocal is the "SHHHHH" vocal exercise. This will help build strong vocal chords and breathing. AS LOUD AND AS LONG YOU CAN...SHSHSHSHSH... This can be annoying to others. so you may want to practice this privately ...

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