How to Make Your Straw Phonation in Water Device
At it’s simplest, you put a short length of flexible silicone or vinyl tubing into a standard water bottle. You fill the bottle with only a small amount of water. You vocalize through the tube and into the water. Easy peasy.
- tube length: 14″ to 17″, or 35cm to 45cm.
- tube diameter: mine has an outside diameter (OD) of 3/8″ (10mm) and an inside diameter (ID) of 5/16″ (8mm). It’s okay to use tubing slightly larger or small.
- water height: about 1 1/2″ to 3″ (4cm to 7cm), with the sweet spot about 2″ (5cm). You can vary the water height for different training objectives.
Where to Find Your Silicone Tubing
I found mine at a local hardware store. They had rolls of it and you pay by length. It was cheap. It will last a long, long time.
I live in Brazil and haven’t purchased silicone tubing from Amazon. I did search Amazon and if you copy and paste these phrases below, several good options will turn up.
Possible Search Phrases to use at places like Amazon.com:
- silicon tubing 8mm by 10mm
- silicon tubing 5/16″ ID 3/8″ OD
It’s okay to buy more than you need. They’re inexpensive. I keep one in the car and one in the house. I’ve built them for friends. They make great presents.
The Benefits of Vocal Exercises Using Straw Phonation in Water
I can’t emphasize enough how powerfully transformative this device can be in the hands of a singer who knows how to use it. It has changed my life. And this is true even without the Hypopressive breathing work that I discovered only recently.
I will cover the benefits thoroughly in another post. Here’s a short list of the results I’ve seen over the past 18 months in my own training:
- Massive increase in vocal range. I’m training comfortably over four octave and singing over three octaves.
- Rapid elimination of vocal strain and inefficient movement of muscles, limbs, articulators, etc.
- Remarkable improvement in pitch accuracy.
- Huge increase in vocal strength in both vibrational modes, M1 and M2 (what others call chest & head & falsetto voices).
- I’m developing better dynamic control, from soft tones to strong, edgy tones.
- Fast growing mastery of breath management.