Building Your Own Stamina

Lisa Popeil

You’ve just finished a four-hour gig and feeling wiped out. Muscles hurt, you can barely see straight and you need to somehow revive yourself for the after-show meet-and-greet. If you feel like you just ran a half-marathon, you’re probably right. Whether you sing or play an instrument, the muscular and aerobic toll on performers is enormous. Music is a sport, even though your body may not be traveling and there’s no ball in play!

To reach the top of your game, you need to build your stamina for the rigors of the stage and the road. Keeping within the sports analogy, we have much to gain from the work of sport physiologists and coaches. One basic rule for stamina training in sports is‘training-plus-recovery-equals adaptation’. There are many ways of guaging training for musicians: how long can I sing before fatigue sets in, how many nights in a row can I play before exhaustion takes over, how fast or high can I play before cramping begins. Although professional athletes may benefit by having a high pain tolerance, ignoring pain should not be a goal for performers. Our instruments: voice, hands, fingers, lips (for wind players) need fine motor control, not brute force to get the job done. Injuries are not an option for a musician who wants to play for a lifetime.

Recovery is the part of the formula which includes not only rest but also a change of activity such as stretching or moving in opposition to one’s repetitive action. Adaptation, meaning the extent to which the body has changed itself with improved strength and stamina, is probably somewhat genetically determined but defective relatives should not deter a musician from aiming for the highest pinnacle of physical conditioning.

Singers have the greatest challenge since the mode of their musical production is approximately the size of a dime. Hoarseness lurks as an unwanted but persistent stalker in the life of the professional singer and is caused by the swelling of the vocal folds. Most specifically, this edema is a buildup of a gelatinous substance in the layer underneath the vocal fold surface. The swelling impacts the folds’ ability to vibrate which creates the hoarse sound.

In general, there seem to be two distinct types of fatigue: muscle fatigue and tissue fatigue. Muscle fatigue can be experienced as tightness, pain or a muscle losing its ability to function. Tissue fatigue, especially for singers, can be felt as rawness or soreness along with redness and swelling.

Though the mechanism of muscle fatigue and regeneration is not thoroughly known, it has been theorized that for singers, the period of time for the vocal fold tissue to completely repair itself after strenuous overuse may take anywhere from a few hours up to three days! Female singers fatigue more quickly than men, because their vocal folds vibrate as much as 1 1/2 to twice as fast since they sing higher notes. Remember that when singing the A above middle C, one’s vocal folds must open and close an astounding 400 times per second.

Here are some tips to help singers and musicians create a practice regimen geared for increasing endurance and managing muscle building and repair:

1) Every 60-90 minutes, drink water and eat something to keep your blood sugar from dropping.

2) Aim for a professional 15-20 hours per week of musical activity.

3) Don’t accelerate your training level too rapidly; consider beginning at an hour a day (technique and songs), then increasing each week by one-two hours.

4) Remember the cardinal rule for sports: stretch, warm-up lightly, train and then cooldown. For musicians, warming up and cooling down are exercises which are shorter in length, softer in volume and generally lower in pitch and effort than regular training exercises.

5) Massage your musical muscles. Get out the lotion and gently massage the tension away.

6) Alternate hard days and easy days. You might want to do a little more one day and a little less another day. If your musical workouts are really strenuous, consider taking one whole day off.

7) FInd balance in your life. Though your physical development program might make you into a veritable killing machine on stage, without spiritual, social and emotional health, your music will suffer.

Creating a practice schedule to improve musical skills is standard operating procedure for those who strive for excellence. Once your skills are at a high level, it becomes time to focus on strategizing for stamina. That way you’ll not only have enough energy to get through several long sets but be able to charm your way through the meet-and-greet afterwards.