Six Great Harmony-Singing Practice Tips

By Sue Thompson. All rights reserved. www.singharmonynow.com

1. Practice singing the three notes of the major chord going both up and down the chord. Do it

in as many different keys as you can play.

2. Practice singing harmony to the three chord notes, going up and going down, starting on each one of the notes. Do this with both high and low harmony, and if you have 3 people practice doing it as a trio.

3. Look at your songbook. Find the Common Melody Patterns in the songs you sing. Underline them in the lyrics. Practice singing harmony on these parts of the song using a syllable like “na”and using the lyrics from different songs.

4. When singing close harmony with members of the opposite gender: Learn to hear the difference between pitch and tone color in the voice. If you match the tone color, instead of listening for the actual pitch of the note, men and women are likely to sing too far apart.

5. Train your ear to easily recognize the difference between the sound of a unison and an octave.

6. Men: When harmonizing with women, sing high in your range. Women: When harmonizing with men sing low in your range.

To take your harmony singing to the next level, check out our instructional CDs, How to Sing Harmony the Natural Way and Switch On Your Harmony Autopilot. And as always, feel free to contact us if you have questions or if we can help you with your harmony singing!