Releasing Tension
A primary goal of music making, whether singing, playing the piano, or playing any other instrument, is to release tension. To the greatest extent possible, we want to strive for tension-free singing, and tension-free playing.
Tension is tightness, and it can occur all over our bodies, inside and out, up and down. Tension can be happening even if we are unaware of its presence. Tension can reduce our effectiveness in singing and playing, can increase anxiety while playing, and can induce soreness, pain, and even injury.
One ironic problem with striving to reduce or eliminate tension is that too much effort placed on trying to get rid of tension too quickly can actually increase tension. A teacher who over-stresses the idea of reducing tension with a student, for example, is likely to increase both anxiety and tension in that student. Of great importance, therefore, is that the learning environment itself needs to be tension-free.
Effective teachers learn and develop ways to help students reduce tension by employing effective teaching strategies that include nurturing healthy relationships with students, developing each student’s trust and confidence in themselves and their abilities, helping students release tension without necessarily (specifically, or always) calling it that, maintaining a tension-free learning environment, and teaching healthy singing and playing technique that avoids, reduces, or releases tension.
Effective teachers also know the importance of time. Working on improving things too fast, too aggressively, with too much emphasis on right-ness and wrong-ness, often results in negative outcomes. Teaching and learning in a stress-free and tension-free environment can go a long way toward letting time heal wounds and solve technical struggles. Many problems work themselves out over time simply by being in a healthy environment. (If you are a student in an unhealthy learning environment, get out, or ask for outside help.)
Some students have trouble recognizing that they are holding tension in their bodies. For these students, it can be helpful to employ simple exercises that enable a student to feel the difference between holding tension and releasing tension. For some students, it can be difficult to release tension, or even simply to relax certain parts of their bodies.
Here are some tension-reducing activities that can help some students “feel what it feels like” to have less tension. Perform these exercises several times each, on many occasions (such as daily) over an appropriate (extended) period of time.
1. Lift your shoulders high (to ears), hold, and then release (drop) them.
2. Lift your arms high, reaching up to “touch the sky,” hold, and then release (drop) them.
3. Spread your hands wide open, fingers outstretched, hold, and then release them.
4. Open mouth very wide, as in a huge yawn, hold, then release mouth, jaw, and face.
5. Stand, twist back and forth at the waist, and let your arms flop around freely, wherever they go.
6. Walk, and while walking, let your arms flop freely at your side, or wherever they go.
7. Spread your feet wide open, toes outstretched, hold, and then release them.
Once the above are mastered, these additional exercises can be used. (Be aware that some students will unconsciously try to control the drop, slowing it down. The goal is to completely “let go” and drop freely.)
8. Stand, lift arms parallel with floor, hold, then release them, dropping by side.
9. Sit in an open chair, lift up arms parallel with floor, hold, then release them, dropping in lap.
Finally, work on the breath, and breathing.
10. Take in a deep breath of air, without lifting the shoulders or clenching any muscles. Hold in the air, release any part of the body that feels tight, and then release, let it all go.
Engage in these activities without trying to apply them directly or immediately to the voice, piano, or other instrument. Focus for a time just on the feeling of releasing tension.