As a singer, you absolutely need to hit the right pitch. If you have a hard time with pitch, learning to get it right will lead to a noticeable improvement in your singing voice. Luckily, problems with pitch often come down to a few simple issues that are quite easy to fix. Here are ten potential reasons why you can’t hit the right pitch.
Poor Posture
Bad posture is easy to fix, but it takes time to get used to standing up straight to the point where if feels natural and you do it without thinking about it. At first you will have to keep reminding yourself to do it. But even just standing up straight for a moment, you will immediately feel the difference. Breathing becomes easier and your confidence improves, too, which leads to the next point.
Poor Confidence
A lack of confidence has a strong impact on your singing voice. It weakens your voice and makes it virtually impossible to sing in tune. Adopting a good posture helps confidence quite a bit, but you also need to believe in yourself and your ability.
Tension
Carrying a tune becomes impossible if your mouth, tongue or throat are tense. Try to loosen your singing muscles by massaging your cheeks and stretching your jaw. Ten to fifteen solid yawns will often do the trick, since they not only stretch the jaw, but also the vocal cords.
Incorrect Tongue Position
If your tongue is in the back of your throat, it prevents your vocal cords from vibrating properly. You want to keep it forward in your mouth, with the tip touching your bottom teeth. I have a number of exercises on my site to help you position your tongue properly.
Exhaling Too Quickly
If you exhale to quickly, your pitch rises. You need to control your breathing to stay in tune. This is a very comon reason why you can’t hit the right pitch.
Using The Wrong Voice
Singing makes use of a head voice and a chest voice. If you can’t hit the right pitch, you have to use them both correctly. For example, when singing vowels, you want to use your head voice to keep the tone from going flat.
Song In The Wrong Key
We often think we should be able to sing every song out there, but that simply isn’t the case. If a song is not in your key, you won’t be able to hit the notes. You might be able to bring it up or down a key, but if not, it’s just not your song.
Yelling Instead Of Singing
Singing too loudly is a common problem. A lot of beginners think they have to yell to project their voice, which might be why they can’t hit the right pitch. A higher volume does not equal a more powerful voice.
Difficulty Matching Notes
This is a bit more difficult to overcome than the other issues, but certainly not impossible. All it takes is practice. Have someone play notes for your then match them with your voice. Keep practicing until you can get them right every time. If you do not have someone to play notes for you, there are online keyboards available, like this one.
Focus On The Wrong Frequencies
Often beginning singers will mistakenly focus on the overtone or undertone, instead of the main tone. Naturally, this a reason you can’t hit the right pitch. If you can, try changing the volume of the overtones and undertones, so you can hear the main tone more clearly.
If you can’t hit the right pitch, it is highly likely you are committing several of the errors on this page. Pick one issue and work on it until it is fixed, then move on to the next one. You should see some improvement almost immediately, but it will take a bit of work to get to the point where you are nailing the pitch each and every time. I know you can do it!
10 reasons you can’t hit the right pitch is a guest post by Camila Rabin, a music teacher who recently started the blog musicaroo.com.
