The Song Fight Bulletin Board

I'm a lead(Lucy) in a musical(Jekyll & Hyde) that opens tonight(Thursday). But! I am currently losing my voice. Help, Songfighters! To Action!

QotD: What are your vocal remedies for a sore throat/no voice?

First off. Congrats and break a leg, B.

Second. Getting to bed before 12:30am is a start.

Third. Epsom salt and warm water gargle in case it is an infection and not just stressed vocals.

Fourth, and my fav thing. Tea with lemon and honey. Unprocessed honey is best, but any honey in the house will work.

Yes - honey is the stuff.

And lay off the rum.

QotD: lots of water and rest. Gargling sometimes helps, too. Sometimes throat lozenges.
I don't like honey.

I don't like tea, but it's definitely the stuff.

Break a leg, Bjam!

Billy's Little Trip wrote: Tea with lemon and honey. Unprocessed honey is best, but any honey in the house will work.

The honey is good. Avoid the Lemon because its acidic and that's not going to help. It will just promote reflux and may delay the process. Rest your voice and drink a lot of water. You may wanna breathe some steam too. It's all about keeping those vocal membranes moist.

Niveous wrote:The honey is good. Avoid the Lemon because its acidic and that's not going to help. It will just promote reflux and may delay the process. Rest your voice and drink a lot of water. You may wanna breathe some steam too. It's all about keeping those vocal membranes moist.

Yeah. Raw honey. And room temp water.

Niveous wrote:

Billy's Little Trip wrote: Tea with lemon and honey. Unprocessed honey is best, but any honey in the house will work.

The honey is good. Avoid the Lemon because its acidic and that's not going to help. It will just promote reflux and may delay the process. Rest your voice and drink a lot of water. You may wanna breathe some steam too. It's all about keeping those vocal membranes moist.

Quite the contrary. Lemon juice is a natural disinfectant and will kill bacteria in your throat, which is, in most cases, the cause of the soar throat. I'm sure the vitamin C doesn't hurt either. Honey is a natural antimicrobial (thank you auto spell check). Honey is soothing and will prevent bacteria and infection, but honey isn't very good in killing it.
My mom's German method is with cider vinegar. Absolutely disgusting, but again, it's the acid that kills the bacteria. Honey alone just sooths your throat temporarily.

.......OK, thank you for the call. This is Doctor BLT in the morning *hits button that makes a dog bark and cow moo sound, the another button that says "me so horny"*....all righty then, *hits button that says "t.w.e.r.p. fight radiohhhhhh* next caller, you're on the air with BLT in the morning.

Billy's Little Trip wrote:Quite the contrary. Lemon juice is a natural disinfectant and will kill bacteria in your throat, which is, in most cases, the cause of the soar throat. I'm sure the vitamin C doesn't hurt either. Honey is a natural antimicrobial (thank you auto spell check).

Auto spell check is good. Auto homophone check might be better.

Billy's Little Trip wrote:My mom's German method is with cider vinegar. Absolutely disgusting, but again, it's the acid that kills the bacteria. Honey alone just sooths your throat temporarily.

Ahhh, we used to use cider vinegar, honey and lemon in hot water. Actually quite good.

Billy's Little Trip wrote:

Niveous wrote:

Billy's Little Trip wrote: Tea with lemon and honey. Unprocessed honey is best, but any honey in the house will work.

The honey is good. Avoid the Lemon because its acidic and that's not going to help. It will just promote reflux and may delay the process. Rest your voice and drink a lot of water. You may wanna breathe some steam too. It's all about keeping those vocal membranes moist.

Quite the contrary. Lemon juice is a natural disinfectant and will kill bacteria in your throat, which is, in most cases, the cause of the soar throat. I'm sure the vitamin C doesn't hurt either. Honey is a natural antimicrobial (thank you auto spell check). Honey is soothing and will prevent bacteria and infection, but honey isn't very good in killing it.
My mom's German method is with cider vinegar. Absolutely disgusting, but again, it's the acid that kills the bacteria. Honey alone just sooths your throat temporarily.

Lemons are a natural disinfectant because they are acidic. If the issue is bacterial then yes, it may help. But if it is overwork of the vocal membranes, it may do more harm than good. It matters on if Bjam is feeling sick or if she just overdid the rehearsals. If it is the latter, don't use the lemon.

inevitableguy wrote:

Billy's Little Trip wrote:Quite the contrary. Lemon juice is a natural disinfectant and will kill bacteria in your throat, which is, in most cases, the cause of the soar throat. I'm sure the vitamin C doesn't hurt either. Honey is a natural antimicrobial (thank you auto spell check).

Auto spell check is good. Auto homophone check might be better.

Screw you, I have plenty of gay friends!

...oh, I said soar, didn't I?

For those of you wondering...

I tried pretty much everything. Tea, honey, oil shot(ew, do not recommend this), salt water, water, cough drops...

And I got my voice back! It wasn't perfect, but it was good enough. The show went faaaaaantastically. So wonderful. My character is super whorey, so I think everyone I knew who came to saw it were a touch shocked. If any of you are in Boston and want to see it, there are shows tonight and tomorrow afternoon as well.

If I didn't have plans already tomorrow I would definitely be down to see you be whorey...

Oops, missed giving my two cents on this: Yogi's Egyptian Licorice tea is awesome for sore throats. Way better than black tea with honey.

fluffy wrote:Oops, missed giving my two cents on this: Yogi's Egyptian Licorice tea is awesome for sore throats. Way better than black tea with honey.

Does it clear up chronic rawness from smoking, drinking whiskey, and eating broken glass? Because that's what I need.

PS- I love licorice, I'll have to find some of this. If I'd known they made licorice tea, I'd already be a fan.

I don't know about long-term chronic damage, but when I've been coughing like crazy and it hurts to swallow, or when my throat is extremely sore because of a nasty infection or whatever, licorice tea provides instant relief.

Nyquil tastes like licorice. Maybe there is something to this.

@Mark. I like licorice too. A friend brought me some back from Germany a few years ago because he was told that it's very intense and knew I liked licorice. It is very strong. I'm trying to remember what is was called and I'm pretty sure it was called salmiak pastillenit. It's made from licorice root with no sweetener and it's VERY concentrated and salty. The stuff I got looked like cough drop sized pieces and is hard. If you every come across any, buy it, you'll be surprised.

Salmiakpastillen. Awesome stuff.
They tend to have pretty strong licorice in the Netherlands, too (though typically a lot softer than our Salmiakpastillen).

In contrast, probably the strongest (although still fairly effective) I've seen in the U.S. is Fisherman's Friend -- which is primarily mentholyptus but also has a pretty strong licorice flavoring.

As an alternative, I've always sworn by Jægermeister as a sore-throat remedy -- at least as effective as NyQuil but with a higher alcohol content. One of the 38 secret herbs in their proprietary formula has clearly got to be licorice root as well.

jast wrote:Salmiakpastillen. Awesome stuff.
They tend to have pretty strong licorice in the Netherlands, too (though typically a lot softer than our Salmiakpastillen).

What does that word translate to? I used a translator, but it didn't change the word.

@Eric. Funny that I don't care for Jagermeister. I think because, when I am in a drinking mood, it tastes like cough medicine, then my brain equates it to being sick, lol. But I can drink a rum and coke and eat a piece of licorice without thinking that way.

Billy's Little Trip wrote:What does that word translate to? I used a translator, but it didn't change the word.

Literally, Salmiak translates to ammonium chloride. I'm not quite sure that's the right translation in this case, however.

Edit: wait, it actually is. Salmiakpastillen contain licorice root extract, ammonium chloride and aniseed oil.