The five-note scale warm-up

Play it in your range

Piano: Salamander Grand Piano V3 by Alexander Holm, licensed under CC BY 3.0. Retuned, shortened and compressed for this site.

The pattern

The five-note scale is the first five notes of a major scale, sung up and back down without a break: do re mi fa sol fa mi re do. The steps between the notes are whole, whole, half, whole, so the pattern fits inside a fifth, seven half steps from bottom to top.

After each round the piano moves a half step and you sing it again in the new key. That's how one short pattern covers your whole range.

Why singers start with it

It asks very little of the voice. There are no leaps, so you can follow every note by ear, and each key stays inside a fifth, in one part of your voice, before the piano moves on.

Because it moves by step, it suits legato, smooth and connected singing, and it's the natural carrier for the first sounds of a warm-up: trills, hums and closed vowels.

It also travels well. Half a step at a time, it walks through your range in small, even moves, so you notice where your voice changes without forcing anything.

How Scalita uses it

It's the backbone of the app: 12 of Scalita's 15 routines use it, and 10 of them open on it, nine of those with a trill. The piano starts from a key that sits comfortably for you and moves a half step at a time through the range you saved.

In the routines it mostly carries trills and hums. Gentle / Recovery, the cool-down, is built almost entirely on it.

Singing it on note names

You can sing the pattern on its note names too. In movable do, used in music classes and choirs in English-speaking countries and in Indonesia, do is wherever the pattern starts, so every key is do re mi fa sol fa mi re do. Numbered notation writes the same thing as 1 2 3 4 5 4 3 2 1.

In fixed do, used in Spain, France, Italy, Brazil, Turkey and Latin America, do is always C. The names change with the key, and you sing each note's own name without its sharp or flat. Scalita's Do Re Mi routine shows each note's name the way your notation writes it, so it works either way. More on this in note names and octaves.

Smaller and bigger versions

• 3 Note, 1 2 3 2 1: the same idea in less space.
• 5 Note Descending, 5 4 3 2 1: it starts at the top and comes down.
• Major / Octave: the whole major scale, once the voice is going.

Syllables Scalita pairs it with

Routines that use it

General Warmup, Range Extension, Power & Volume, Agility & Runs, Breath Control & Stamina, Gentle / Recovery, Pre-Performance Quick, Do Re Mi, Heavy Rock / Distortion, Classical / Opera, Bridge Builder, Vocal Coach I