So let’s say you are a vocalist about to lay down a track for a new hit single when suddenly you come down with a case of hiccups. Not cool!

What can you do quickly to remedy your situation?

It turns out there are a few ways we can get rid of the hiccups.

But first, let’s understand why hiccups happen

What is a hiccup?

Hiccups happen when the vagus nerve ends up being inflamed and triggers an involuntary contraction, which may quickly interrupt what you’re doing.

Some medical conditions like Parkinson’s or medication drugs, like those taken for chemotherapy, can trigger hiccups as a negative effect– however, usually, hiccups are just a benign problem that won’t need any attention from your physician.

Hiccups frequently happen all of a sudden and can quickly end up being annoying. This triggers people to try all sorts of uncommon and creative ideas to get rid of them.

It comes as no surprise that conversations and theories on how to treat missteps are abundant online. For this factor, it can make be difficult to separate genuine advice from straight-up myths.

Let’s look at the best things to try if you want to get rid of hiccups quickly.

Tips to get rid of hiccups for singers

• Tap or rub the back of your neck
• Rubbing the skin at the back of your neck may promote your phrenic nerve.
• Poke the back of your throat with a cotton swab. Carefully swab the back of your throat with a cotton bud till you gag or cough. Always carry some backstage just in case!
• Sidetrack yourself with something engaging. Hiccups frequently disappear by themselves when you stop focusing on them. Think about your lyrics or what the afterparty of the concert will be like. Do not focus on them and they will go away, like magic!
• Olive oil in your throat. The oil stimulates the vagus nerve and generally triggers the private with the hiccups to burp. When this happens, the sphincter muscle of the lower esophagus unwinds so the contractions can stop. Though necessary oils have ended up being more popular recently because of the series of health benefits they supply, consumers ought to know that not all-important oils are of great quality.
• Take a deep breath and hold it for about 10 seconds. Much of it starts with your diaphragm muscle, which needs to be stretched so that you can avoid sustaining convulsions. Then take a rest and relax. Then hold this for another 10 seconds. Repeat this procedure step for the 3rd time so you would have taken 3 deep breaths, and without releasing the previous one, take another breath while holding it in for a count of ten.
• The holding your breath method is probably the most full-proof if you are on your own. You can also get someone to scare you. The startling can juice up your adrenaline and fight off the hiccups.
• Swallow three times and even do crazy things such as doing a handstand while drinking water has been said to work as well.

Tips for singing with the hiccups

Let’s say you try all these tips and it just doesn’t work for you!

The next thing to do would be to learn how to sing with or without the hiccups.

Unfortunately, hiccups are unpredictable and therefore hard to know when you are going to be in the middle of a note and let a subtle but cute hiccup out.

I would recommend the following tips.

• Cut your phrases unusually short. You don’t know when the next hiccup will come. You are basically playing Russian roulette when you are holding long notes. So keep your notes and phrases shorter than normal.
• Turn your back to the audience. The more you can hide the fact that you have a hiccup the better. You may know your are convulsing and letting out a minuscule sound every once and a while but the audience actually might not notice.
• Move around a bit and distract them with your movements, especially head movements. These movements will distract from your body convulsing when you hiccup.
• If you are caught just smile. Unfortunately, there is nothing you can do. It happens to everyone and we shouldn’t be ashamed. But it can only be as embarrassing as YOU make it.
• In the studio you have the luxury of waiting for a bit, taking a bathroom break, or even just tracking the song in sections. Live performances are different and part of the magic is the mistakes that people make every night.
• Talk to your audience and explain. It could be a very good comedic performance and it will take the pressure off trying to hide it from them. Make yourself the butt of the joke, but then deliver an amazing performance regardless and you’ll gain the respect of the audience. They’ll also have a special memory and story to tell about the concert.
• Ask your band to play an instrumental song or a high-energy song that will allow you to not be the center of attention.