Blue is one of the most well-known blues and jazz vocalists of all time, with her deep, emotive voice that has been captivating audiences for decades. To learn to sing like Blue, it is essential to focus on the following techniques and styles that she was known for:

Unique Vocal Techniques

1. Vocal timbre and phrasing: Blue was a master of phrasing, which emphasized the bluesy, melancholy quality of her voice. Pay attention to her use of slides, bends, scoops, and vocal fry.
2. Smooth legato: Blue has a prominent use of legato phrasing, meaning that notes are sung smoothly and connected to one another.
3. Vibrato: She uses a slow, wide vibrato in many of her songs to add more emotion to her performance. You can watch this video to learn how to incorporate vibrato into your own singing.

Songs Showcasing Blue's Techniques

1. God Bless the Child: This song captures perfectly Blue's vocal range and showcase her use of legato and vibrato, as well as phrasing that hardly follows the original melody.
2. Don't Explain: This song is an excellent example of her ability to use bends and slides to draw out notes and create a mournful, bluesy feeling.
3. Strange Fruit: This haunting and often disturbing song is an example of Billie Holiday's ability to use silence, breathing, and phrasing to create drama and tension.

Practical Advice

1. Practice breathing techniques that help you support your voice. Take lessons from breath support, breathing basics, and breath support articles.
2. Work on articulation to bring clarity to your lyrics, while still maintaining the smoky, emotive quality that Blue was known for. Exercises like the finger bite can help you achieve this.
3. Study vocal range, identify your range, and practice hitting the notes within it. Use the Singing Carrots vocal range test, to find out your vocal range, and then find songs that match your range using Singing Carrots song search.

Singing Carrots Resources

1. Practice warm-ups, pitch visualizer, and exercises for range and agility at Singing Carrots pitch training.
2. Learn effective song-learning approaches with the How to Learn a Song Effectively article.
3. Check out singing tips and tutorials in the Singing with Intuition, Skills, Emotion, and Thinking article.
4. Get inspiration and guidance on how to sing your favorite songs with the Singing Carrots song book.
5. Improve your vocal knowledge with Singing Carrots educational singing course to enhance your singing skills with actionable tips on mindset, technique, and performance.

Now that you have the tools and knowledge to sing like Blue, start practicing, and soon you too will be captivating audiences with your smoky, emotional voice.