I often will take a 'biopsy' from a chant or anthem to be rehearsed and build a vocalise around it. For instance, making an exercise out of one or two crucial examples of quilisma, podatus, or such in an introit or other proper to be practiced at that rehearsal. One can vary the vowel in these exercises, as well as the pitch, etc. This will pay off when one actually gets down to practicing that chant.

Also, I often ask one scholar to choose any note and any vowel and perform it softly, or mediumly, or loudly, (his or her choice), and have him or her hold it (straightly!, no wavering of tone!) whilst everyone enters one by one and perfectly matches the one who initiated the example. This builds consciousness of blend and makes a ludic teamwork of it.

We also practice leaps of various intervals, listening self critically for perfection in matching pitch, vowel quality, and even consonant quality.

If there are particular diction problems that will be encountered during the evening's chant or harmony, these will be made a game of at vocalise time.

You can use your imagination and add to these few examples your own useful excercises. The idea is to tie vocalise to the evening's offering of music to be rehearsed.

I rarely use vocalises from books, but prefer to hone techniques required for an intelligent mastery of problems that are inherent in our music.

These include wild, sometimes silly, always exaggerated configurations of face and mouth muscles. Ditto strange things that we can do with our voices that may be useful in how to sing certain syllables, words, or phrases with inimitable clarity.

(Recall how small children reach a certain age at which they go about making really crazy faces and weird sounds with their voices? They are discovering the fascinating array of self-expression by face and voice that is theirs as human persons. This is essential for those who would be singers. Imitate these children. Your face should 'look like', and your voice 'sound like', each word you sing! Every last syllable is as a precious gemstone that you are offering to God, and should sound like it. Developing a consciousness of this is a function of spiritual vocalise. )

Practicing the correct use of the diaphragm is also de riguer - inhaling, and exhaling on one or more pitches or note groups. Emptying the lungs without a loss of wind pressure due to correct use of the diaphragm will bring many problems to a well deserved end.

Too: don't overlook intonation in vocalising! Choose any vowel-consonant combination and make a vocalise of perfectly uniform group intonation on that example. Most any challenging word or short word sense unit will do. Tricky examples, such as perfectly uniform forming of, say, 'quell', or 'cantankerous', or just about anything that will be challenging as a group experience. Sometimes the more bizarre the better.

Getting rid of the 'err' in 'r' can be focused on, too.
Clean group execution of 'l', etc., etc., the 'wuh' in 'w', - just about any picky thing that you can think of to have fun with - but always tie it to the evening's rehearsal fare.

Don't overlook dynamics as food for vocalises! Choose a tone or group of tones and go from p to f, or from f to p, and back; or with an > followed by pp. One of the greatest challenges in choral direction is to get people to understand and exploit tonal variety as part and parcel of music making. So they get the right note? Big deal. So what? They need to play around with the idea that if one accents a note and then doesn't sing the following one softly, one isn't 'accenting' , one is just getting louder. Much fun can be had refining these ideas at vocalise times. Practice quick changes of dynamic and be sure that your scholars understand your signals for them and respond spontaneously.

In short: analyse the music which you are going to rehearse and extract vocalises from it.

Also, and this is very important! I do not use an instrument for vocalising. Nor do I use one at mass for chant or motets. In fact, if something has no integral accompaniment, I teach it absolutely a capella. There is no better ear training. Especially, if you are teaching chant, teach it by singing it yourself the way it is supposed to sound and do not use an instrument. Chant is vocal, and only the voice can teach it.

(Organs have many legitimate uses at mass: accompanying anthems, NON-chant hymns, and ordinaries that have real accompanimental parts, playing voluntaries and ad libitum improvisation, and so forth. BUT! Their job is not to cover up sloppy choral technique and ill-prepared choral singing. A choir or schola should be able to stand on its own - even in those pieces which have independent instrumental parts. As for the piano: it may have legitimate uses at rehearsals, but has no legitimate use or place at liturgy. [In fact, a parish that advertises that it has a grand piano, so what!, is one that one doesn't wish to be at. Have you noticed that few advertise that they have, say, a von Beckerath organ?])