So I'm helping a friend learn how to sing...

[A B Up Start]

just do what every musician does these days....use autotune. (jk)  

[musiknerd]

maui boy no ka oi

And I've never sung a note in my life. My range is pathetic, my breaths are regular (after every 2 or 3 bars), and my long E's sound weird. Anyone got any fixes/advice for the last? I'm pretty sure I can fix the other 2 with practice.

Well, breath is the most important thing to have with singing. If your breath sucks, your singing sucks. Make sure you think of breathing low. The first thing you should accomplish is breathing without the shoulders moving. The breath should be relaxed. Depending on individual problems I would suggest different exercises to achieve good breath. Here are 2 things that really helped me:
1. Get rid of all of your air, then take a deep breath. The stomach (or what you think is your stomach) should freely expand. This is the feeling you want all of the time.

2. (Do this separate from the suggestion above) Take a sharp breath in. The tongue should be raised near the soft palate, and it will sound like an angry cat. This should give you a good breath along with raising your soft palate.

To learn to sustain breath, do exercises with hissing on "S" for a set number of counts; each count being a second. It is usually done in groups of 4 (4, 8, 12, 16). Eventually, the "S" should be able to be held out for at least 16 seconds.

My favorite warm-ups are legato arpeggios with "Ah" and "Oh." Staccato is helpful to attain energy (and to realize that you do have a diaphragm).

If intonation is bad: It is probably a breath and energy problem, but the soft palate also may be too low (which is usually fixed by good breathing and energy). I'm assuming you're talking about Classical singing, but with popular singing, the soft palate is not raised and your breath intake should be less.

Sorry for the long post, but there is much to vocal technique stuff. If you need more advice, just ask! PM's may be best, because I am not great with checking these forums. I hope this helps!

P.S. The "E" may be in one of your passaggios, or when you switch registers. I don't know much about the male voice, but I'm assuming it's the same. Do exercises like arpeggios and 5-note scales (going up then back down or vice versa) with that "E" being the highest note if you're going up (arpeggio: lowE, G#, B, then the problem"E", and go back down to B, G#, lowE), or the lowest note if you're approaching it from above. I don't know what E is giving you the problem, but I think you get the idea. Also, go beyond this E in either direction. Do not let this E be the highest or lowest of your complete warm-up.  

[musiknerd]

maui boy no ka oi

I do 1 and 3 already but for different reasons. As for 2, what is a soft palate? I have no idea what you're talking about there. Also as for where voices usually switch registers, they are either in the A-B region of the E-F region. It's almost never, if it ever even is, in other regions.

There are no set "notes" for passaggios. Maybe some places are more common than others. The soft palate is what goes up when you yawn. Literally if you take the tip of the tongue to the top of your mouth you will feel the rigid part in the front (hard palate) and the soft part in the back (soft palate). The soft palate has the ability to raise and lower. But don't think of yawning when you sing- a good breath should get the palate up (again, I'm assuming you're talking about Classical singing). Yawning paralyzes the tongue which is a major part (and obstacle) of singing.

Oh, and for the breathing exercise that I mentioned earlier, the back of your tongue goes towards the soft palate.