The Voice: Its Production, Care and Preservation

by Frank E. Miller

To maintain the expanded chest during expiration, which also means during singing, is not difficult. There is nothing forced about it. For if there is the correct pause after inspiration, if the breath is held for a brief space of time, the pressure naturally exerted outward upon the upper chest is readily felt. Accompanying it is a gradual drawing in of the lower abdominal wall, not forceful enough to be called stringent but simply following the return of the diaphragm to its natural position as the lungs return to theirs. Therefore, when it is

stated that if a crescendo is to be produced on a single tone or phrase, this is accomplished by increasing the outward pressure on the chest and the inward and upward pressure of the abdominal muscles; there is no thought of prescribing a sudden and undue strain, but simply of employing more potently and more effectively certain forces of pressure which Nature herself already has brought into play. What is perhaps the most important distinction of this method of breath-control and voice-management is the fact that it relieves the throat of all pressure, the correct tension and vibration of the vocal cords being brought about by the reflex action of muscles and nerves. This lack of strain on the throat does away with all danger of a throaty quality of voice-production, which not only is highly inartistic but also leads to various throat troubles.

Breath-control implies that no breath is wasted, that every particle of breath, as it comes out, is converted into voice. Dissipation of breath results in uncertainty of voice-production, a branch of the subject which will be taken up in the chapter on "attack." An excellent test for economy of breath is to hold a lighted candle before the mouth while singing. If the flame flickers, breath is being wasted,

is coming out as empty air instead of as voice. There is the same difference between voice produced on breath that is under the singer's control and that produced on breath which is not properly steadied, as there is between a line drawn straight and sure by a firm hand and a wavering line drawn by a hand that is nervous and trembling. In fact, in singing the waver of the voice that results from poor control of breath is a tremble, a tremolo, and is one of the worst faults in a singer.

It also should be pointed out that the singer is not to continue an expiration beyond the point when it ceases to be easy for him to do so. As soon as the air-column becomes thin the singer's control over it becomes insecure, and, from that point on, the air that remains should be regarded simply as a reserve supply and aid to the next inspiration.

To sum up: Breathing consists of two separate actions, inspiration and expiration, the intake of air and its emission. Of the three kinds of inspiration mentioned in most books on singing and termed clavicular, abdominal or diaphragmatic, and costal, neither completely fills the bill. The correct method of inspiration is a combination of all three. It is costal—that is indicated by an expansion

of the whole framework of the ribs—assisted by an almost automatic sinking of the diaphragm and a very slight, almost passive, rising of the clavicle, the final detail being a slight sinking in of the lower front wall of the abdomen. In this method, although it is a combination of the three—the clavicular, the diaphragmatic and the costal—the clavicle plays so small a part, that the method may be termed mixed costal and diaphragmatic.

The breath having been taken in, it should be held for a brief space of time.

In expiration, allow the breath to escape very slowly. Maintain the chest firm and expanded, and add, as occasion requires, to the natural inward and upward pressure of the abdominal muscles. Avoid all throat effect. After expiration the chest and abdominal pressure is relaxed and the next inspiration prepared for.

Take in breath through the nostrils, emit it through the mouth. This latter instruction may seem superfluous, but it is not. In the so-called "backward production" of voice, considerable air escapes through the nasal passages and the tone-quality is nasal and disagreeable.