Against this it has been urged that it is unnatural, not according to what is found in man and other animals in nature. It is perhaps forgotten that when we make a great effort, as in lifting, we put the breathing apparatus into just this state; we gird up our loins—or the equivalent of that process—so that this method cannot be said to be contrary to nature. The only question seems to be as to whether it is necessary and advantageous, or wasteful of energy. For ordinary efforts it does not seem to be necessary, though the chest must in singing and speaking always be held more or less full, not by any deliberate and painful effort, but in a quiet, unobtrusive way.
The diagram ([Fig. 44]) will make the difference in the theories referred to clear.
Up to the present the student has been urged to fill his chest, after days of less vigorous practice, to the fullest, retain the mechanism in this condition for a short time, and then in the slowest and most regular fashion relax it, the purpose being development and control. In actual speaking and singing such breathing is not usually either possible or desirable.
Nature herself always works with the least possible expenditure of energy and with power in reserve. These must be the voice-user's principles, to be deliberately and persistently applied. To fill the chest to the fullest on all occasions is to use up energy to no purpose and to induce fatigue. Art is ever economical. Effort, obvious effort, detracts from the listener's enjoyment. Ease in the executant corresponds with enjoyment in the listener, or, at all events, if nothing more, it puts him in such a frame of mind, that the more positive qualities of the performance find him in an undisturbed, receptive state.
The singer or speaker must breathe easily and adequately, but not so as to waste his energies. Prior to the execution of his task, he should consider what respiratory efficiency calls for in the case of any particular phrase, and meet this without waste—i.e., fully, but with something to spare. For the best art, as well as the soundest technique, there should always be in the executant enough and to spare. Let the last word be so uttered or sung that the listener may feel, however vigorous the passage, that more could have been done had it been required; in other words, speak or sing the last word feeling that several others might follow did one so choose.
When this principle of reserve force is not observed, the voice-user may distress himself or his audience in a variety of ways, among others by a bad habit known as "pumping"—i.e., endeavoring to produce sound when the breath power is really spent. It is only necessary to refer to it for a moment that its unwisdom and physiological unrighteousness may be apparent.
Another term, coup de glotte (blow or shock of the glottis), has led to so much confusion and misunderstanding, which unfortunately, has been followed by erroneous practice, that it would be well if its further employment were abandoned.
Breathing, so far as voice-production is concerned, is for the sole purpose of causing the vocal bands to vibrate; and at this stage we may say that the perfection of any vocal result depends wholly on the efficiency with which these vibrations are produced, so that breathing and tone are brought together, so to speak, by the mediation of these little bands, the vocal cords; and this is the justification for speaking of the larynx as the vocal organ. This usage, however, is objectionable, as it tends to narrowness and to divert the mind from other highly important parts of the vocal mechanism. In one sense, the respiratory organs and the resonance-chambers are each as important as the larynx.
The term coup de glotte has been sometimes employed as the equivalent of "attack," and again as the synonym of nearly all that is bad in voice-production. As to this latter, all depends on the sense in which the term is employed.
Before the vocal bands can be set into suitable vibrations the expiratory breath-stream must be directed against them in a special manner, and they themselves must be adapted to the blast. It is a case of complex and beautiful adaptation. The clarinet or flute player must learn to "blow," and equally must the singer learn to use his breath. The processes each employs, though not identical, are closely related; both use the breath to cause vibrations, and there can be none that are effective, in either case, except a certain relation of adaptation of breath-stream to instrument be effected—with the clarinet-player, adjustment of breath to reed, and with the voice-user, of breath to vocal bands.