5/26/2018 Great Singers Breathing
1/3
MUSIC 241Vocal PedagogyGreat Singers on Great Singing:
Breathing
From Great Singers on Great Singing,by Jerome Hines
Lift the chest a little from the back, mostly by lifting the
head expressively . . . as when
youre shocked. If you inhale using the tummy alone and pull it
in to sing . . . you will nothave a long career. You start to lose
the support. If you push down with the chest andabdomen, where do
you get the breath? Expand down and push up to sing. You
shouldleave your belly in, expand your chest and back, and you
should use your hands and armsin an upward sweep to get a full
breath. It is a taller feeling and pulls the shoulders back
to a good posture.Licia Albanese
Im in accord only with natural breathing: to notsing with the
chest, but use thediaphragm. Its not necessary to make a great
study, because if the diaphragm responds,
you go.Franco Corelli
If a note is properly supported, when you are singing, somebody
might even be able tohit youhe indicated the stomach areaand that
note is still there.Placido Domingo
The only muscles which should work are these . . . (he indicated
the area just under theribs in the front). Thats my diaphragm. When
you inhale you fill the lower parts of the
lungs first, so automatically your ribs have a movement out. The
support is the
movement, with the help of your abdomen, under the sides of the
rib cage. If you sing ahigh note, what do you feel with regard to
the diaphragm? I think its a double kind of
movement . . . of working of muscles . . . even up a little. Its
both. Its like a bowelmovement. If one could see through the body,
I would say that the rib cage, through thatmuscle work, is
expanding outward . . . and something in between is holding it up.
The
outer muscles below the ribs have a tendency to go out. You use
your chest also as aresonator . . . as a support.Nicolai Gedda
When I breathe, my diaphragm goes out, the whole rib cage fills,
and the back musclesare absolutely engaged to their fullest. Its
almost as though theres air around there too.Its as if the whole
thing just opens up, an automatic mechanism that happens by
pushingout the diaphragm. Depending on the difficulty of the
phrase, I will engage other musclesin my body. [In order to
negotiate coloratura clearly] I find that I must use my
buttocks.Its almost as if the buttocks muscles tighten also, like a
support below the support. When
you got for an extremely high note, your back stiffens, goes
very straight.MarilynHorne
[Answering the question What did your teacher tell you about
breathing?] I didnthave trouble with breathing.Zinka Milanov
[Pressed to further explain her breathing technique] You have to
have the feeling, whenyou start to sing, like a snake would go from
here over to here . . . She moved her handfrom the solar plexus
region, just below the ribs, to the larynx and then to the
mouth.
Zinka Milanov
5/26/2018 Great Singers Breathing
2/3
When we breathe in, the diaphragm, which is a curved muscle here
[he indicated thebottom of the rib cage], as it starts to flatten,
pulls the lungs down. That creates a partialvacuum and in goes air.
As the diaphragm goes down it tends to displace organs and
other things in a manner which makes expansion all the way
around . . . notjust in thefront or the sides, but also in the
back.Sherrill Milnes
The sensation is very simple. You take a breath and stay in the
position as when you arein the bathroom . . . and you keep this
position until the phrase is finished. You mustpush, like a woman
in labor, giving birth . . . it is the same thing. When you push
like
that, the diaphragm comes up.Luciano Pavarotti
I was taught to breathe deeply through the thorax with . . .
lets say, the diaphragm, aseveryone doesbut it feels like the pit
of the stomach, or the abdomen, really. Its deeper
than the stomach, its the pit of the abdomen.Joan Sutherland
[On the subject of support] Its is like a floor. It is like a
balloon. Its like a floor holding
an air-filled balloon . . . without tying the top of the
balloon, though.Joan Sutherland
