How to breathe properly

Learning to breathe properly is vital to a centered voice.

If you’ve already started the program, i.e. watched the spoken and sung tutorials, read the book, listened to the audio tracks and started practicing with the Vocal Exercises, this article might be helpful if you’re running out of breath when singing, or the note is “wobbling” a lot.

This is usually because the note isn’t supported by the diaphragm. If this is the case, practice the breathing exercises shown in the Level 1 videos.

First of all, just practice singing a single note in the center of your range using the “nnghah” vocal exercise for a while, until there’s more control of the note.

A great visualization for this is that the note is like a small ball at the back of the mouth (actually, 7/8ths back is more accurate:), kept in the air by a jet of air (or water) from the diaphragm.

Main reasons 

There are 4 main reasons for breathing problems when singing:

You’re technique isn’t completely in place yet.

You’re thinking too hard, i.e. the brain isn’t working in tune with the body.

The “thinking too hard” is making you try too hard and over breathe; and

You’re still connected to your old way of breathing only from the chest, and are finding it hard to get out of the habit.

So, in one way or other, the breath feels “stuck”. And that can always be traced back to the solar plexus.

If you’re over thinking, you might well be in the frustrating early stages, when you’re “unthinking” bad habits, and gradually putting better ones in their place.

The problem with learning to sing, especially at first when we’re “putting it all together”, is that we’re intellectually trying to understand something intrinsically emotional. The feeling of patting your head and rubbing your stomach at the same time.

However, show the body how to do something new, change the path of how it used to do something to a new way that works better, and the subconscious will learn the path and take you there automatically, over time.

In other words, using the emotion memory of the body. There are no quick fixes in singing, and the key is to really observe what you’re doing, initially.

For example, practice when you’re cleaning your teeth, where there’s a mirror handy, and see if you’re connecting with your diaphragm as you breathe in!

Sing as much as you can, wherever and whenever, and get used to the feeling of it, of how it feels when you get it right.

Over time, the path will become clearer and clearer. And the more you practice and work at it, the quicker you’ll progress.

Basic rule of thumb: If it feels right and sounds right, then you’re probably doing it right.

Also, be forgiving with your self, especially in the early stages. Don’t expect to be belting out a song perfectly after a week. The voice is a muscle and needs to be developed like any other to truly get the best out of it. And the whole body needs to be involved in the process, working as one.

So you’re programming the body when practicing, then over time learning to get out the way and let the emotion memory do the work for you.

This then gives you confidence when you sing a song, and also leaves you free to truly feel the emotion, trust your instinct, and tell its story.

Practicing a song

In practical terms, when the breath feels “blocked”, the first thing we do is get out of the head and into the body:

Sing a few lines of a song that you know well and that feels comfortable (in the middle of your range).

Find the places in the song to breathe. A good way to do this is to read them out loud, like a poem.

Put the lyric sheet in front of you, and mark where you would naturally breathe when speaking.

You can give yourself leeway here, too. If it’s a long phrase that needs a lot of breath, it’s totally fine – and often more impactful – to take a small sip of breath before the last note, or two notes. As long as it fits with the meter of the lyrics.

For example “Every little beat of my heart” could be broken down into

“Every

Little beat

Of my heart”

Or

“Every little beat

Of my

HEART!”

Or

“Every

Little

Beat

Of

My

HEART!”

Obviously, use your discretion depending on the tune and rhythm and where the lyric line is in the songs’ emotional arc.

Basic practice guidelines 

Close your eyes, sing the song, and whenever you need to take a breath, consciously connect with your diaphragm.

Remember to breathe sideways, and not up into the chest. Relax the diaphragm as you breathe in.

Another practice exercise 

Take a part of a song that has a high note that needs emotion and power behind it.

Find the places in the song to breathe.

Now practice the “Huh!” exercise. The amount of power you can get from this exercise (and my experience is that this can be very hard to get at first, so persevere!). is the amount of true power you can achieve when singing a powerful note.

It has to come from the diaphragm, and you have to let it go as soon as you’ve created the “huh!”. Remember, the diaphragm is making the sound, not the throat:)

When you can make a “Huh!” that rings out, you’re truly connecting with the diaphragm.

Now sing the same passage of the song again, and connect with the power of the diaphragm.

Some problems are sorted quickly and easily. With others it takes time. So the “Huh!” sound is also a way for you to know if everything is working together.

Let it go

And what it comes down to, as far a breathing is concerned, is finding the “getting every thing in place and then letting it go” (rather than the holding on to it) feeling.

You might find that you the note is still falling short, and not sounding supported by the breath. You can hear this when it’s either weak (sounding thin), or wavers slightly as you sing. Or it’s hard to get any power on the dramatic passages of a song.

This means that the diaphragm isn’t yet strong enough. This doesn’t mean that you need to develop a six-pack, but that certain muscles need to work together more efficiently. Once again, practice the breathing exercises in the Level 1 videos.

A simple breathing exercise 

Professional singers learn this by performing many, many gigs, but you can help the process along in a very simple way, using this exercise .

The muscles around the diaphragm are working together in the most profound way at the end of a breath.

So take a deep breath in, breathing out with the diaphragm on either a very quiet sung, even note, or else a “ssss” or “zzzz” sound.

Make the out breath as long as you possibly can, until you absolutely have to take another breath.

It’s that last little bit of air in the lungs when all the muscles are really working together, that helps develop control of the note, and diaphragmatic strength.

The solar plexus 

The solar plexus is the root of the diaphragm’s power. When singing, the solar plexus is the root, the doorway to the emotions.

If you feel you’re not connecting with the meaning of the song, for example, and the performance feels flat, quite often it’s because we’ve been thinking technically, not emotionally, and so not telling the story of the song.

Thus the necessity to develop the voice away from a song, by singing exercises etc, so the body gradually learns “how to sing” automatically and develop true technique.

Then when we sing a song, we concentrate purely on the song, and the meaning of it.

So that when we take a breath in, we naturally connect with the solar plexus, the doorway to the emotion of the song, and the root of the power of the breath, because we’ve trained the body to do this during practice.

Try the “Putting It All Together: Singing A Song” techniques of Chapter 41 of the Level 1 videos. Get connected once again with the meaning of the song, and telling the story of it.  Once again, you can hear when you’re doing it right. It’ll feel right, and sound right.

Take the focus from “out there”: the audience. Let them come to you, through the focus of your attention. Being here and now. Make the sound and let it go. Then re-center yourself and take another, relaxed breath. And so on.

Feel the connection of your voice and the back of your throat to your diaphragm, keeping the head balanced on the spine. Connect with the feeling in your diaphragm in the same way.

That’s where your center is. The “Huh!” shows you the extent of your vocal power. It’s the bubble that surrounds you. With practice, you’ll find your center.

You then know how far your bubble extends. You’ve practiced regularly and have a sense of your instrument. You’ve learnt to approve of your voice. It’s all still a bit hit and miss but that’s OK, it’s getting there.

Performing

Try to feel focused and centered. Find a spot directly in front of you (one that doesn’t make you raise your head), and communicate with the audience through this space (and remember, often the smaller the audience, the harder the gig. You don’t have to look at the audience. Be in your own space and let them come to you).

Try not to put your attention all over the place. Draw them to you by being as completely present as you can, and forgiving yourself immediately if you wander off for a few seconds or even a line or two and sometimes a verse!

To re-cap

Try to always start a practice session with a full breathing exercise, until you feel it’s all working together and making sense.

This is all the Level 1 breathing exercises, Chapters 3 – 9 of the book and also the first track of the Vocal Exercises, which takes you through the whole process from start to finish.

This has been useful to students who can only practice in the car, I’ve found. They can practice on the way to work etc. Not ideal, but better than nothing. If this is you, then try to also do the breathing exercise standing up, to get the feeling of everything working together. Centering the breath, starting at the beginning.

If you start over breathing or singing, or you feel your breath getting stuck, take a minute or so, go back to the string and take a couple of breaths from the solar plexus, i.e. get out of your head again.

Yet again, there’s no rule of thumb how long it will take to master your breathing. Some people do it automatically. My experience with students is that it’s usually a gradual process, and incremental.

The key is to try and enjoy your voice as much as you can. Hence the feeling of “smiling” as you breathe in, relaxing and “opening” the diaphragm. Centered, relaxed, then using your power.

You only need a small sip of breath, and often only have time for a small sip within a song. It’s what you do with the breath that counts. It’s the muscles around the diaphragm that are doing the work so that the diaphragm can remain relaxed, and connect you to the emotional truth of the song.

If you have that “stream of consciousness” voice burbling on and judging everything you do, put it in a box and tell it you’ll deal with it later.