This article is dedicated to all musicians who ask themselves: "How and how deeply should one take a breath?"
I began to ask myself this question from childhood. My saxophone teacher (I do not want to offend him, although he does not use the internet) said that breathing is a very complex issue. As far as I remember, he said that the stomach should inflate... However, I did not receive any more specifics and began to figure it out already in college. In my opinion, this skill should be reinforced at the very beginning of training (music school).
My teacher in college said that you should breathe down to the navel, no lower (!), since that does not work and can even cause health problems. He was right, but as with any experience, each person must feel it on "their own skin".
On the other hand, I spoke with doctors. They said that the diaphragm (by the way, here is the definition from Wikipedia: the diaphragm is an unpaired muscle that separates the thoracic and abdominal cavities and serves to expand the lungs; its boundary can conditionally be drawn along the lower edge of the ribs) can lower very far, so that the abdomen can fully inflate, or it may not lower as far — roughly down to the navel. It all depends on what is required and, most importantly, how quickly a person can push this air out. If you at least breathe a little "into the stomach", then the diaphragm is working.
The subject "methodology" in college had a different approach. Breathing was divided into three types (scientifically): thoracic (or costal), abdominal (or diaphragmatic), and mixed (full or thoraco‑abdominal) breathing. The approach was: you cannot breathe only with the chest — otherwise everything gets tense (you can check this yourself; it works 100%); next — when a person has begun to understand that one needs to breathe deeper — they will use abdominal breathing; and third — a professional can already breathe with a mixed type of breathing.
At the moment I work at a music school and met a vocal teacher who invited me to come by and try to sing. She said that I might succeed at something. When we began to talk and she tried to warm me up, she unequivocally said: "Breathe even deeper, the breath should sink as deep as possible." Then she told me about the resonator in the forehead, which I really felt, and my expectations were justified.
There is a difference between a wind player and a vocalist! The specifics are that a vocalist’s vocal cords work (yes, Captain Obvious), while for a wind player the “cords” are as if shifted a little further — to the mouthpiece. Because of this, wind players and vocalists breathe differently, yet both use the diaphragm when inhaling. For a vocalist’s cords to work and for good resonance, they need to take a very deep breath — the diaphragm will drop as low as possible. A wind player will breathe not as deeply, keeping the lower abdominal muscles engaged, since there is very little time to inhale and they cannot open the mouth fully for inhalation as a vocalist can.
We will return to this topic, as it has not been fully disclosed; there will be a continuation here.
Much also depends on one’s own sensations, which I will not forget to write about in the near future.
