Julie Nybo

Somatics
Breath Support
Singers have powerful muscular breath patterns. They are able to take control of their
internal core use it to push air through the vocal cords and create sound with the vibrations
coming from the vocal cords. Dancer have powerful muscular breath patterns
I have observed a group of singers do warm-up exercises over the span of a few days.
Watching these students strive for constant breath support is engaging and also a mystery
because it is all internal. Correcting issues with breath and musculature can be challenging in
singers. We have learned in class that inner experiences affect outer experiences. With this in
mind, a teacher can observe an outer action and know that it is directly produced from an inner
problem. At the beginning of any given singing exercise the teacher would ask the student to take
a breath in. I noticed throughout the room that there were variations in each student with just this
simple request of breathing in. Some people stuck there chests out filling their upper body with
air. Other students were allowing their spine to curve a little bit in the cervical and thoracic
region causing their spine to be smooshed together this in turn only allowed their belly to fill
with air. Other students were standing up straight and filling every inch of space inside of their
belly, lung, and core with air. The last observation is the correct one but also not easily achieved.
Lets talk about how we achieve the desired breath support in a singer.
Breath support, breath brings life and movement. It is a physiological support for all life
processes and, hence, all movement. Breath enlivens us. (pg.39) Breath is our first experience of
inner space. (pg.64). There is ample room in our body for breath to move throughout; enlivening

our cells, muscles, and bones. When no breath is present or shortened we are lifeless. Breath
spans across three dimensions; sagittal, horizontal, and vertical. As they work together they
create a system of support that influences the way our bodies move and how efficient our
movement will be.
I would like to turn our attention to the first two singers breathing gestures listed above.
The first case the students only used their vertical sense of breath this caused them to raise their
chests as they took an initial breath in and then also releasing the breath out the vertical
dimension. The vertical sense of breath is the dimension that pulls our breath down from the
lungs towards the pelvis; it is a head to tail breath. These students only used a third of the amount
of breath space possible in the body. There was no support from the core because it did not
initiate from the core. The second set of students only tapped into the sagittal breath. As they
condensed their upper body into an enclosed position the only possible type of breath is to stick
your stomach out and push air up any pathway that might be open. This is the opposite problem
from the first there is no connectedness to the lungs they are only using their belly breath. Both
groups of students inhibited breath support pathways.
Why are pathways such a big deal? Pathways are an important part of humans. There are
patterns in our lives, we have habits that we do every morning as we get out of bed, shower, eat,
brush our teeth and head to school. They influence the way we move throughout the day in weak
or strong ways. Patterns are habitual and can only be changed through observation, effort, and
practice. The principles of Bartenieff fundamentals state that development of patterns are
established through a stage-specific developmental progression early in life. These basic
connective patterns become integrated in the adult and function as patters of total body
connectivity which are then available for timely use and phrasing according to context (pg.39).

If you are thinking all is lost. I am adult now and I will never be able to repair those pathways. I
am going to try to persuade you otherwise. What Bartenieff is saying is that each patterns takes
time to break down, re-align, and then create. Once they are created we can use them habitually
as an integrated part of our everyday actions. Now that we know why patterns are so important
the next step is to figure out how to change our patterns and pathways to be more efficient and
internally successful.
Correcting these students starts with first bone structure. Singers need to stand with
purpose and liveliness. The spine is an active part of the body. It is not rigid. Peggy Hackney
noticed in dancers that when she is not enjoying watching a dancer that the spine is not fully
involved. The personal may be maintaining a fixed relationship in the head-neck area, which cuts
the head off from the receiving movement impulses or often the person is holding a set
relationship in the lower back so their tail and pelvis seem rigid. She also noticed that some
people hold the chest forward and up by setting the lower thoracic spine. All patterns of holding
cut down the fluid nature of the movement and, hence, the possibilities that are available at any
one moment. (pg.89). The spine is an active part of the standing position. With the information
given here I am suggesting that we not stand up straight and hold tension in our bodies to keep
our spine aligned rather I am suggesting that these singers could use the full length of their spine
by reaching out the top of the head and pull down from the bottom of the tail and their spine
would keep its natural curves. This way they will not be arching upward over the thoracic spine
and not be crunching the lumbar spine as they slouch. Bone structure is the first key to
alignment.
The second way to correct breathing patterns is muscular patterning. If we stay talking
about patterns for a second and creating more efficient ones David Alt suggests to teacher that

they must carefully guide young singers to coordinate opposing muscle groups until the student
is in command of simple muscular activities. One coordination builds upon another until the
breath flows freely and efficiently through flexible and dynamic laryngeal adjustments for pitch
and volume (pg. 33 of Alt). Muscular sequencing is more important than muscular strength in
producing efficiency of movement. Both Hanckley and Dave Alt have similar ideas about this
statement. Dance Alt states that Freedom, not strength, is the key to successful singing (pg.33).
He suggests that as teachers we not use the words support the tone or breath control because
they cause tension in students that will only inhibit the amount of hair that is flowing through the
body to support singing. He then goes on to talk about abdominal breathing. It is accomplished
with a cooperation of the diaphragm contacting and descending for inhalation land the
contraction of the rectus abdominals muscles for exhalation.
-Next I will talk about musculature corrections
-I am going to observe Jana Shumways Class on November 13th.
- I have not figured out my other resource yet but I am using the book and also David
Alts article in a Choral Journal located on JSTOR.