Never Run Out of Air while Singing with Philippe Hall
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00:54 Introduction to Passive Support
01:48 Exploring Airflow and Air Pressure in Singing
03:12 Understanding Subglottal and Supraglottal Pressure
06:38 The Role of the Diaphragm in Singing
10:18 The Importance of Relaxation and Breathing Rhythm
13:53 Practical Tips for Efficient Breathing in Singing
16:54 Q&A and Recap on Passive Support
18:59 Embracing Movement in Singing
19:40 Understanding Ribcage Expansion
21:21 Mastering Natural Expansion and Breathing
23:00 The Importance of Relaxation in Singing
24:16 Passive Support and Avoiding Stacking Air
27:40 Achieving Optimal Inhalation for Singing
33:38 The Big Five Coordinations of Singing
35:59 Wrapping Up and Looking Ahead
Introduction to Passive Support
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Speaker: I'm excited today to talk to you about, about passive support. So we're going to talk about these things. Here we go. Fix my camera feed. Does that change anything? It's going to be fun. All right. The name of the game is it's going to be fun. I got to get you synced up. Cause I want, I want you to be able to see.
My eyes, but it's still not sinking up here. All right. So let's just move it over here. How's that? Perfect. Okay. Are we doing all right? Did it switch back? Oh my goodness. They're like bouncing back and forth You guys can have a good laugh. All right, just have a good laugh and watch this guy juggle All right.
I'm happy. I'm happy It's back because I love using my phone as webcam tip for anybody that's teaching or singing doing lessons You get a great feed with your webcam.
Overview of Passive Support Topics
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Speaker: All right, so let's talk about What I what we're going to be doing here for the next 45 minutes we're going to be talking about passive support Your inhalation interference stacking air relaxation during singing and breathing rhythm All these are super important to me because we have two parts of support and later on today You're going to hear from lisa popil who's going to talk to you about active support. So let's just uh start this off by asking some questions And if you've got questions Just pop them into the chat, okay?
Put those questions right into the feed. I'll blend them in on the screen All right, and if you need to hear me louder or anything like that, you just give me a heads up Okay, great. How about that? Thank you. Thank you very much. Okay Great.
Understanding Airflow and Air Pressure
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Speaker: So do we need airflow? Do we need airflow or air pressure during singing?
Which one do we need? What is subglottal pressure? What is the glottis? What is superglottal pressure? Where does our air come from? And how do we create subglottal pressure? I want you to think about these questions because they're very important. So first of all, do we need airflow or air pressure? Any thoughts?
Feel free to pop them in the chat. All right. I'm serious. I'm serious. I want to hear what you think. This is really important to me. All right, what you think is going to help you improve Your concept of the big five, right? And we're talking about here, let's give you some hints. Have a look at that real quick.
Okay, let's come back. We need both. We need airflow and we need air pressure. So what does that work? There you go. World of Mindless Dreamers. Great. Excellent. We need a balance of both. I like it. I like it. Great. Great response. Now comes the question. Let's look back here. Do we need air flow or pressure? We need both.
Exploring Subglottal and Supraglottal Pressure
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Speaker: What is subglottal pressure? Subglottal pressure and what is the glottis? So if we don't know what the glottis is, what is subglottal pressure? That doesn't mean anything to me. It just sounds, you know, medical. How's that gonna help me as a singer? Your glottis is the opening between your vocal folds. Okay, and you can it's open and open glottis or closed closed glottis So literally the opening between the width they give them it bothered me for a while because it's not a part It's the opening like really just just the space in between.
Yep. That's the glottis. Okay So subglottal pressure is your pressure below the the pressure below your glottis below your vocal folds Inside of where? Inside of your lungs. Inside of your lungs. What is supraglottal pressure? Supraglottal pressure, supra means on top, sub, below, supra, above. Supraglottal pressure is the air pressure develops inside the top of your vocal tract, your whole vocal tract, from your lips down to your ears.
To your glottis to your vocal folds. So think about it. Go ahead. Breathe in. Hold your breath There's pressure in here and there's pressure in here There's supraglottal pressure above your vocal folds and subglottal pressure below your vocal folds. They work together This is really important. They work together to keep a balance And when they're more imbalanced, your vocal folds aren't getting pushed up so much, they're getting also pushed gently back down so your vocal folds can align and, and, and, uh, adduct and oscillate in a more neutral pressure zone.
So why is that important? Well, it's important because this is how we sing and speak and make sound. Where does your air come from? How do you get air into your body? How do you create sub glottal pressure? Remember, the sub glottal pressure is the pressure of the air inside of your lungs. It's the pressure, the flow of the air that's going up right there through your vocal folds that sucks them together and keeps them in motion.
With no subglottal pressure, with no air flow, there is no sound. No sound. So, is it necessary? Logic, logical, right? It's necessary. We have to have it. And when I'm talking about passive support, we need to think of, of the subglottal pressure. Inhalation. So here we go. Let's look at it. World of Mindless.
Inhalation. Create pressure with exhalation. Okay. Pretty simple. Simple. And this is what I want to, um, dig into. So if we're talking about the inhalation, inhalation, once more, let's go back. How do we create sub glottal pressure? Brrrrr. Right there. How do we do it? We inhale. Alright?
The Role of the Diaphragm in Breathing
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Speaker: So what is the main muscle that activates subglottal, to create subglottal pressure during inhalation?
It's right there. It's kind of like, oh, the diaphragm. Right there. The diaphragm. What does the diaphragm have to do with it? Well, the diaphragm is what allows air to come inside. So, let's take a look at the diaphragm. Diaphragm is right there. Right there. Right beneath your ribs, it spans the whole area beneath your lungs and your heart.
Up here is called the thoracic cavity, beneath it is called the ventricle. is your abdominal cavity. So, up, the diaphragm divides the upper part of your torso on the inside from the lower part where all your organs are. It's a dome shaped muscle. Okay, you know where the diaphragm is. It's the muscle that has to activate for you to inhale.
So, when you breathe in, the diaphragm's going to contract and go down. That's what it does. That's the only way you get air inside of your body. It goes down and it pulls air into the body. And when you exhale it goes back out. That's the diaphragm. So let's jump back to my question. What, what if there is something in the way?
What could be in the way? What could slow down What do you think guys? What could keep your diaphragm from being able to go down? Because remember, if it doesn't go down, you can't breathe. You can't inhale.
Now, let's take a peek.
Abdominal Muscles and Breathing Mechanics
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Speaker: The abdominal muscles. Your abdominal muscles are so powerful, if they squeeze, you can't get any air into your body, or very little. So, let's do an experiment. You're going to pull in all the muscles in your abdominal region, pull them in, hold tight. Hold tight, and now while you're holding tight, while you're holding tight, try and breathe.
Hold tight and really try and breathe. You feel it hit a wall. You can't get in very much air. What's gonna happen if you push out? Push them all out this time. Now try, hold that push, push, and now try and breathe in. You also hit a wall. Your diaphragm now cannot go down, right? It cannot lower and contract because your abdominal muscles are Are in the way this is this is so important to understand and we're going to be training this We'll be training this during our big five intensive training program Okay back to the concept here.
Uh huh. That's what's happening Every time I switch cameras it it bugs on me. See now it froze up again. What a pity Oh, well, um, so we'll pick another camera. Where is this one? Is that one working? There you go. So now I figured out I got the bug. All right. The bug is when I switch screens too often, my phone freezes up.
Okay. But we're still here. So let's go back. Inhalation, interference, stacking of air. So inhalation is you have, the diaphragm has to be free to move. Interference. is your abdominal tension, one form of tension, and contraction, over contracting the muscles that, that block the movement of the diaphragm. And then you'll start stacking air.
So we need to look for relaxation in singing. And find a breathing rhythm, okay? So, this is, this is super important. If you can't relax, you can't inhale. I want you to think of that. This is a mindset shift for you when you're singing. In order to inhale, you have to relax. You don't have to relax and become a lump and just very no tension at all.
Remember, we need tension in singing. We just need good dynamic tension. So, you cannot inhale without relaxing your abdominal muscles. The relaxation in singing comes every time you breathe, and this will help you to be able to sustain long notes, to not run out of air. It's of course ridiculous to say that you're never going to run out of air, like the little catchy title of this video.
presentation never run out of air, but I find that singers run out of air very quickly when they shouldn't be running out of air. And the reason why is that they are not doing the passive side. Remember, we're going to talk about active support later. The passive side of support and passive side is relaxation.
Relaxing the ab, abdominal muscles, and above all, below the, the belly button, right down to the pelvic floor. Okay, so if I, if I point on this, ah, get over here, here we go, I'm always doing this like a weatherman. So if I'm pointing, it's so weird, pointing to the abdominal muscles, Look at the low, low muscles.
You see those, those six, six pack muscles, right? The six pack muscles up here. Uh, uh, they're, they're up there. It's like playing in a mirror. So hilarious. Okay. So we're right up here and You go up and down with those six pack muscles right there. And you have the six and down below, there's two more and they're very long.
And they go all the way down to your pelvic floor. That's usually where people hold most tension. So you got to relax down there. And you've probably heard when you are supporting or breathing. This is supposed to go forward, right? Your stomach, your abdomen is supposed to go forward. But that leads to people pushing out.
And we just talked about that if you push out all your muscles and try and breathe in, you're blocking the diaphragm. If you pull in all the muscles too tight and try and breathe in, you're blocking the range of the motion of the diaphragm and you can't breathe in. So, in order to breathe and find relaxation in your singing, you have to let go.
You have to let go of the abdominal muscles so that they can be flexible and move. And the expansion in your abdomen is not coming from pressing out. Okay? Recap. Talking about passive support. Passive means you're not actively doing anything. You're just inhaling, and the only way to inhale is to release the abdominal muscles.
We just talked about why and how, and you experience that in your own body, okay? If you pull in and you push out while you're breathing in, your diaphragm cannot lower. You cannot breathe efficiently. So, I want you to now, as your challenge today, and in the song you're going to be working on, any song you're singing, You pretty much know when you're going to breathe, right?
I think you do. And if you don't and you're just breathing with no plan of when you're going to breathe, you need to start planning out when you're going to breathe. And in order to breathe, you need to let go. You need to remind your body, you need to tell your mind, your conscious mind, I can't breathe if I don't let go.
In other words, relax to breathe. Relax to breathe. Breathe out and relax. The air will come in.
Practical Breathing Exercises
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Speaker: Let's just try that so you experience exactly what I'm saying. Breathe out all your air.
Now, don't do anything. Just relax the lower abdomen. Air comes in. It just comes in automatically. Easy way to do this. Relax your abdominal muscles. And we're just going to say a gentle,
just keep saying it. Try an S. Remember, keep your abdomen relaxed, all these muscles down here in your abdomen, keep them relaxed. Now an S, S, S, S, S, S, S, S, S, S. You could do this all day long, without stopping. You could do this sound, these sounds, all day long without stopping, you would never run out of air.
Why? Because if you are relaxing your abdominal muscles while you do this. You're just going exhale, inhale, exhale, inhale, and the inhalation is what? It is passive. And now try and do it the active way and go shh, shh,
Speaker 2: shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh.
Speaker: I'm already tired. If you are breathing like that in your singing, you're not breathing passively, you are interfering with the action of the diaphragm, you're stacking air, and you have no breathing rhythm.
And your singing will become strained, and you'll lose air. Here's a mind blower. Okay, let me recap that.
Importance of Relaxation in Singing
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Speaker: If you have any questions, go ahead, put them in the comments. So, so important. It's so subtle, and sometimes the most simple things get ignored, and that's why we need to remind singers of this. If you don't relax your abdomen, you can't activate the full range of your diaphragm.
If your diaphragm cannot flex and descend throughout its full range, you will not have an efficient inhalation. If you don't have an easy, efficient, relaxed inhalation, you will not create the subglottal pressure. You need to sing, and when you create subglottal pressure with an efficient inhalation because the diaphragm could lower through its full range of motion and the expansion in your body happens naturally because you relaxed.
Now you have enough air to sing without active support. About 90 percent of everything you need to sing. So, excellent. I've got a question here. Let's just jump on that. World of mindful, mindless dreamers. This is where the posture comes in, correct? Posture. Um, think of optimal skeletal alignment. If you're standing in skeletal alignment, your body's relaxed.
Did you know that? If you're standing in proper skeletal alignment, I mean posture, Your muscles are just, everything's just resting. Everything's just hanging there. The only, the main thing that's working is your neck to hold your head up. But the less, the more you're in alignment, everything's just resting and hanging there.
So if you're in excellent skeletal alignment and good posture, your muscles will be more relaxed.
Singing and Movement Flexibility
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Speaker: We're going to be singing and moving, and that's okay. You don't have to stand in the perfect skeletal alignment every time you breathe in and every time you sing. There are people that dance, I sang and danced for years, for decades.
There's people, look at Pink, she's like spinning down a rope. There's, there's people singing upside down, it's possible. But the inhalation, the more you relax to inhale, the more supple and flexible the system is. Alright, so, find your skeletal alignment, it's wonderful, and find a way to return to that as whenever you can, even when you're moving.
Ribcage Expansion and Breathing Techniques
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Speaker: Okay, we've got a question, how much should ribcage be expanding? Does it vary? Excellent question. Yes, it does vary from person to person because people have different sizes of ribcages. And they are different in size. Ability level. Some people have very strong back muscles, very strong intercostals. Some people are not athletes, so they're not as developed.
But, the ribcage will expand and gently lift. If you relax your lower abdomen, blow out your air, put your hand right here. You can feel yourself. Feel your ribs here, if you like. Just breathe out.
Now relax to breathe.
You will feel that the ribs expand. You will feel that this part of your chest gently raises. It's not a lot. It just lifts up a tiny bit. You will feel, if you're really sensitive, that your ribcage tilts upwards a little bit. You will feel, if you're sensitive, that Your ribs getting bigger. They're not really getting bigger.
What's happening is the muscles between the ribs are expanding. So, when you inhale, look for your natural expansion. The only way, I'm gonna repeat this, the only way you can find your natural expansion is to relax to breathe. Let go of the tension in your, in your body, in your thoracic cavity, in your abdominal cavity.
Let go of the tension in the back and, and the abdominal muscles when you breathe in. And you're doing great. Now you, now you have natural expansion.
Avoiding Tension and Over-Expansion
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Speaker: Let's, let me give you one more tips, one more tip for the ribs, okay? Let's see you breathe in you feel your rib expansion. What if you overdo it? Now you're tight.
You're tight people. You're too tight. So relax to breathe Feel the expansion feel how it's comfortable to stay there now expand more Now your ribs are tight. Your back is tight There's effort to hold that expansion and now you can also feel it in your speaking voice Just try and talk in that position Relax, relax to breathe.
Now feel all of that expansion. That's comfortable. That is your natural expansion and how you want to create the expansion. How do you create the expansion? You relax, lower abdomen, you relax your abdomen so that your diaphragm can lower to pull in the air to fill up your lungs to let your ribs expand.
Now you're in a perfect singing position. And you can definitely find optimal scale alignment for that. And then I've got another question here. No singing sitted. You can sing while you're sitting down. It doesn't mean it's the optimal skeletal alignment. So you probably will sing better standing up. But if I stand up and I stand stiff as a board, I'm going to sing less well as if I'm sitting on my little Ball chair and have a little bit more flexibility because again, it's the tension that Tightening and holding that's going to shut down the singing.
All right.
Understanding Air Stacking
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Speaker: How do you train? To unstack air if that's happening often So we got it first of all just talk about what I mean by stacking air. So what I want you to do is I want you to breathe in a little, uh, some quick sips of the straw. Alright, you're gonna breathe in, and we're gonna do this. Breathe in for three, breathe out for one.
Okay? We're just gonna repeat that. I want you to observe how the air stacks up, and it just gets bigger and tighter. So, in for three, out for one.
And now I'm stacked. I'm completely full. Let it all go. Now, if you breathed out more air on the one than you did on the three inhalations, then you, you messed it up. Sorry. It's gotta be equal amounts coming in.
And what happens is you're, you're not letting out the air. So you have to let out the air as well. Jump back in here. Passive support. Stacking air. Relax during singing find your breathing rhythm. You must Sing out what you breathe in if you don't release your air while you're singing You must release it after you're singing before you breathe in Because if you're breathing in more than you're singing out, you're going to start stacking air.
It's like does that make sense? You are you have balloons here. You fill them up 100 percent. Now you let out 30 percent You And you let you, you fill them back up a hundred percent. Now you let out 20, fill them back up. Now you let out 10, except in our lungs, there's an exchange of gases going on. So you can have 90 percent full capacity and feel like you have no air to sing on.
That's what stacking air feels like. Okay. That's becomes when you don't relax. When you don't relax for the inhalation, and when you don't let your air go. Whenever you have a break in singing any song, it's, you want to come into relaxation. Relaxation during singing. You need to relax. What does that mean?
It doesn't mean fall over in a clump, it means let go of the tension and reactivate it. Let it go. And reactivate it. Why? Because it keeps your voice flexible. It keeps this system flexible. It's efficient. It's less tiring.
Practical Singing Exercises
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Speaker: So, let's do an example of stacking air. I'm sitting down. Okay? I'm gonna do a song.
Poof! Sing it. On F sharp. Okay? We're gonna sing this song. Come on. Come back to focus. Here we go. You ready? I'm still breathing. And I'm gonna breathe the wrong way. I'm not gonna relax. I'm just gonna do I'm not gonna prepare. I'm not gonna breathe. I'm breathe in. I'm just gonna breathe and sing
Speaker 2: I'm still breathing I'm still breathing I'm still breathing I'm still breathing I'm alive I'm alive I'm alive
Speaker: Oh my gosh, that is so so tiring My whole body is tight.
I can get the sound out because I'm balancing the five, the big five coordinations of singing well, but I'm telling you Oh, that was, that was higher than it needed to be. So, Let's go back down. Now, watch. I'm going to sing out. When I breathe in, I'm going to relax. Every time. And I'm just going to let the air come in.
Ready? Breathe out. I'm
Speaker 2: still breathing. I'm still breathing. I'm still breathing. I'm still breathing. I'm alive. I'm alive! I'm alive!
Speaker: It's so much more flexible. I'm not stacking the air. Bah bah bah bah bah bah bah bah bah And it's works in every style of singing.
The Importance of Relaxation
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Speaker: So, to find your passive support The name of the game is to get an optimal inhalation.
Okay? Because the one example I gave you is going to get me so tight. I won't make it through a song and I'll be struggling because I feel like I'm out of air and I'm real tight in the body. And the other example
Speaker 2: I
Speaker: can do all day. You can do all day long because there's the breathing rhythm. It's supple.
Relax, let the air in, sing it out. Relax, let the air in, sing it out. Relax, let the air in, sing it out. It's, it's a big deal. I used to sing, um, my breathing. I didn't have a good breathing rhythm, so I would get into this sensation of tight and stacking and I'd push and I'd use a lot of force. I could still get it out, but it was just tons of hard work and you lose your longevity.
So Janet said, it sounds like there's better resonance in there. Okay, great. Great. I know that improves the sound as well. So let's look back here. Passive support. Why? You cannot sing without subglottal pressure. What is subglottal pressure? It's simply the pressure that you create inside of your lungs when you breathe in.
If you interfere with your inhalation, because why? Because you tighten up your abdominal muscles, your diaphragm then cannot do what? It can't lower. It can't lower throughout its full range of motion and you will not be getting a good inhalation. All right So how do we how do we breathe in we relax?
This is I really want you to get this you must relax to breathe in and you must relax your lower abdomen Below your belly button in the front. Yes, you need to relax the all the abdominal muscles Because when the diaphragm goes down and presses on the internal organs, they have to displace. So the expansion is coming because you relax, because the air is coming in, because the diaphragm is lowering.
Not because you're pressing it out. If you press it out, you're going to start stacking, here we go, stacking air. It's going to start getting tight on you, and you'll feel like you're out of air. You'll run out of air while you're singing, and you'll have 80 percent full capacity. It's ridiculous. So the best thing you can do in your singing is Relax and inhale.
Sing, relax, sing, relax. All right. Where do we relax? We relax lower abdominal wall. And then you come into a breathing rhythm. All right. Works the same way for all kinds of singing. We could do classical aria. We relax.
Speaker 3: Quanto è bello,
Speaker 2: quanto è caro.
Speaker 3: Relax. Relax.
Speaker 2: Più la vedo e più mi piace, ma in quel cor non son capace, lieve affetto
Speaker 3: ad
Speaker 2: inspirar.
Speaker 3: Relax.
Speaker: Sounds like you can sing forever and it's so Comfortable it's easier to do when the song's a little slower. I I admit but when you have a fast texty song It's actually becomes easier this way because you're not breathing For the fast lines you're not stacking the air you're just It's singing out and letting in.
You can do that all day long. You don't see anybody going, uh,
Speaker 2: uh, uh,
Speaker: no. And a lot of singers are breathing like that. Even if you bring a little bit of that,
relax to breathe. Okay. So I want to, um, yes, compressor, compressor activated. Yeah, what is the compressor? That's what I'm trying to get you to. It's your air pressure, your subglottal pressure. You're not working here. It's the subglottal pressure that moves the voice. And doing passive support, this is even, this is before activating support.
Everything I just did, I didn't have to use active support yet. We'll be talking about active support later today. This is all about how to, how to win with doing less. How to basically inhale. How to remove the interference out of your diaphragm's way. Let the expansion happen instead of trying to make it happen.
Get out of the cycle of stacking air. Come into the enjoyment of relaxing during singing. And coming into a breathing rhythm where things just stay comfortable. And can be very dynamic, as you observed. Alright, there's so much more, um, I want to work on with you.
The Big Five Coordinations of Singing
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Speaker: And that is why I created the Big Five Coordinations of Singing.
The Big Five Coordinations of Singing, this intensive training event, we're going to be focusing on your airflow, on your expansion. We're going to be focusing on this breathing timing. We're going to be focusing on active dynamic support. We're going to be rehearsing these things. Because the way you sing today is your singing habit.
You, there are habitual actions, the big five, okay? There are coordinations, every coordination is controlled by muscle activity. So, in order to change your singing, you have to improve your singing habits. You've got to work on these. Even a tiny 5 percent improvement in your breathing, in your use of passive support, will strengthen all of the other four coordinations of singing.
A tiny improvement in your ability to adjust the compression and vocal fold thickness, will bring so much more efficiency into your singing. And this will allow you to become the singer, the artist. Artist, the master of your voice. It's all right here. It's in you. It's in you. I had to discover mine. You have to discover yours.
And the better you get at these individual coordinations, you can then combine them. Combine them. Here's that one. Another client of mine is singing Adele, right? Hello from
Speaker 2: the other side. So
Speaker: we have Adele. What's she doing there? Watch her. She's not going Hello, she's not singing it
Okay, is she doing is adele doing this
Speaker 2: hello from the other side
Speaker: That's stacking
Speaker 2: that's
Speaker: There's no relaxation in there. It's such hard work
Let's look at a comment here.
Final Thoughts and Upcoming Events
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Speaker: We're going to wrap this up. May I conclude that you never make that from pressure active? Well, this is a funny thing about the diaphragm is you can't really control it. It does what it does. You can only interfere with it. So if you make room for it, it works by itself. Wrap your head around it.
We have no conscious control of the diaphragm. We can either get in its way. Or get out of its way. So when you're breathing from your diaphragm or diaphragmatic breathing, that's passive support and singing, you have to get out of its way. The way to do it is just practice some mindfulness and some breathing.
And we're going to practice that. We're going to have an entire class on that part, be part of your. your workout routine, your training routine during the big five intensive training where we're going to spend all our time improving your coordinations. All of these coordinations we're going to be working on during this four week cinema intensive training.
Also your vocal folds. So I've got to wrap this up because Kaya is joining me and we are going to be back here live Kaya Herstad Carney. Thank you so much for tuning in Please check the description on these videos. I'm going to leave them up so you can re watch them in your description You have a special offer because you registered For this event, so there are coupon codes in that offer that are gonna allow you to save big on this summer's intensive training.
Hope you're enjoying our voice summit. I'll take a quick break and I'll see you back here in just a few minutes with Kaya Hairstead Carney.
