Forget about "Diantian", Singing with sufficient breath support with Abdominal Breathing
Breathing is one of the most important elements in singing. You may hear that you need to sing with "Diantian" (a term used by Chinese). So people are busy finding where the "diantian" is. But please forget it from now on! Just learn "abdominal breathing" and it can help you to sing with enough breath support.
【Text Version】
Feeling out of breath when singing lengthy and intensive lyrics
Singing is actually a cardio activity as we need to sing with abdominal breathing.
How to do abdominal breathing when standing up
When you sing, please stand with legs apart in shoulder width. Relax your neck and shoulders. Your shoulders should not be moved upward or forward, instead, they should be in a bit backward position.
1）Exhale all the air out, then inhale through your nose, air flow into your lungs.
2) After inhaling, both rib cage and belly will expand.
3）Then exhale slowly (easier to exhale through your mouth), belly will contract.
Why belly will expand during inhalation and contract during exhalation ？
When you inhale, air flow breathed into our lungs will push down our diaphragm, making belly to expand. In contrast, when we exhale, air flow breathed out from our lungs, diaphragm moving upward and return to its original dome shape.
If you could not manage the above logic when you are standing, the best and easiest way to practice abdominal breathing is to lay down on the floor or bed. When we sleep (in the most relax condition), we can easily do the abdominal breathing. But if you want to strengthen abdominal breathing, you can do the following exercise.
Practice abdominal breathing while laying down
1）After you lay down on the floor or bed, set the tempo at 60bpm on a metronome. Exhale first.
2）Then inhale in 4 seconds (belly expand/moving up), suspend in 4 seconds, exhale in 4 seconds
You can extend the duration after you get used to the 4 seconds inhale/suspend/exhale. Inhale in 5s, suspend in 5s, exhale in 5s and so on. You need to practice this for 5 minutes.
Practice abdominal breathing while sitting
If you are sitting behind a table, you can put your elbows on the table and leaning forward, hands holding your head. You will find that you can do the abdominal breathing easily. You can sit down to practice "inhale in 4s, suspend in 4s, exhale in 4s", also do it for 5 minutes
Whether you practice while laying down or sitting down, all you need to do is to practice 3-4 times a day and for 5 minutes each time. Your brain and your body will regard abdominal breathing as a habit. So you can easily apply abdominal breathing to sing when you stand tall.
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