Breathing, part 1

Breathing in Brass Playing

In this video, I'd like to talk to you about one of the hottest topics in brass playing: breathing.

The Importance of Breathing vs. Blowing

• Everybody talks about it.
• Everybody places it as their number one importance.
• In fact, we hear many people saying the most important thing in brass playing is breathing.

Actually, I disagree. The most important thing in brass playing is blowing. But in order to do that, we have to get the air coming in correctly.

Breathing Technique

I'm not one of those people who discusses the diaphragm, positioning, or pushing out here and there. I don't like to keep it as physical as that.

• If we take the air in the way we want a note to sound, we'll breathe properly.
• For example, if we want a note to go like this, you can hear from the way the air comes in how the note is going to sound, as opposed to another style of breath.

You'll notice that both of those breaths are completely different.

Different Breaths for Different Pieces

• Mala 3 breath
• Bolero breath
• Berg three pieces breath

We have three completely different breaths. Basically, the focus of the breathing is in different places. You can think of it being at:

• This point,
• That point,
• Or this point.

This will bring the air in the way we want it to go out.

The Mechanics of Air

The most important thing is that the note begins with the air coming in. It starts here.

There is no single breathing method that fits every entrance we're going to play.

• Sometimes, the air will come in really fast, and then, bang!
• Other times, it's going to go exactly the way you'd speak, just think of it like that.

The most important thing is that the air must come in with no resistance.

• If you hear sounds like "uh" or anything similar, take it out.
• That's no good. We need it to come in completely without resistance.

A Helpful Breathing Example

Now, someone once showed me a fantastic example of how to breathe.

1. If I keep talking until there's no more air left in my lungs and I hold that position, when I release it, my lungs automatically fill.
2. This will work naturally and is a good way to understand how we actually breathe.

How Do We Release the Air?

This is very interesting. I'd like you to try this:

• Take a full breath of air in, hold it, and then release it.
• Now, did you have to blow the air out? No, you didn't.

The lungs want to exhale.

In many ways, having said that, blowing is more important than breathing, sometimes we don't even need to blow. This brings us to the subject of support.

The Concept of Support

There are two words that I don't like discussing in brass playing:

• One is diaphragm.
• The other is support.

Because what is support? To define it is very, very difficult.

Support is air pressure. It's a quantity of pressurized air within our body.

• Now, bear in mind that these are my words, my ways of explaining.
• I'm sure you can go and ask a doctor, and he'll tell you I'm talking nonsense. But these are my words and my thinking regarding breathing, and it works.

A Demonstration

If we take the air in and just let it release, there's no blowing involved. This is my default setting for how I actually play.

Here's the end of the second movement of the Davide concerto to show how air can just naturally exhale. There are no camera tricks here, so you can see how much air I apparently have if I just let my lungs exhale.

Mustn't do that too often, though. Not good for the blood pressure.

Overcoming Breathing Paralysis

There's one other thing that I'd like to discuss here:

I see so many students I work with who seem to be paralyzed by their breathing technique. Everything happens between here and here.

Let's not forget:

The objective of breathing is for the air to come out this way.

I see so many people, and it stops. The bottom line is we need to take air in, so it can come out through our lips and into the instrument.

Don't forget that. It sounds self-explanatory and simple, but it's often forgotten.

Don't be frightened when you're practicing breathing. Remember that breathing and blowing are linked.