Lately I’ve been working on a new breathing exercise that has made a big difference for me. The goal is to learn to breathe in quickly and quietly so you can take a breath whenever you need it instead of whenever it’s convenient. While this idea is not new to me (Alex Murray advocates taking several quick, quiet, little breaths and maintaining good tone quality, than taking a few big ones that may attract unwanted attention), I’ve never been able to incorporate that effectively into my playing.
I have a lot of tension management issues so I’ve concentrated on learning to take full, easy, quiet breaths. This has done me a lot of good, but those wonderfully relaxed breaths are also slow breaths. My quicker breaths tend to be a little sloppy and entrances after are not as refined as I would like. This new exercise addresses that!
I got this exercise from a masterclass given by Jill Felber at the 2011 Florida Flute Association convention. She said that basically “you have to learn to pant like a dog”. She suggested playing the Bach Partita, breathing after every note. When you are comfortable doing that, then try after every beat, then every measure. The goal is to take quick, unobtrusive breaths. (You could also do this on any long articulated passage, or on scale exercises.)
Practicing the quick intake and immediate expulsion of air (while producing a good sound!) is really tiring at first. The biggest challenge is to not take in too much air on all those mini breaths, but eventually I am able to reach an equilibrium of intake versus outgo. When it’s really working, it feels like a kind of internal bouncing action that is really freeing. It sounds like you are using circular breathing when in reality you are breathing much more than normal. Neato, huh!
Working on this exercise has really improved my ability to take unobtrusive breaths in all situations and to reenter with good tone. It was just the tweak I’ve been needing. Maybe it’ll work for you, too!