If you have confidence in them, they will
always serve you. If you doubt them, they are doubtful; for the least doubt
on the part of the singer means more or less contraction and restraint;
hence they fail to produce the true conditions.
This automatic breathing, the result of the movements described, does not
show effort or action half so much as the old-fashioned, conscious muscular
breath. Breathing in this way means the use of all the forces which Nature
has given us. Breathing in this way is Nature's demand, and the reward is
Nature's help.
The devices we use to develop automatic breathing and automatic
breath-control are the simplest possible exercises, studied and developed
through the movements, as before described. In this way through right
action we expand to breathe, or rather we breathe through flexible
expansion, and we control by position, by the true level of the tone. In
this way, as we have found, all true conditions are secured and maintained.
We will take for our first study a single tone about the middle of the
voice. Exercise three in Article One of this second part of the book will
suggest the idea.
Sing a tone about the middle of the voice with the syllable _ah_.
Lift, expand, and let go, by the use of the hands and the body, as before
suggested. The lifting and expanding in a free, flexible manner will give
you all the breath that is needed; and the position, the level of the tone,
will hold or control the breath if you have confidence.
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