Voice Mechanics Part 2

Breathing from the Diaghragm

The diaphragm is a big sheet-like muscle that's at the bottom of your chest cavity. The diaphragm helps you get air in and out of your lungs by moving up and down. When your diaphragm moves down, you breathe in. When your diaphragm moves up, you breathe out!Try taking a really deep breath. Can you feel a stretching feeling in your stomach? Your stomach gets bigger. That's your diaphragm moving down as you breathe in. Now try breathing out all the air in your lungs. Keep pushing out air until no more comes out. Your Stomach gets smaller. The tightness you feel below your chest is your diaphragm pushing up to get the air out! Without your diaphragm, your lungs couldn't fill up with air or push old air out!
There is another way of taking in air and that is by expanding your lungs with your chest. The problem with this method is that the chest muscles are reflex muscles, they work letting the air in and out quickly. If someone is using their chest muscles to breath you will always see their shoulders rise. Do not breath this way for singing, there is no way to control the outward flow of air