Klarinet Archive - Posting 000764.txt from 2000/11

From: Tony@-----.uk (Tony Pay)
Subj: Re: [kl] Article: Breathing and Support
Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2000 01:45:46 -0500

On Thu, 23 Nov 2000 21:25:03 -0800 (PST), leupold_1@-----.com said:

> --- Knaphet@-----.com wrote:
>
> > My understanding is that the abdominals and other muscles
> > surrounding the thoracic cavity are responsible for the support.
> > Maybe it is just a question of how we name the muscles we are using
> > , but I welcome some clarification.
>
> I've been using improper terminology, for clearly "diaphragmatic
> support" is a conceptual inaccuracy. Being an exclusively autonomic
> muscle, the diaphragm is beyond our conscious control. What we are
> really doing during the process of supporting the air stream is
> exploiting the diaphragm's autonomic function (of always applying
> outward force) by manipulating the length of time that it is allowed
> to stay expanded, via the abdominal muscles. If we didn't have
> abdominal muscles to counteract its autonomic function, the diaphragm
> would remain fully expanded forever and we would never be able to
> exhale. That would suck.

No, this is just wrong.

Three muscles: biceps, heart, diaphragm:

My biceps are under my direct conscious control, via efferent nerves. I
can flex them at will. Though I may not be aware of them in the normal
course of events, I can become aware of them directly, and sense their
degree of flexion.

My heart is not under my direct conscious control, via efferent nerves.
It beats in response to my body needs. I can influence its beating only
indirectly, by thinking sexy thoughts, for example, which results in
hormonal secretions to which it does respond. I am not directly aware
of the action of my heart in the normal course of events, but neither
can I become aware of it directly, though I can sense its effects,
by putting my hand over it, or listening to it.

My diaphragm is under my direct conscious control, via efferent nerves.
True, like my heart, it acts by itself outside my consciousness in
response to my body needs, like lack of oxygen (or, more strictly,
excess of CO2). But I can use my diaphragm at will too, and take an
intentional breath, restricting my action to it and it alone. (I can
also control the extent and duration of its flexion, corresponding to
taking a faster and a deeper breath, and when I relax it, the natural
elasticity of my viscera, like the rubbish in a dustbin that we push
down on, returns it upwards.) But like my heart, though unlike my
biceps, I cannot be aware of it directly, via sensory nerves.

These properties of the diaphragm are not particularly well understood
in the wind-playing community, though any really good player will be
aware of them instinctively. But actually understanding what is going
on is well worth the effort.

I posted an article I wrote about it in 1996:

http://www.sneezy.org/Databases/Logs/1999/04/000786.txt

...though it could do with a bit of a makeover, perhaps, now.

The fact that in playing we can control our diaphragm directly, yet be
aware of it only by the results we produce, is one of the minor miracles
of musical performance.

You could actually think of the clarinet as a biofeedback system which,
when properly calibrated, outputs a musical tone the loudness of which
is a direct function of the degree of flexion of the player's diaphragm!

That's rather like Douglas Adams's white mice in the 'Hitch-hiker's
Guide to the Galaxy' -- which mice, you will remember, were actually
super-intelligent aliens, running the whole Earth as an experiment, and
manipulating particularly those guys in white coats who fed them and ran
them through mazes.

I'll respond directly to Neil's article, and the various responses to
it, when I've the time to write something more extended.

Tony
--
_________ Tony Pay
|ony:-) 79 Southmoor Rd Tony@-----.uk
| |ay Oxford OX2 6RE GMN family artist: www.gmn.com
tel/fax 01865 553339

... As far as we know, our computer has never had an undetected error.

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