How to Breathe - with your Harmonica

How to play the harmonica better by correct breathing

Playing the harmonica is very natural and easy because it's our BREATHING, in and out, that makes our harmmonica play, makes it produce sound. 

All other mouth instruments are breathing OUT only, but with the harmonica you get to take advantage of what we do naturally all day every day, and breathe both in and out to play.

When you play the harmonica, you are both inhaling and exhaling, which is a very natural way to play an instrument, since that is how we breathe.  In harmonica language, the inhale is called "draw", and the exhale is simply called "blow".  So, whenever you see the word "draw", think inhale.

To get the best tone, we need to think of breathing DEEP, breathing from the bottom 2/3 of our lungs, breathing from our diaphragm.

When we play the harmonica, a large part of our body becomes part of the sound.  The sound can echo and be enhanced by all the air chambers in our body, which include the air spaces inside our heads, inside our mouths, our throats, and our lungs.

By keeping these spaces OPEN we can get a rounder, fuller tone - if we DON'T take advantage of these spaces and stay all cramped up inside, our harmonicas will sound more like a squeaky little mouse than something big.

Its like the difference in the sound you get between hitting a little bongo drum and a big bass drum - if you hit them both with the same force, If you hit them both just the same, the bongo drum will go "pop" and the bass drum will go "BOOM!"

When we play the harmonica, we are making a complete circuit between our breathing apparatus and the reeds in our harmonica.  That circuit goes back and forth, back and forth, and that flowing back and forth is what makes the sound.

Here's an exercise:

Put your harmonica down, but imagine you are still breathing through your harmonica.  Have your lips pretty much in a position you would have them while playing your harmonica. 

Now just breathe normally, but listen to the sound your breathing makes coming in and out of your lips.  Breathe only through your mouth, NOT through your nose also.

Feel the air flowing over the tip of your tongue, over the back of your tongue, going on down into your lungs and back out again.  Put your tongue up near the roof of your mouth - what does that do to the sound of your breathing?  It should make a higher pitch.  Feel the air moving inside your mouth - can you feel that there is not much air space in there right now?

Keep breathing and leave your lips and everything else just the same, but let your tongue relax into a more normal position a little lower in your mouth. What does that do to the sound coming out of your lips?  You should have a lower sound than you did with your tongue up near the roof of your mouth.  Keep breathing like this, but feel how the air wants to dry out your tongue - do you notice how you easily feel the air going over the tip of your tongue and not feel it as much going over the back part of your tongue?

Now keep everything inside your mouth just like it is:  lips just like they would be if you were playing the harmonica, tongue in a relaxed place inside your mouth, and you are listening to the sound your breathing is making.

Keeping everything else the same, drop your jaw a couple of inches.  What does it do to the sound?  Does it go up or down?  You should notice that the breathing sound goes down dramatically in pitch when you drop your jaw a little bit.  Where do you feel the air flowing over your tongue?  Do you still feel it mostly on the tip of your tongue or do you feel it more on the back of your tongue?

Try keeping your lips and tongue the same, but moving your jaw up and down while continuing to breathe.  Notice how it changes the pitch.  Notice also how much more air it feel like you have inside your mouth when you drop your jaw a little bit.

This time, keep your lips in position like you were playing the harmonica, but drop your jaw even lower.  Keep breathing in and out and listening to the sound, and drop your tongue way down to the bottom of your mouth and listen to what that does to the sound.   Imagine that you are creating a cave inside your mouth, and the wind is whistling in and out of the cave. 
Really try to imagine a big cave with the wind whistling in and out of an opeing of the cave. 

Feel how much air space there is inside your mouth right now, and feel how the air is flowing on down your throat into your lungs, and get used to that big, open feeling. 

Feel how much difference there is than when we started with that little of bit of space with our tongues up near the roof of our mouths?