Sally Collyer

Breath management training in classical singing is becoming increasingly physiologically focused, despite evidence that directives focusing on chest-wall kinematic (ribcage and abdominal) behavior effect minimal change in acoustical measures of singing. A direct and proportionate relationship between breathing behavior and vocal quality is importan...

The influence of fundamental frequency (F0) on the relationship between sound pressure level (SPL) and spectral balance (SB) has been largely unexplored in the female singing voice. Five classically trained females performed a messa di voce across their musical F0 range. Average maximum SB rose with F0 by 0.27 dB/semitone (ST) to B4 and then decrea...

Breathing instruction for classical singing is becoming more physiologically focused, yet the effect of chest-wall kinematic directives on breathing behaviour is largely unexplored. Five female classical singers sang Caccini's Ave Maria without directive and under two directives: 'steadily pull the abdomen inward' and 'steadily expand the abdomen'...

This article addresses three issues. Firstly, breathing studies of trained classical singers have found high inter-singer variability, which raises many questions about the nature and role of breathing in singing; these study findings and their implications are discussed from a pedagogical perspective. Secondly, the article examines the resulting l...

This study investigated the influence of fundamental frequency (F0) and sound pressure level (SPL) range on respiratory behavior in classical singing. Five trained female singers performed an 8-s messa di voce (a crescendo and decrescendo on one F0) across their musical F0 range. Lung volume (LV) change was estimated, and chest-wall kinematic behav...

The messa di voce, in its pure form a crescendo and decrescendo on one note, has been revered for centuries in classical singing, but the pedagogical assumptions of linearity and symmetry have received little critical assessment, especially across a wide fundamental frequency (F0) range. Five trained female classical singers performed a total of 31...

Research into respiratory behavior during singing and speech makes extensive use of standard respiratory and vented pneumotachograph facemasks. This study investigated whether the use of such facemasks would affect respiratory behavior in terms of lung volume (excursion, at initiation and at termination) or duration (of inspiration and of expiratio...