[Harp-L] Milkshake or Balloon? (was Inhaling through nose trouble, please help)

[Winslow Yerxa <winslowyerxa@xxxxxxxxx>]

OK, I got curious about the milkshake exercise, so last night on my way home from rehearsal I stopped in at Mel's Drive In and ordered an espresso milkshake (the things I do for research!).

I noticed that I was breathing through my nose while I sucked the milkshake into my mouth. Sometimes I was inhaling, sometimes I was exhaling. (Maybe this would be good for learning circular breathing, where you sustain a note for a moment by pushing pulling air from your mouth while you inhale or exhale through your nose.)

When I thought about this it occurred to me that when you suck a liquid into your mouth, you don't want to inhale it and start choking and coughing, so you completely shut your breathing apparatus out of the circuit.


So if, when you suck a milkshake into your mouth
 
-- you don't breathe through your mouth
-- you can breathe through your nose anyway with no effect on the suction

then maybe the milkshake exercise isn't appropriate for learning to breath through your mouth with your nasal passages closed.
But there's another problem - you're sucking, not breathing. You use suction to draw the liquid into your mouth. This is great for learning to bend, but will cause all sorts of problems with pre-bending, notes not sounding, and high notes squealing if you try that same tongue-based suction just to play a draw note.


The balloon exeercise, by contrast, goes directly to the heart of the purpose: to inhale and exhale through the mouth with the nasal passages closed off. 

But, someone objected, nobody blow up a ballon by inhaling.

But who ever inhales while making T or K or P sounds or saying Eee-yooo? Fact is - and I encounter this a lot in teaching - nobody does 75% of the things you do playing the harmonica while inhaling; they all take getting used to. Once you get the hang of puffing your cheeks out while attempting to exhale with your lips closed, it's easy enough to reverse breath direction and suck your cheeks in.
You can see me demonstrating the balloon technique in this video from Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition:


http://bcove.me/yzug9363 
Winslow  

Winslow Yerxa
President, SPAH, the Society for the Preservation and Advancement of the Harmonica
Producer, the Harmonica Collective
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, ISBN 978-0-470-33729-5
            Harmonica Basics For Dummies, ASIN B005KIYPFS
            Blues Harmonica For Dummies, ISBN 978-1-1182-5269-7
Resident Expert, bluesharmonica.com
Instructor, Jazzschool Community Music School