Singing and Co2

[Filip1993]

I saw a post over at peatarian where people discussed how singing affects Co2 levels in the body. What are your thoughts on singing and Co2? Is singing harmful? This study was mentioned in the post:

http://www.google.se/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=& ... 8703,d.bGQ

 

[Blossom]

I suppose it would depend on the person. Harmonicas are sometimes used in pulmonary rehab to help train people with chronic lung disease to have better control of their breathing. I would suspect that it's important to take a break if the singer becomes breathless for too long. I doubt it is really dangerous but for someone not practiced in singing regularly I suppose it is possible to decrease CO2 by blowing off more than normal. I wonder if that's related to the cultural image of the obese opera singers? Some obese people have what's medically called obesity hypoventilation syndrome and retain more CO2 than average sized people. It would be interesting if that were related to the obesity paradox. None of this is scientific of course just my own personal musings. I'm also not fat bashing btw. Interesting link Filip.

 

[tara]

I guess you could try testing CP and or pulse and temp before and 5 mins after a singing session, and see if you can tell what effect it has on you?
I would expect it depends on how you are singing.

 

[marcar72]

I would imagine singing would increase CO2, not sure though. Everytime I "attempt to sing" it seems like I'm instinctively not exhaling as much as I normally would.

 

[Filip1993]

I always feel warm and calm after singing. It certainly feels like it increases CO2, but I'm not sure either.

 

[tara]

I always feel warm and calm after singing. It certainly feels like it increases CO2, but I'm not sure either.

That sounds like as good a sign as you could hope for. Keep it up . :)

 

[Sheik]

It probably depends on your technique too, as funny as that sounds. If your voice is breathy, you will breathe a lot more. If your voice is very efficient, almost all of the energy will be converted to sound and you won't need to take as many breaths. You can get an idea of how efficiently you are phonating by putting your hand in front of your mouth to feel how much air is coming out as you sing. If it's efficient you will feel almost no air coming out.

I tried breathing into a bag after singing once because I had gotten the impression that my CO2 was depleted. It seemed to help but it's hard to say for sure.

 

[tara]

It probably depends on your technique too, as funny as that sounds. If your voice is breathy, you will breathe a lot more. If your voice is very efficient, almost all of the energy will be converted to sound and you won't need to take as many breaths. You can get an idea of how efficiently you are phonating by putting your hand in front of your mouth to feel how much air is coming out as you sing. If it's efficient you will feel almost no air coming out.

I tried breathing into a bag after singing once because I had gotten the impression that my CO2 was depleted. It seemed to help but it's hard to say for sure.

This makes sense to me.

 

[SQu]

I had singing lessons for a while and being breathless and hyperventilating were not what you wanted and got you the opposite of what you were trying to achieve - a strong voice. You had to keep going on just one breath and the effect was of slowing, controlling and pausing breathing. You do breath through your mouth but the other effects seem to outweigh that or you'd sound weak and breathy. It was calming and almost meditative.