Great Singers on the Art of Singing Part 24

V. Open the mouth without inhaling.

VI. Make the strident sound ("e" as in when).

VII. Close the mouth and let the air pa.s.s in and out of nostrils a few seconds.

VIII. Open the mouth without inhaling.

IX. Sing the vowel "Ah" as in _father_ in such a manner that it is a combination of the dark tone and the strident tone.

X. Do this in such a way that all of the breathy disagreeable features of the dark tone disappear but its foundation features remain to give it fullness and roundness, while all of the disagreeable features of the strident tone disappear although its color-giving, light-giving, life-giving characteristics are retained to give the combination-tone richness and sweetness. A beautiful result is inevitable, if the principle is properly understood.

I have tried this with many people who have sung but little before in their lives and who were not conscious of having interesting voices.

Without a long course of vocal lessons or anything of the sort they have been able to produce in a short time--a very few minutes--a tone that would be admired by any critic.

A COMFORTABLE PITCH

It is to be a.s.sumed that the student will, in these experiments, take the pitch in his voice which is most comfortable. Having mastered the combination tone on "Ah" at any pitch, it will be easy to try other pitches and other vowels. "Ah" is the natural vowel, but having secured the "know how" through a correct production of "Ah" the same results may be attained with any other vowel produced in a similar way. "E" as in _see_ has of course more of the strident quality, the high, bright quality and "OO" as in moon more of the dark, but even these extreme tones may be so placed that they become enriched through the employment of resonance of all those parts of the mouth, nose and body which may be brought naturally to reinforce them.

"PING"

I have never met a singer who was not looking for "ping" or what is called brightness. Most voices are hopelessly dead, and therefore lack sweetness. The voices are filled with night--black hollow gloomy night or else they are as strident as the caterwauling of a Tom Cat. The happy mean between the extremes is the area in which the singer's greatest results are attained.

Think of your tone, always. The breath will then take care of itself. If the tone has a tremulo, or sounds stuffy or sounds weak, you have not apportioned the right amount of breath to it, but you are not going to gain this information by thinking of the breath but by thinking of the tone.

LET YOUR OWN EARS CONVINCE YOU

Now, that is all there is to it. I am not striving to found a method or anything of the sort; but I have seen students waste years on what is called "voice placing" and not come to anything like the same result that will come after the accomplishment of this simple matter. Try it out with your own voice. You will see in a short time what it will do.

Your own ears will convince you, to say nothing of the ears of your friends. All I know is that after I discovered this, it was possible for me to employ it and make records with so small a percentage of discard that I have been surprised.

It remains for the intelligent teachers to apply such knowledge to a systematic vocal course of exercises, studies and songs, which will help the pupil to progress most rapidly. Don't think that I am pretending to tell all that there is to vocal culture in an hour. It is a great and important study upon which I have spent a lifetime. However, as I said before, I have nothing to sell and I am only too happy to give this information which has cost me so many hours of thought to crystallize.

Typographical errors corrected by the transcriber of this etext:

Talmadge=>Talmage

Artious=>Artibus

citadal=>citadel

Wohltemperites=>Wohltemperiertes

liebenswurdig=>liebenswurdig

Delibes=>Delibes

Words not changed: unforgetable, skilful, Beyreuth, marvelous