SPEECH
The vowels and consonants are, in speaking, produced by certain noises (Geräusche), which in singing sound together with the tone. These sounds are produced by local diminutions of the cavity of the mouth, or by the opening or closing of the lips and teeth, as well as by movements of the tip of the tongue, &c., while a single pulse of the air passes through the tolerably wide open glottis and through the cavity of the mouth without regular vibrations. For the air rushes more directly out of the mouth in speaking than in singing. Of this we may be easily convinced by holding a feather before the mouth; it will show far more motion in speaking than in correct singing. If, in speaking, people would take pains to form the vowels in the front of the mouth—a habit so necessary in singing, and which is easily acquired by practice—our common speech would be much more melodious, far-sounding, and less strained. We see the truth of this when we hear words called out from a height and from a distance; the different consonants then mostly disappear, excepting the m and n, which are formed mostly in the front of the mouth. The vowels, on the other hand, are more or less plainly heard, according to the places in the mouth where they are formed. Certain it is that for the beauty of our common speech, the resonance of the cavity of the mouth peculiar to each vowel may be rendered available. A singing tone in speaking is very disagreeable. Every one who is not used to it, finds the singing dialect of Saxony in the highest degree offensive and unpleasant. Nevertheless, a more attentive observation soon teaches us that behind the noise which characterizes the several sounds in language, a timbre is heard similar to the tone in singing, and in various instances there occur regular musical intervals, as at the end of a sentence or in the special accentuation of single words. Thus, at the conclusion of an affirmative sentence the voice usually falls about a fourth from the medium pitch, and at the end of an interrogatory sentence rises about a fifth above the usual speaking tone. Words specially accented are usually a tone higher than the rest, &c. In public speaking and in dramatic representations these variations of sound are more numerous and complicated, and the inventor of the modern Recitative, Jacob Perri, even declares that he formed it by imitating in singing these variations of sound, in order to restore again the declamation of the ancient tragedians.[ 16 ]
Tedious and intolerable as it is to hear so much sing-song in common speech, it is equally wearisome when people drone on always in a dry speaking tone at the same pitch, without ever letting the voice rise or fall. The most interesting matter thus delivered will lull the hearer to sleep. It cannot be denied that a rich field is here offered for farther scientific observation, and those natural laws which lie at the foundation of the art of singing may certainly be applied with advantage to the perfecting of the mode of speaking, especially in those who have to speak in public.[ 17 ]
To extend these remarks any farther does not come within our present purpose, which is concerned exclusively with the voice in singing and its cultivation. For this reason I leave unnoticed many most interesting phenomena relating to music in general, but not particularly to the culture of the voice, although they are of the deepest interest to the educated musician.
[7] Tyndall.
[8] The concert pitch in different places and at different periods has undergone great changes. The Grand Opera in Paris in the year 1700 established 404 vibrations to a second as the concert pitch of a1, which gradually rose higher, as the wind instruments became more perfect and had a more important part assigned them in concerted music, until 1858 it had attained the height of 448 vibrations in a second. In this same year (1858) at Berlin and St. Petersburg it reached its greatest height—451½ vibrations in the second. In Mozart’s time, in Vienna, it had only 422 and 428 vibrations.
[9] As long as melody alone was aimed at in music, and was accompanied only by octaves, the tones preserved their natural purity. But with the rise of harmony (the accord of different tones) there was rendered necessary a more regular system, to which the purity of the tones was sacrificed.
[10] “It is not possible to sound a stretched string as a whole without at the same time causing to a greater or less extent its subdivision; that is to say, superposed upon the vibrations of the string we have always, in a greater or less degree, the vibrations of its aliquot parts. The higher notes produced by these latter vibrations are called the harmonics of the string. And so it is with other sounding bodies; we have, in all cases, a co-existence of vibrations. Higher tones mingle with the fundamental tone, and it is their intermixture which determines what, for want of a better term, we call the quality of the sound. The French call it timbre, and the Germans call it Klangfarbe. It is this union of high and low tones that enables us to distinguish one musical instrument from another. A clarionet and a violin, for example, though tuned to the same fundamental note, are not confounded.…
“All bodies and instruments, then, employed for producing musical sounds, emit, besides their fundamental tones, tones due to higher order of vibrations. The Germans embrace all such sounds under the general term Obertöne. I think it will be an advantage if we, in England, adopt the term over-tones, as the equivalent of the term employed in Germany. One has occasion to envy the power of the German language to adapt itself to requirements of this nature. The term Klangfarbe, for example, employed by Helmholtz, is exceedingly expressive, and we need its equivalent also. You know that color depends upon rapidity of vibrations—that blue light bears to red the same relation that a high tone does to a low one. A simple color has but one rate of vibration, and it may be regarded as the analogue of a simple tone in music. A tone, then, may be defined as the product of a vibration which cannot be decomposed into more simple ones. A compound color, on the contrary, is produced by the admixture of two or more simple ones; and an assemblage of tones, such, as we obtain when the fundamental tone and the harmonics of a string sound together, is called by the Germans a Klang. May we not employ the English word clang to denote the same thing, and thus give the term a precise scientific meaning akin to its popular one? And may we not, like Helmholtz, add the word color or tint to denote the character of the clang, using the term clang-tint as the equivalent of Klangfarbe?” (Sound: A course of Lectures delivered at the Royal Institution of Great Britain by John Tyndall, LL.D., F. R. S., Professor of Nat. Phil. in the Royal Institution and in the Royal School of Mines. English edition, pp. 116–118.)—Tr.
[11] As to the characteristic sounds of the different keys, the views of musicians are to the present day divided. Many even of our most eminent theorists, as Hauptmann, for example, in Leipsig, have maintained that all keys (Tonarten) are only transpositions of one major and minor key, and that like musical effects may be produced with one as well as with the other. The majority of musicians are, however, of the opinion that each key has its peculiar character, and that by transposition into another key the musical effect is changed. My son, Carl Seiler, has discovered that each key has its own peculiar, prominent over-tones, which determine its distinctive character. A table of all the keys (Tonarten), in which the prominent over-tones of each are given, shows also that the mutual relation of the keys (Tonarten) is elucidated by these over-tones. And thus again scientific investigation confirms what the founders of the theory of music, with their sound sense for the beautiful, recognized as correct.
[12] The position of the body in singing must be such as in no way to interfere with the easy drawing of the breath. One sings most easily standing as erect as possible, quiet and unconstrained, the chest somewhat projected, the body slightly drawn in, and the hands folded.
[13] It was instruments of this class—trumpets, horns, bugles, etc.—in whose timbre the highest inharmonic over-tones overpower all the rest, that were painfully offensive to the exquisite musical organization of Mozart from his earliest childhood.
[14] It is all but impossible to give an idea of what is meant by Tonansatz, without a practical illustration. It is that striking of the note or the air corresponding to the touch in piano-playing.
[15] A selection of such exercises, prepared by the present writer, has recently been published by Mr. O. Ditson in Boston, and also two books of old Italian solfeggi from Mieksch and Mazzoni, arranged to the present pitch.
[16] According to Boethius, the lyra, which was used by the Greeks to accompany declamation, embraced, in the tuning of its strings, the principal intervals used in speaking.
[17] Since the appearance of this book I have often been consulted by persons whose calling required them to speak in public, and whose vocal organs were no longer competent thereto. Here also I have found in most cases that there was an incorrect use of the registers, and that men especially form the lowest sounds with that forced enlarging of the windpipe already mentioned (that is, with the so-called Strohbassregister). Many have probably fallen into this unnatural and exhausting manner by attempting to speak or to sing loudly. Together with the incorrect use of the registers, there is also an incorrect management (Leitung) of the vibrating air, which so often renders speaking so difficult to public speakers. As, when the voice is not wholly directed to the front of the mouth, it does not move the external air quickly enough and so does not reach far, the speaker commonly tries to help himself by a greater expenditure of force. Misled by false views, speakers usually attempt by a great waste of breath and by exertion alone to produce an effect which can be realized only by skilful management of the most delicate and easily moved of all things, the air.
IV
THE ÆSTHETIC VIEW
OF THE ART OF SINGING
Having treated, in the two preceding divisions of this book, of the physiological and physical laws lying at the basis of singing tones, and of their practical application to the formation of the voice, we come now to the better known—the æsthetic—part of our task.
The reader will bear in mind that as, in the preceding sections, our attention has been confined to what directly relates to the culture of the voice in singing, notwithstanding the strong temptation to transcend the limits which our present design prescribes, so in this section also the same purpose is kept in view, and it is not to be regarded as treating of the æsthetics of music in general.
Hitherto we have had to do with fixed, irreversible laws, which are to be implicitly followed in order to render singing as perfect as possible. We have seen how the decline of the art of singing had to follow as a necessary consequence the non-observance of these laws. In speaking thus far of the agreeable and the disagreeable, of the beautiful and its opposite, we have had no reference to artistic feeling. We have been concerned only with direct sensuous pleasure or pain, not with æsthetic beauty. We have been occupied thus far with the technique of our art—the form. But with the animating spirit of this form, the æsthetic, we enter upon a broader field, which, dependent upon purely psychological reasons (Motiven), may undergo a change, either from the general progress of mankind or from the culture of the practised artist. Thus, although from Aristotle down to Lessing and our own times the principles of beauty in all the arts are the same, yet every period, in which art has nourished, has produced works, various indeed, and corresponding to the spirit of the age, works, which, however, notwithstanding all differences, have still conformed to the demands of the principles of beauty. Thus, in architecture, sculpture, painting, music, &c., there are different styles of art, every one of which, however, has its justification and its peculiar beauty. We are not, therefore, to judge these different styles of art by the taste and ideas (Auffassung) of the present, but by the character of the times that produced them. Although the mode of thinking may vary in accordance with the different stages of culture of individuals and mankind, there are, nevertheless, certain principles of beauty which all nature announces.
By beauty we understand the highest perfection of the single parts in a perfectly represented whole, and the most intimate union of the ideal with the material, i. e., of the spiritual with the formal, which must have as its basis a certain proportion and order in the position of the several parts as well as in their relation to the whole work. In the perception of the beautiful, everything must tend to awaken the feeling of repose and pleasure; and the more susceptible we are of the impression of the beautiful, the more shall we be disturbed by defects, even the least, in any work of art. The pleasure which we take in any work of art, which, however faultless in certain respects, shows any glaring defect, is greatly abridged. The ugly spot will absorb our attention and destroy the pure enjoyment of its beauty, and still more disagreeable will be the effect if the different parts, otherwise beautifully shaped, are thrown out of their due symmetry and proportion. In the successive arts, as music, the dramatic art, &c., proportion (Maassvolle) is an essential condition of beauty, more than in the simultaneous arts; and an artist whose technique is altogether perfect, and who can succeed in reproducing every emotion of the mind in his work, is a true artist only when he never transgresses by an excess of passion the fine boundary lines of beauty.
It is given to only a very few to recognize at once the high and beautiful in art. In most the sense of the beautiful awakens only with a riper spiritual development. It is thus the fruit of a higher stage of culture. To children and persons wholly uneducated a brightly painted picture-book is more beautiful than the Dresden Madonna, that great masterpiece of painting. And most people take greater pleasure in a waltz by Strauss or Lanner than in a symphony by Beethoven or Mozart. Beauty depends upon principles, i. e., rules and laws, which are founded in the nature of the human reason. The appreciation, therefore, of beauty accompanies the development in man of his reason.
Music, above all the other arts, finds the earliest and most universal recognition, and almost every one listens to it with pleasure. Helmholtz says that music is much more intimately related to our sensations than all the other arts put together. Tones touch the ear and are instantly felt to be agreeable or disagreeable, while the impressions of painting, poetry, &c., upon our senses must be brought to our consciousness, and be judged of there by comparison. But it is not only through the direct effect of tones, as it appears to me, but more through the life (Belebung) which animates it, that music comes so close to us, and is so natural and near of kin to us. That must needs be the most interior of the arts whose office it is to express the various moods of the human soul in their tenderest and most secret fluctuations. The incorporeal material of tone is far better fitted to express these different moods (Stimmungen) than it is possible for poetry to do. Peculiar, definite feelings it cannot, indeed, distinctly denote without the help of poetry. But it is this very indefiniteness that enables music so to insinuate itself into the soul of the hearer that the tones heard seem to be the expression of his own feelings, and not those of another. Hence it is that music, in its whole nature, acts beneficently and soothingly, because its ruling principle is always a striving after repose, after a rest in consonances, just as this is the innermost aim and struggle of our own life. In the other arts this is much less the case. Aristotle, in his twenty-seventh and twenty-ninth problems, distinguishes the influences of music as the expression of tones of feeling (Stimmungen), and not of definite feelings. And Brendel, who, in his history of music, holds to the order among the arts received by the Greeks, by which architecture takes the lowest place, then sculpture, painting, music, and, lastly, as the highest of the arts, poetry, remarks, that “Music, by virtue of its power to express the most delicate shades of sentiment, would certainly take the highest rank were it more definite.” It has always been attempted to extend the boundaries of music by calling in the assistance of painting and poetry. Haydn, Mozart, Schubert, etc., have imitated in their compositions the singing of birds, the rippling of water, storms, &c. And now our modern musicians of the future endeavor to express in tones definite thoughts and feelings, imagining that here a new epoch in art is to open. But these new compositions always require elaborate explanations. Music until now, at least, has not yet given up its ethereal, indefinite character.[ 18 ]
It is essential to the full effect of a work of art that the artist should create it, and the hearer or beholder should enjoy it, without thinking of the rules and laws of beauty. A work of art must act immediately upon the feelings; it must appear to be spontaneous, and must be felt without reference to any aim or plan. What is æsthetically beautiful pleases a cultivated taste at once without any reflex consideration. But when, by the help of the understanding, we seek to account for the harmony and perfection of the several parts, and find by more searching study that the work is in conformity to the laws of reason, our enjoyment will naturally be enhanced. But this study must always come as a consequence of the first effect upon the soul, otherwise all effect is wanting. The unconscious enjoyment of the legitimate in art is the first condition of the influence of the beautiful upon the soul. The happy, elevated feeling which all works of art immediately awaken in us is thus only an unconscious recognition of the reasonable, the harmonious, the symmetrical. But this unconscious impression is instantly disturbed by any, the least imperfection, before we perceive where and in what it consists, for the human mind is not able fully and at once to examine a production of art in its entirety to its minutest parts.
An artist must, therefore, be esteemed according as his works excite and ravish the hearers or beholders without their knowing why, and he stands all the higher the simpler and the more naturally—i. e., the more unconsciously—this takes place.
In order to reach such a height, and to be able to act upon the souls of men with an elevating and informing power, it is first of all necessary that an artist should cultivate the form, or the technique, of his art to its greatest possible perfection, and have such perfect command of it, that the practical application of it is as natural to him as to breathe. For empty and dead as all technical knowledge is unless it is animated with a soul, yet no product of art æsthetically beautiful is possible without a perfect technique.
But the culture of the technique in the art of singing requires a special faculty in the teacher, and, together with the finest power of observation, an ear, which not only perceives the purity of the tone, whether high or low, but feels also the direction of the aerial column, the too much or too little of the breath, the coloring of the timbre, &c. An æsthetically artistic education demands likewise that the singer should have the highest general culture. As soon as the technical education has advanced so far that it no longer makes any demand upon the attention of the learner, the infusion of life and soul into the singing must be begun. The teacher must then be so filled with the spirit of his art that he shall be able so to inspire his pupils that, forgetting themselves, they may be absorbed in the high ideal work of their art, and regard their well-trained voices simply as expressing the noblest and most varied sentiments (Stimmungen). And on this account a teacher should seek to act upon the souls of his pupils, and awaken in them above all things a feeling for the high and the noble, that they may be able to find the correct mode of expressing it in singing. It is a very hard but not impossible work to educate true artists, who, penetrated with faith in the high worth of their art, shall fulfil its aim by exercising a refreshing and elevating influence upon their fellow-men. But, in order to be able to form true artists, a teacher must be devoted without intermission to his own culture, scientific and general; must strive with pleasure, and love, and inspiration to accomplish the high work of his calling, and make the severest demands upon himself, before he can expect anything great of his pupils.
Having spoken of those parts of the technique of the art of singing which rest upon impregnable natural laws, such as the registers of the voice, the formation of tones in regard to strength, pitch, and timbre, &c., let us consider more closely those other parts of the technique which rest upon psychological, i. e., æsthetic principles (Motiven). To these belong Rhythm, Correct understanding of the Tempo, Composition, Execution, that is, the delivery of the sentiment of the composition, and the aids thereto.