I
Modern thought on the subject of vocal cultivation has crystallized along well-defined lines. For one thing, it has emphasized in a striking way the problem of the management of the vocal organs. The fact is now clearly recognized that the voice has one correct mode of operating, as well as an almost limitless possibility of wrong or incorrect forms of activity. When the voice is correctly produced it can be used daily in large halls and churches without strain or undue fatigue. By judicious exercise, when rightly produced, the voice is greatly increased in volume and power; it acquires facility in the singing of difficult and elaborate music; its compass is increased, giving it command of a wider range of notes than is possessed by the untrained voice.
Yet vocal cultivation demands the adoption of the correct management of the vocal organs. When the voice is correctly produced nothing more than judicious exercise is needed to bring it to the condition of technical mastery. But if the proper manner of producing tone is not acquired, then the exercise of the voice is fraught with peril to the vocal organs. Instead of the voice being benefited by practice the contrary result is almost inevitable. The use of a wrongly produced voice on an extended scale, involving, as it must, the daily attempt to produce tones powerful enough to fill a large space, strains and injures the vocal organs. This results in a weakening of the voice, in loss of control, in discomfort and pain to the singer, in a strained, harsh quality of tone, and finally, if persisted in long enough, in complete loss of voice.
The difference between the correct use of the voice and any incorrect manner of producing tone is inherent in the organ itself. No one who wishes to sing can elude the problem which Nature thus propounds. On the contrary, the problem of vocal management must be solved some time in the course of a singer’s vocal studies or the technical command of the voice can never be attained. Vocal cultivation is that form of exercise of the voice which leads, through the correct management of the organ, to a command of all the voice’s resources of beauty, range, power, and flexibility.
Even on the earliest singers of the church a solution of the vocal problem was imposed. These singers had to perform daily in large cathedrals and churches; they had to sing their music in time and in tune. Some measure of vocal cultivation was of necessity involved in their training. We are, fortunately, not left in ignorance of the methods applied in vocal training in the centuries which preceded the rise of solo singing. Many references to this subject found in the writings of early musical historians have been gathered together by H. F. Mannstein in his Geschichte, Geist, und Ausübung des Gesanges von Gregor dem Grossen bis auf unsere Zeit (Leipzig, 1845). Fétis also contains many passages which throw valuable light on the subject It is true that the subject has been considered rather obscure, owing to the fact that students have looked for something not to be found, that is, for rules bearing on the mechanical management of the vocal organs. In order to understand this subject fully the modern conception of voice culture must first be briefly considered.
Modern methods of voice culture are based upon the doctrine that the vocal organs must be consciously guided by the singer in the correct performance of their functions. The idea is that the voice must be led to adopt the correct manner of action by direct attention to its mechanical processes. According to the present conception, the singer must see to it that his vocal cords act in a certain way; that his breath is controlled at the proper point; that the tones have the correct origin and receive the influence of resonance in the correct manner. Even back of this conception lies a belief in the helplessness of the vocal organs to hit upon the proper mode of acting without the conscious direction of the singer. The singer must impose a certain manner of operating on the voice and carefully supervise all the processes of tone production. This is the scientific view of voice culture; until quite recently it was almost universally held.
It is almost incredible that this view is thoroughly modern and that its origin cannot be traced further back than the invention of the laryngoscope in 1855. Not until 1883 did the scientific view of vocal cultivation find definite expression in the writings of any authority on the voice; in that year Browne and Behnke, in their book entitled ‘Voice, Song, and Speech,’ stated the scientific doctrine in plain terms, and asserted that the voice cannot be controlled in any other way than by attention to the mechanical processes of the vocal organs. For many years thereafter this doctrine went unchallenged, and methods of voice culture treated as the most important materials of instruction the means they embodied for enabling students of singing to acquire direct conscious control over their vocal organs.
An entirely different conception of voice culture has recently been advanced and has indeed made great headway. From the fact that the new doctrine found its first complete statement in the writer’s ‘Psychology of Singing’ (New York, 1908), it has come to be known as the psychological theory, in contradistinction to the mechanical theory embodied in the scientific system.
Briefly stated, the psychological theory of voice production is as follows: To the vocal problem propounded by nature the solution has also been furnished by nature herself. Nature has endowed the voice with a sufficient guide and monitor—the sense of hearing. There is a direct connection between the cerebral centres of hearing and the centres governing the muscles of the vocal organs. The volitional impulse to produce a certain sound involves the hearing of the sound in imagination; through the nerve fibres connecting the centres of hearing and of voice, the nerve impulse is sent to the vocal organs which causes them to assume the positions and perform the muscular contractions necessary for the production of the desired tone. Thus the voice is controlled by the ear, and it needs no other form of control than that furnished by the ear. A correct management of the voice in singing results in the production of tones of a distinct characteristic sound, while any incorrect use of the voice produces tones which differ from the correct type, more or less, according to the degree of faultiness in the vocal management. The ear is the only reliable judge of the voice. Only by listening to the tones it produces can it be determined whether a voice is correctly used or not. The object of vocal cultivation is first of all to enable the voice to produce the correct type of tone. This is accomplished by practice, which consists of repeated efforts to sing tones of the type recognized by the ear as correct. If the ear has the right conception of pure tone, the vocal organs gradually fall into the way of producing correct tones, that is, of operating in the correct manner. In this the voice is guided by its own instincts, which offer a safer and more efficient guidance than that provided by the conscious management of the vocal organs. No attention whatever need be paid to the mechanical operations of tone production. The vocal organs are informed by the mental ear what is expected of them, and perform their functions instinctively without any help from the intellect.
One advantage of the psychological doctrine is that it at once dispels all the mystery which has seemed to surround the early history of the subject, and which has extended even to the method of the Italian teachers of bel canto. Little notice has indeed been taken of the systems of vocal cultivation which flourished before the rise of the Italian school of vocal teachers. But since the universal adoption of the scientific doctrine, repeated efforts have been made to penetrate the secret of the old method. These efforts have always resulted in failure, for the reason already mentioned. Investigators have sought to re-discover the form of instruction used for the purpose of imparting a direct conscious control of the vocal organs; their conviction that no other means of vocal command is possible has blinded students of the subject to the instinctive processes actually followed. As our main purpose in the present chapter is to describe the system now known as the old Italian method, a fuller treatment of its records, both literary and traditional, will be reserved for a later section. A review of the early history of voice culture will lead most readily to the consideration of the old Italian method.