At this church anthems and settings of the Canticles are sung every Sunday evening. The men are voluntary; the head boys get from 30s. to 40s. a year, the solo boys receiving 3d. or 6d. as an encouragement after rendering a solo or verse part.
In spite of all that can be written on the subject of voice-training, the art is one most difficult to communicate. Some teachers succeed; others fail. A remarkable instance of this came under my notice lately. The headmaster of a school asked me to pay his boys a visit in order, if possible, to discover the reason of the great falling-off in their singing. His previous singing-teacher had brought the boys to a high pitch of excellence. When he left, the singing was placed under the charge of an undermaster, who had for a year or more heard all the singing lessons given by his predecessor, who used the same voice exercises with the same boys in the same room. Surely, one would have thought the results must be the same. But the singing had deteriorated; flattening, and a lifeless manner had overcome the boys. The causes, so far as I could discover, were first that the new teacher wanted the magnetic, enthusiastic way of the old, and second, that he had not so quick an ear for change of register, and allowed the lower mechanism of the voice to be forced up higher than its proper limits.
This chapter focuses a large amount of valuable experience, but amid the many hints which are given, two ways of securing right tone stand out with marked prominence. They are, soft singing, and the downward practice of scales.
CHAPTER V.
INFORMATION ON VOICE-TRAINING, COLLECTED BY THE SALISBURY DIOCESAN CHORAL ASSOCIATION.
I am indebted to the Rev. W. Miles Barnes, rector of Monkton, Dorchester, for the following information, recently obtained by him on the subject of voice-training. It appears that for the information of choir instructors (some 200 in number) in union with the Salisbury Diocesan Choral Association, the advice of precentors and organists of cathedrals was lately sought as to the best way of correcting a very common fault in the singing of country choirs.
The following questions were proposed: