Expressive Voice Culture, Including the Emerson System

by Jessie Eldridge Southwick

In the beginning, therefore, such vital conditions as are essential to the production of tone should be considered.

First, a standing position, in which the vital organs are well sustained, is essential. One cannot even breathe properly unless one stands well. The weight should be mainly upon the balls of the feet, and the crown of the head so positively elevated as to secure the erectness of the spinal column. This will involve the proper elevation of the chest, the essential freedom of respiration, and the right sustaining tension of the abdominal muscles.

(a) Take standing position as follows: weight on balls of feet, heels together, toes slightly apart; line of gravity from crown of head, well lifted, to balls of feet; the ear, point of shoulder, and point of hip should be in line; muscles of the thigh strong in front; ribs well lifted so that front line from waist to throat is lengthened to full extent; back kept erect, and curve at waist not emphasized. Breathe strongly and deeply several times.

To secure the elevation of the ribs the hands may be placed under the arms, as high as possible, fingers pointing down; then try to turn or press the ribs up and forward with strong action of hands, breathing freely and emphasizing strength in waist muscles. Sustain the ribs in this elevated position, and thus uplift the chest. Keep shoulders free. Drop hands to sides again.

(b) Take half a step forward; sustain weight on advanced foot; do not change position of retired foot, but keep the sense of purchase in it. The chest should be carried forward of the abdomen and the abdominal muscles given their best leverage by a slight bending forward from the hips. (Bending forward must not be done by any dropping of the chest, or shortening of the line at waist through relaxation.) This position must be light, active, buoyant, and reposeful.

A constant sense of easy balance should be developed through poising exercises.

The habit of healthful and powerful respiration should be established by physical exercise for that purpose, and the right manipulation of breath in tone production should be secured by the nature of the voice exercises. Any vocal exercise which involves in the very nature of its production a good control of breath becomes, by virtue of that fact, a good breathing exercise as well.

[Footnote: See exercises described in a later chapter.]

If the voice be perfectly free, it is then capable of expressing truly all that the person thinks and feels. The first desirable end sought, then, is freedom. What is freedom, and how secured? When all cavities of resonance are accessible to the vibrating column of air the voice may be said to be free. By cavities of resonance is meant the chest (trachea and bronchial tubes), the larynx, pharynx, the mouth, and the nares anterior and posterior, or head chambers of resonance. The free tone is modified through all its varieties of expression by those subtle changes in form, intensity, movement, inflection, and also direction, which are too fine for the judgment to determine, or even observe successfully. These varieties are made possible by the very organism of the voice, which is vital, not mechanical, and are determined by the influences working from the mind through the nerves which control this wonderful living instrument. This is governed by the law of reflex action, by which stimulation of any nerve center produces responsive action in other parts of the body. The voice will obey the mind. Right objects of thought will influence it much more perfectly and rapidly than the mere arbitrary dictates of calculation.

Right psychology would be the only thing necessary to the thorough cultivation of the voice if the conditions were so perfect that there were no habits of stricture and our instrument were thus in perfect tune. And in spite of the fact that it is not usually found in perfect tune, the influence of practice under right mental conditions is the most potent and indispensable part of voice culture. Let this fact not be lost sight of while we are discussing those more technical methods of training which are designed to tune and regulate our instrument.