III
STUDY IN TONE-COLOR
And now we must turn to our last point of discussion, tone-color. What is the nature of this element of our vocabulary—this Klangfarbe, this Timbre? Upon what does it depend? You will say, "It is a property of the voice depending upon the form of the vibrations which produce the tone." True! And physiologically the form of the vibrations depends upon the condition of the entire vocal apparatus. Tone-color, then, is a modulation of resonance. But what concerns us is the fact that it is an emotional modulation of resonance. What concerns us is the fact that, as a change of thought instantly registers itself in a change of pitch, so a change of emotion instantly produces a change in the color of the tone—if the voice is a free instrument. And so, as before, I want you not to think of the physiological aspect, but to yield to the emotion, noting the character of the resultant tone, regardless of what has happened in the larynx to produce that result.
As Browning affords us the best material for our study in change of pitch, so the poems of Sidney Lanier offer to the voice the richest field for exercise in tone-color. Musician and poet in one, Lanier's peculiar charm lies in his unerring choice of words, which suggest in their sound, when rightly voiced, the atmosphere of the scene he is painting. Lanier uses words as Corot uses colors. This gives the voice its opportunity to bring out by subtle variations in timbre the variations in light and shade of an atmosphere. To read aloud, sympathetically, once a day, Lanier's The Symphony is the best possible way to develop simultaneously all the elements of a vocal vocabulary. We shall use this poem to-day as a text for our study in tone-color. Let us omit the message of the violins and heavier strings, and take the passage beginning with the interlude upon which the flute-voice breaks:
But presently
A velvet flute-note fell down pleasantly
Upon the bosom of that harmony,
And sailed and sailed incessantly,
As if a petal from a wild rose blown
Had fluttered down upon that pool of tone
And boatwise dropped o' the convex side
And floated down the glassy tide
And clarified and glorified
The solemn spaces where the shadows bide.
From the warm concave of that fluted note
Somewhat, half song, half odor, forth did float,
As if a rose might somehow be a throat; ...
What an ideal for tone-color! Dare we think to make it ours? We must. We must adopt it with confidence of attainment. Let me quote a little further:
When Nature from her far-off glen
Flutes her soft messages to men,
The flute can say them o'er again;
Yea, Nature, singing sweet and lone,
Breathes through life's strident polyphone
The flute-voice in the world of tone.
Read this passage aloud as a mere statement of fact, employing a matter-of-fact tone. Gray in color, is it not? Now let your voice take the color Lanier has blended for you. Let your tone, like a thing "half song, half odor," float forth on these words and linger as only a perfume can about the thought. Now let the tone change in color to clarify and glorify the following message from the flute:[13]
Sweet friends,
Man's love ascends
To finer and diviner ends
Than man's mere thought e'er comprehends.
I cannot, for lack of space, reprint the whole flute message, but you will get the poem, if you have it not, and voice every word of it, I am sure. Here are some of the most telling lines for our present purpose: