Harry Collins Deacon

“ Singers, and those of this country especially, are very little (in too many cases not at all) alive to the fact, that the moment singing is touched, we enter upon the region of the dramatic. In speaking generally of dramatic singing, the operatic or theatrical is understood. But the smallest ballad has its share of the dramatic, and if this were more widely felt, we should have better singing and a better use of the tremolo and vibrato, which can hardly fail to place themselves rightly if the import of the piece to be sung be rightly felt and understood. ”

“ The theory formerly advanced, that the female voice is only a reproduction of the male voice an octave higher in pitch, is at once set aside by the clearly observable fact of the middle register being common to all voices, male and female. The peculiarity of the female voice is the possession of a large range of fine head-notes in the place of the male falsetto; and of the male voice the possession of a large range of open chest notes. ”

“ Indeed, there are many who would prefer singing the 'Inflammatus' from Rossini's 'Stabat Mater' to such a piece as 'Dove sono.' Many of the old Italian composers wrote music of a high tessitura, though it is true that the pitch was lower in their day than it is now. 'Deh! vieni, non tardar,' is an example of moderate tessitura, though it has a compass of two octaves. The tessitura of the vocal music in Beethoven's 9th Symphony is justly the singers' nightmare. ”

“ In soft passages it has a beautifully weird and ethereal effect of half-light when not spun out. In vocal music it is to be used in the first-named situations. The human voice loses its steadiness in every-day life under the influence of joy, sorrow, eagerness, fear, rage, or despair, and as subjects for vocal treatment usually have their fair share of these emotions, we must expect to hear both the vibrato and the tremolo in their places, and are very much disappointed if we do not. ”

“ Reason, judgment, and taste must be brought to bear with the same kind of philosophical and critical study by means of which an actor arrives at the full significance of his part, and it will be found that a big vocal piece like 'Ah perfido,' 'Infelice,' or 'Non più di fiori,' requires more psychological research than is generally supposed. ”

“ It is possible to produce many notes in both ways, and this is the basis of the all-important operation of blending the registers, an operation requiring in some cases an almost incredible amount of patience on the part of both instructor and instructed; and very frequently voices are ruined, either by their being in the hands of those who have not the necessary knowledge or patience, or far more frequently by the singer himself or herself working alone in the dark. ”

“ At what time 'treble' may have found its way into English it is difficult to say. 'Childish treble,' as the voice of old age, appears in Shakspeare, and 'faint treble' used to be applied to what is commonly known as falsetto. English amateur pianists frequently call the right hand the treble hand. ”