...humming is good!

I've been reading a very interesting book, We Sang Better (Vol. 1) by James Anderson. 250 tips on how to sing from singers 1800 to 1960. Singer's Tip No.134 is basically 'don't hum'. The book says that, at some time, some singers were trying to use humming to find their head voice, but that 'it in no way assists the student to get the throat free and open'.

I disagree. In my singing lessons we always started by humming to warm up. When I first tried to hum, I used to keep my mouth closed and hum on 'mmmmmm', but Rae told me that the correct way to hum was to keep the mouth open and lift the back of the tongue to make the 'ng' sound in tongue.

I'm also a trumpeter, and I use a practice mute, which is something you shove in the bell of the trumpet to make it quieter, so that you don't disturb anyone when you're warming up. It has another use, which is that shoving something in the bell creates more pressure, so that you have to push more air through the trumpet. To do that you have to open up the mouth and throat more. When you take the mute out, then you find that you play louder, and have a more open, full sound. It's particularly useful if you tend to hold back while playing.

Humming does the same thing, because, believe it or not, singing and trumpet playing are basically the same thing, except that in trumpet, the instrument is outside the body, and in singing, the instrument is in the throat. Humming is really good to get the voice going if you've got a cold or your voice is a bit sulky, because on those days you don't really want to push it to get it started, but humming can really get the cords working without stringing, and once you open your mouth, the sound is more free and the throat has opened up.

But they say you shouldn't use a practice mute too much, because it can have bad effects on your playing. Maybe that's where the singers who were trying to use humming to find their head voice were going wrong; maybe they were using it too much and producing a nasal sound. I only hum to warm up. It's important, in every aspect of practice, to remember that moderation is key.

...it's all about technique!

In my last post I mentioned the book that got me started on my mission to reconstruct Bel Canto: Mathilde Marchesi's 'Theoretical and Practical Vocal Method'. You might now be wondering, 'What exactly is it that makes Marchesi's method so different from what we hear today?'

Well, with Marchesi, it's all about technique, technique, technique.

She wrote (and here is one of the reasons I love her):

"People frequently speak of the Italian, French or German School or Style of singing. Having resided for many years in the different centres of these three nationalities, I can safely say that, with the exception of national songs of a popular and local character, peculiar to each nation, there are only two Vocal Schools in the whole world: the good, ... and the bad."

So how does one develop this good technique? Well, the really useful thing about this book, that makes it the perfect starting place for a singer, is that the exercises are progressive. They start off really easy, gradually getting harder and harder until you have this rock-solid technique.

They start as easily as singing one note at a time, rising slowly up through the voice's range, to develop the tone. This exercise Marchesi calls 'Emission of the Voice'.

"Open the mouth naturally, keep it quite still, and draw in breath slowly; then attack the sounds neatly on the broad Italian vowel A (ah), by a resolute articulation or stroke of the glottis (coup de glotte) avoiding all jerkiness as well as effort."

Even learning scales starts off by singing only two notes together.

"The voice in its natural state is as a rule rough, uneven, heavy, and of limited compass. Having secured accuracy of intonation in the attack of each sound (by the stroke of the glottis) the next task should be the development of volume, power, and compass of the voice, and the blending of the registers. The pupil should not at first attempt to sing the complete scale, ... otherwise there is a risk of never succeeding in any kind of passage."

Eventually she expects the student to sing two octave scales in various rhythms. This graded system is used on every technique in the book, making every aspect of singing attainable with time and dedication.

I think one of the most important things she writes is that, at that time (the end of the 19th century), the style of music was changing and singers weren't expected to sing really fast, flashy numbers any more to show off their vocal acrobatics; instead it was all about very long phrases and nice tunes. So singers started to say that they didn't need to learn to sing really fast notes any more, because it would just tire the voice out, and why bother?

But Marchesi said that the case was exactly reversed: if you learn to sing all the fast notes and fast phrases, then you can sing the long phrases without ever tiring your voice, because it strengthens the muscles in the throat. Whereas if you try to sing the long phrases without ever having learnt the fast ones, you'll tire the voice out really quickly.

Sadly, few people listened to this advice, and singers have now forgotten how to make the voice strong and flexible enough to sing fast accurately.

She finishes by saying:

"Every art consists of a technical-mechanical part and an aesthetical part. A singer who cannot overcome the difficulties of the first past can never attain perfection in the second, not even a genius."