OPERA singing observes
is not for wimps! This refers to singers & audience (public). Not only that modern singers are scared, but modern audience is also scared of big, loud, clear and released animalistic sounds (I conclude that by reading comments on my channel). Teachers scares students. They tell them to stop "screaming, yelling, shouting". They are afraid of THROAT! Mahalia Jackson was a completely natural, untrained singer. She had one voice lesson in NYC and the teacher told her to "stop screaming" or she would never make it anywhere. Thank GOD she didn't listen to the teacher. She has more chiaroscuro and register coordination than tenors singing today. Old singers were not afraid to sing with full voice. That was a norm! There is a popular saying in voice studios today which is 'sing on the interest and not on the principal'. That is not what these singers did. And if you don't 'sing on the principal the audience will lose interest,' as Tom LoMonaco used to say. In a 1979 article by LaFranco Rasponi, Tebaldi made the following statement: "Where are the big voices today? There are only tiny mosquitoes flying around. And we - Milanov, Nilsson, del Monaco, Corelli, and others - lost three and four kilos at each performance, so tremendous was the tension we gave to our assignments! It was our blood we gave to the audiences. How could we have been such fools?" This is what modern voice teachers and people accustomed to modern operatic sound usually say about old school voices/singing: - it is shouting/yelling/screaming/pushing - they sing too open - vulgar, loud singing - they will get nodules etc. etc. etc. I have many names for people who would say those things about old school singing: morons, idiots, imbeciles, pussies etc. How people can think those things are still beyond me. Put Netrebko on the stage of Metropolitan and let her sing one phrase and then put some kid on the stage of Metropolitan and let him shout one "EEEEEH" and I guarantee you that kid would be 100x clearer then Netrebko (or any modern opera singer). And still, people will say: but that kid is shouting, he is not singing! Yeah, so? Like Callas would say: "Use your mind a bit!" My Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/thisismister... - Our website: https://thisismisteropera.wixsite.com...
Κατηγορία
Many teachers today bypass fully engaged, big singing because it tends to cause a student to "constrict" or go into the Valsalva maneuver. Since we can understand what causes the Valsalva and how to disengage it, there is absolutely no reason why a singer cannot sing completely engaged, big and free. That is historically what all the great singers did. They all had very little constriction in the sound while keeping the voice fully engaged and free. Unfortunately, now days the young singers are being taught the opposite; i.e., that the singers of the Golden Age of opera were "forcing" and singing "too big". These young students are taught that chest voice is bad - in particular for women - and that singers like Del Monaco or Tebaldi were "forcing" their sound. Nothing could be further from the TRUTH!! It is utterly the opposite. But when you are taught differently from a young age and you are corrupted into thinking that the right sound is wrong and that the wrong sound is right....there is little hope. To sing "big" and "free" the singer must have proper vocal training. This training must include developing the muscles that are to be used in singing in order to create and sustain a variety of sounds. This includes the breathing muscles, muscles of the larynx etc. Additionally, this training must also include developing the singer's aural image to what the right sound is or is not. This is particularly difficult as a singer hears their own voice differently from inside their head than how they hear things from outside themselves. Clearly, if the muscles aren't developed, no amount of correct "aural imaging" is going to make a bit of difference because the singer physically will be incapable of making the sounds. This brings us to another part of the problem for singing teachers today and students today; and in particular the teachers at prestigious institutions: How do we train the singers in a way to develop the muscles they need to produce a fully engaged, efficiently produced, free sound? Well, this isn't going to happen with a half hour lesson once a week for a couple of years. Or even 4 years. It takes years of lessons, preferably at least 2 - 3 times a week. A person cannot get physically fit going to the gym 30 minutes once a week and anyone who thinks they can get vocally fit that way is completely misguided. So the Universities and music institutions are not set up to produce "big", free singing - or in other words "OPERA SINGING". It is not possible. So instead they have teachers that basically just "coach" the students on diction, interpretation, rhythm etc. And what is worse is that these teachers must also convince the students that what they are teaching has merit. And in order to do that they have to point out that the old, great singers were "forcing" and "pushing" so they can justify why they cannot get the students to sound the same way. Additionally, these teachers also terrify the students into thinking that if they sing too loudly they will ruin their voice. That is completely wrong as well. Certainly if someone sings loudly with a "blasty", unclear voice then they will damage it. But great singing requires a clean approximation of the vocal folds. This is not damaging, but it is something that takes time to achieve." (J. Silver) https://www.thesilversingingmethod.com "Above all else the young singer should avoid exercises and studies sotto voce, because not only the trill, but every other ornament of singing, more and more, when sung sotto voce, makes it impossible to execute them any other way, and every time that he wishes to produce them in full voice, huge in large and vast places, he cannot execute these passages, or if he executes them, they cannot be other than full of imperfections, and unpleasant. While it is easy to execute any ornament in a weak and soft voice, it is very difficult to execute them with a large and strong voice." Mancini, Giambattista. “Pensieri, riflessioni practiche sopra il canto figurato (Vienna, 1774) "Let the Master instruct him in the Forte and Piano, but so as to use him more to the first than the second, it being easier to make one sing soft than loud. Experience shews that the Piano is not to be trusted to, since it is prejudicial though pleasing; and if any one has a Mind to lose his Voice, let him try it."