Medical science in relation to the voice as a musical instrument / by Lennox Browne.

  • Browne, Lennox, 1841-1902.
Date:
1876
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Medical science in relation to the voice as a musical instrument / by Lennox Browne. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    therefore, for voice pi’oduction is to have a bellows full of air, and then to know how best to economise that air. On this de- pends the whole art of voice production. The lungs may be expanded or inflated in three dilferent ways :— 1. By pressing them downwards against the lower wall, which is purely muscular and elastic, and has on its opposite or inferior side soft and yielding parts. In this method the shoul- ders and chest wall or ribs remain unmoved. 2. By pressing the lungs outwards against the more or less elastic framework of the ribs. In this method also the upper part is not brought into movement. 3. By drawing the lungs upwards with the collar-bone or clavicle and shoulder-blades ; those parts which are fixed in the first and second methods. The first way is called the abdominal or diaphragmatic (after the muscles which regulate the move- ment), the second is known as the lateral, the third as the cla- vdcular. All breath-taking in singing, as in speaking and in ordinary life, should be abdominal. As the abdominal breathing is prolonged it becomes lateral, which in its turn may, if further prolonged, become clavicular; but clavicular breathing is a method of respiration totally vicious, and to be avoided. It is a method never exercised by nature in a state of health, but only when from disease either the abdominal or chest muscles cannot act, and it is the method least efficacious in filling, as it is the one calculated most to fatigue the chest, for it compresses the vessels and nerves of the throat, and this leads to engorgement and spasmodic action of the muscles. The lateral method is more commonly exercised by women than by men, and under some circumstances is necessary to them ; but it is an error to suppose that the clavicular method is ever necessary to either sex under any condition of health. Whilst the inspiration should be as gradual and as impercep- tible as possible, it should also be as full as possible, so that it need not be repeated more frequently than is absolutely neces- sary. The expiration should not be wasted, jerky, or in gasps, but steady .‘^.nd gradual; for it is on the extension with regularity of expiration that depends the intensity or force, the duration, and the steadiness of vocal vibrations. And here it may be remarked that he is the best singer who can so control the expiration that the least possible amount of air sufficient to cause vibration is poured with continuous effect upon the vocal organs.* Hence, as one so well knows, the greatest singers apj^ear to have an in- exhaustible supply of breath. The method of respiration I have indicated as the natural,f and therefore the best, was the one taught by the Italian school of the last century. There is just as much teaching of what may be called the decorations of the voice in the * The direction of Signor Garcia for a singer to practise his voice with a lighted candle before the mauih is known to many. If the flame is extin- guished, or even wavers, it is a sign that too much air is being expended. t I have to thank Mr. William Shakespeare, a favenrite pupil of tlie ciilabrated Maestro Lamperti, for much useful information and practical illus- tr.ilion on this important subject.