The composer has much difficulty in finding syllables short enough for his diminutive notes, our language being very deficient in this particular. To remedy this defect, the singer should be careful to adopt a neat and pointed pronunciation of those particles of language that fall under the shortest notes. Open syllables should have long open sounds, and short syllables short sounds; the reverse of this frequently occurs in the best compositions. These observations touch only the length of syllables, showing that, unless the quantity exactly coincides with the value of the notes, the musical expression will be greatly injured, if not entirely destroyed.* A firm and decided tone can only be produced by a quick opening of the mouth; the want of this activity in attacking a sound produces a quacking tone, like that of a duck.† How often do we notice a vulgarity in the performance of educated persons, * No one ever knew better how to adapt language to the peculiarities of music than Metastasio; by rejecting words unfitted for singing, by frequently adopting elisions, and words which terminated with an accented vowel, as ardí, pregó, sará, and artfully intermixing different species of feet, to give variety to the periods corresponding with musical intervals, and giving room to the singer to breathe, by dividing lines into halves, in order to shorten periods and render them smoother, by using rhyme discreetly, though without any fixed law, making it subservient to the ear.-Arteaga. † So indifferent performers upon the organ produce a similar quacking tone upon that instrument, by putting down the key too leisurely, whereby the valve is not promptly opened.. occasioned by this negligent manner of opening the mouth; not knowing that the drawling tone arises from a cause so simple and so easy to be removed. The following slovenly expressions from a bass singer of eminence will be in the recollection of many. Doo-ark-ness shall cover the earth. The Gen-te-oyles shall come to thy le-oyt. The wings oo-hof the woo-inde. A soprano of eminence, Bid me dis-ke-orse, de-ance and play. Mr. Bartleman had none of this lax and idle manner. His quickness in putting forth the voice was his greatest excellence. His firmness might be compared to one who walks and marches well with his foot set on the ground and lifted up without any shuffling.* To sustain the voice in an even tone-to increase or diminish it gradually-requires great management of the breath; for there can be no command of the voice without a perfect command of breath. To effect this it is expedient to take a quick and deep inspiration, filling the chest without the least noise,† and using it sparingly. * Dr. Bayley. †The pleasure we derive from the performance of one of our first female singers on the English stage is much diminished, by the disagreeable noise which arises from the bad method of drawing her breath. It is recorded of Farinelli, that he could throw out his voice in one continuous note, swelling it and then letting it die away, for such a It is an unfortunate circumstance for English singing, that so many of our words begin and end with the letter S. This offensive sound, which is made by forcing the breath through the teeth, predominates so much in our language as to arrest the attention of all foreigners; for, if we listen to the following line, 'sing songs of praise,' when our church congregations are holding forth upon Sternhold and Hopkins-we have a more deafening hiss than ever proceeded from an army of geese in Lincolnshire. The following line from Dryden is nervous and expressive, but so loaded with S's as to be utterly repugnant to everything like musical expres sion: And thrice he slew the slain. 'If our alphabet,' as Dr. Burney observes, 'be critically examined, in order to discover the effect which each letter has upon the voice in singing, it will be found that peculiar letters, as well as com length of time, as to excite the incredulity of all those who heard him ; who, though unable to detect the artifice, by which he so economised his breath, supposed he was assisted by some instrument whilst he renewed his power of respiration. A friend of the writer, who occupied an apartment in the Fauxbourg Poissonnier, Paris, was so frequently annoyed by a sound below stairs, which he thought proceeded from the wind singing through a door, that he constantly complained to his servant of her neglect in not closing it. On her assuring him that was not the case, he set about to discover the cause of this phenomenon; and to his great surprise, found in the lower apartment the celebrated Crescentini, practising his sostenuto notes, which he increased and diminished so imperceptibly, as to lead to the supposition that it was the swelling and dying away of the wind. binations of letters, have peculiar vices and tendencies to impede or corrupt musical sound.' As a means of expunging as much as possible this offensive sound, it is a good maxim to turn the plural nouns into singulars, by cutting off this letter whenever the sense will permit,* and often at the end of a word it may be converted into the more agreeable sound of Z. Another defect in our language is the entire want of neat explosive sounds, as bah! dah! pah! tah! té, pé, ké. These articulations are necessary to musical expression, and to obtain them we are driven to the expedient of joining the last letter of a word to the following vowel of the next word, so as to produce this smart and rigorous effect. For instance, refer to the staccato passage in Haydn's chorus, Great and glorious God of Israel, where the full orchestra has the following passage in unison,— Grea-t'an' glo- ris pp &c. glorious God. This effect can only be produced by joining the t to the word and, and discarding the d. By other Though the letter S forms the plurals of French nouns, it is never sounded. With some persons the sound of the W is equally offensive. I once heard a clergyman who had so great a fondness for this letter, that scarcely a sentence of his discourse was uttered without it: upon inquiry, I found this was the result of habit, for he was a great whistler. t Sacred Melodies, vol. iv. |