Long before Manuel Garcia walked the Earth for more than a century, most of the things he wrote about and taught were already integral to the singer’s art. In the preface of his big book he wonders about the history of “the art of singing” and more specifically the teachers of earlier times and what they might have revealed had they written more about the practices they followed. I’m so glad he told us of his curiosity, because I share that thirst to know how singing technique was built. Dr. Stark’s book, “The History of Bel Canto”, guides us through some of the literature to which Garcia alludes, and I am happy to have this pool of knowledge. Garcia knew about the teachers who predated him from the musical literature available also to us, but, unlike us, he also heard of them by the aural tradition which is lost to us today. Along with this pedagogical aural tradition advantage, Garcia had opportunity to converse with individuals who heard the voices trained by those old time teachers. The talkative elders of the musical and vocal arts could have described and compared those ancient voices they had heard in their youth, with the voices with which Garcia was familiar. I envy the opportunities Garcia’s point in history offered him. We can be sure that Manuel and his father knew what made each voice they heard special, and what each of these singers was doing with his or her voice in service to the composer and the public. I feel blessed that Garcia, Jr. wrote about these things sufficiently to defend his father’s and his “school” and am fascinated by and drawn, like a moth to a flame, to his insinuation that, like prior great teachers, he did not reveal all the secrets he had uncovered. I sometimes wonder if he withheld these bits of wisdom just to inspire in others the curiosity from which he tells us he suffered.
You can find in “Factory Made” the advice Garcia gives us about discovering a voice. He doesn’t tell us where to listen or what exactly to listen for, but the question Garcia wants to answer is the one every person who dreams of making a life in the vocal arts should ask:
Is my voice worthy of the huge investment of time and money necessary to develop the voice and artistry of a “distinguished artist”? That is to say, can you hope to enjoy a career capable of returning, at least, the original investment, and, even better, return that investment in multiples sufficient to provide for the continuous support of your life well into retirement?
Garcia tells us that it is up to the teacher. His opinion might have changed if he had survived another century. These days we seem to suffer from a teaching community with intent to offer universal access to the singing art. The call seems to be: “Come one, come all, we will teach you how to sing.” This may be OK for a well-rounded liberal arts education or even an adult music appreciation program, but it is no good if you want to start training for “Brunhilda” or even “Despina”. Garcia was not interested in teaching everyone vocal technique. The students he wanted in his studio were the exceptionally gifted voice students wanting to sing Mozart or Wagner Opera, not the diletantte or musically minded medical, dental, legal, psych, math, physics, chemical or physical education students hoping to be good enough to sing in a chorus. He gave us a list of attributes he required in a singing student. All the assets on his list are useful things to carry with you into the vocal life, but the number one component a singer must have is a voice good enough to warrant the effort to learn how to sing. That asset would seem to be the hardest to recognize, and the least important to the pedagogical profession today.
How do you discover this valuable asset? Where do you look? Chest Register in Chest Voice! Even though Garcia is correct to tell us that the Chest Register/Voice is difficult for some females to developed, from my experience every singing voice that had Chest Register/Voice working revealed the “germ” that Garcia talks about. It is in the Chest Register, in Chest Voice that the full bloom of individual color, native to the instrument with which you were born, gets displayed. If you want to know your voice, look there first.
OK. Now how do you look for that blooming beauty in yourself? I suggest you record/video yourself and use your own taste to decide if you measure up. This is no joke. You are on your own in this matter. There are many more delusional divas and divos in the world than rich ones, and usually the members of the majority find listening to their own voices very uncomfortable. Don’t be one of them. Whatever a teacher tells you to do, you must evaluate the results with your own ears by listening to or viewing your lessons. Keep your teacher honest. Ultimately, most teachers are going to put the responsibility on you anyway if you fail to become a star. If you become a star, the teacher will claim credit, even if none is due the teacher. If you are not interested in becoming a star, I am no less happy to have you reading my blog and hope I can keep you interested with stories from the Warblers’ War Zone.
The singing business is a risky business. So start living with risk now and develop that Chest Register of yours even if your teacher suggests you are asking for the Earth to swallow you up. Sing things that bring you down into the lower part of your voice and expect to find more power and brightness than you might think possible. Very few stars reach the firmament with their Chest Registers disorganized. The Chest Voice in the Chest Register is the foundation of the singer’s voice, and from this foundation one can start to build a unified vocal identity that may serve the singer in you and the Opera World as well.
We will move on to the rest of the vocal structure after this foundation argument sits and rests a few days.