There are abundant opportunities just now for finely trained singers. In
fact there is a real dearth of "well-equipped" voices. Managers are
scouring the world for singers with ability as well as the natural
voice. Why does this dearth exist? Simply because the trend of modern
musical work is far too rapid. Results are expected in an impossible
space of time. The pupil and the maestro work for a few months and, lo
and behold! a prima donna! Can any one who knows anything about the art
of singing fail to realize how absurd this is? More voices are ruined by
this haste than by anything else. It is like expecting the child to do
the feats of the athlete without the athlete's training. There are
singers in opera now who have barely passed the, what might be called,
rudimentary stage.
With the decline of the older operas, singers evidently came to the
conclusion that it was not necessary to study for the perfection of
tone-quality, evenness of execution and vocal agility. The modern
writers did not write such fioratura passages, then why should it be
necessary for the student to bother himself with years of study upon
exercises and vocalises designed to prepare him for the operas of
Bellini, Rossini, Spontini, Donizetti, Scarlatti, Carissimi or other
masters of the florid school? What a fatuous reasoning. Are we to
obliterate the lessons of history which indicate that voices trained in
such a school as that of Patti, Jenny Lind, Sembrich, Lehmann, Malibran,
Rubini and others, have phenomenal endurance, and are able to retain
their freshness long after other voices have faded? No, if we would have
the wonderful vitality and longevity of the voices of the past we must
employ the methods of the past.