My experience in developing and placing the human voice extends from
1882 to 1912, thirty years. During that time I have had a wide and
varied experience with men and women and girls and boys of all ages.
The perfecting of the art of tone production in each individual case
varies with each student. No two persons can be taught the general
principles of the art only. The individual must be studied and the
voice analyzed as a doctor diagnoses a special case. Every nation has
also its peculiar way of using the voice in singing folk or national
songs. As we have in the bay cities a cosmopolitan population, it has
been my opportunity to study the different nationalities that have
applied to me for private instruction. The Italian and Spanish are the
most susceptible students. They live in the realm of music from
childhood. It is a part of their existence; they seem to have a
natural interpretation of songs and singing. After the first placement
of the voice I have had only to lead and give them the picture of the
work before them and my task was a pleasant hour spent in portraying
the poetical application of sentiment to their own individual
understanding. The English, Scotch and Welsh voices are known for
their fine tone production, unusually strong voices, clear, high and
sympathetic, especially the Welsh female voice. They sing high, most
of them, and clear as the meadow lark. The Germans sing with
enthusiastic spirit and most of them with Wagnerian effect, hearty and
robust in their chorus singing, a loud tone quality is their aim. It
is the teacher's art to bring out and to modify all these extreme
faults and change all these varied ideas and different accents of
speech into a harmonious blending and acceptable whole.
I have been obliged to reject many applicants for varied reasons. I
have always felt sorry for those with good voices and without means or
without encouragement at home. Many a fine natural voice has been lost
to the musical world by being ridiculed by the very ones who should
have given a helping hand. Had these parents known what music has done
for the world and for individual beings they would have realized the
advisability of giving their children a musical education. I have
found the French pupils the most difficult to control in regard to the
nasal quality of tone production. They use the nasal cavities
universally in their speech and I never was quite satisfied in my mind
about the tone quality. Being of the Bel Canto school, aiming for pure
melody and the best tone to be produced by the human voice, I was
never satisfied with the result and yet I have heard French artists
who were splendid singers. But the tone was always too high in
placement for my full appreciation. The American voices were
satisfactory almost without exception. Instability was the great
fault; they have not enough earnest concentration in their work and
soon discontinue or change to other teachers and many of them who
started out with a full determination to be singers have done nothing
for themselves. Several of my pupils were negroes and while I found
rare voices among them they were never in a financial position to do
much for themselves. One of these had a rich contralto voice of the
finest touch and was a fine pianist. Another had a still more
beautiful voice but, unfortunately, her husband was not musical and
she sang little after her marriage. This is a real tragedy.
I have often wondered why are we given these gifts and yet denied the
opportunity to develop them. I find the rarest voices among the poor
and middle classes. In relating to me many of the episodes of his
travels around the world, my son told me of the children, eight, nine
and ten years old, of Italy playing on the street corners the arias of
the operas on their violins with skillful and artistic fervor to the
astonishment of the travelers who visit their ports. It is a natural
gift, music is their life. There are few places in the civilized world
that have not produced singers of repute. Yet we have two nations that
we never expect to hear from in this respect, for it is a known fact
that the Japanese and Chinese are wholly unmusical. Five discordant
tones compose their scale, unmusical and untrue chords, or, one might
say, discord.
Knowing this, imagine my surprise when in January 1897, I received a
call from several women of the Chinese mission. With Miss Mabel Hussy
I had assisted in giving the Chinese pupils of the Presbyterian
mission Sunday school an entertainment on New Year's eve. I sang them
a Christmas story of Robin's return, descriptive of the coming home of
the sailor boy, with the picture of an open fireplace, the singing of
the children's carols, the wreaths of holly, the grandmother at the
spinning wheel, the mother tearfully placing the evergreens on the
wall and pictures, thinking all the while of her boy. At last the
Christmas bells chimed the midnight hour to be followed with the
raising of the latch and the happy return of the long expected son
with the snow upon his hair. All this was listened to with rapt
surprise as I carefully articulated the words so nothing of the story
be lost. I accurately scanned the faces as I sang and I saw I had
opened a new world to them. At the close of the number I was roundly
applauded by these 50 old and young Chinese students, who, well
groomed and in their best suits, sat prim and proper. I little thought
that among my auditors was a young man, about seventeen years of age,
the servant of Mrs. Zeno Mauvais, intently listening and satisfying
his long cherished desire to become a singer. This boy was the first
Chinese born in Watsonville, Cal. When he was small his parents
removed to several smaller towns near by but, not liking any of them,
they eventually settled in Ripon and started a Chinese laundry. Lee
Tung Foo, or Frank Lee, as he was called, went to the Mission Sunday
school and with the rest of the pupils learned to sing some of the
Gospel hymns in his way. He wanted to go to day school but his father
would not consent and placed him in one of the hotel kitchens to wash
dishes. This did not suit the young man and after a short time he ran
away to secure an education. He managed to get to Fresno where he
became cook and servant in the family of Prof. S.B. Morse. He was so
well liked that he was assisted in his desire for an education and
through the kindness of the daughter of the house began piano lessons.
After some years he went to Oakland and was employed by Mrs. Mauvais.
Having learned all of his notes he was able to read the Gospel hymns
and play them on the piano. Because he was continually at the reed
organ in the mission the other boys made fun of him and called him
Crazy Frank. After having heard me sing it occurred to him that I was
the very person to teach him and he importuned Mrs. Mauvais to find me
and she and her friends came to ask me to teach this boy the art of
singing. I only laughed at them as I was not particularly fond of the
Chinese and never employed them in any way. I refused three times,
explaining that it was useless to undertake such a task. I expected
nothing more to come of it, but in a week I was asked once more and
was told the boy was broken-hearted with disappointment so I
unwillingly consented. I was obliged to teach him after his work was
done and some times he came as late as nine o'clock, tired and unfit
to sing, but nothing daunted, he was there.
At last I believed that I might be able to achieve something in the
development of the Chinese that would be altogether new in the musical
line. Because I have succeeded with "the impossibility" (as he put it)
I have placed the teaching of this Chinese as one of my greatest
achievements in the art of vocal culture. He had the most indomitable
will and determination to succeed, and he was the most faithful and
conscientious and upright pupil I ever taught. It would require many
pages to tell of the difficulties in his pathway. His people were
enraged at me for leading their son away to be like all the "white
devils" of America. I had to hide him for a year. He was the oldest
son of the family and was obliged to marry before any of the other
members could marry and he appealed to me to help him. Mr. Waterman of
the Berkeley high school allowed him to come there and the Misses
Shaw, teachers, took him into their home where he did their work and
went to school. When the year was over the way was once more clear for
him to take up his music. He had not lost anything as he had joined a
church choir and sang bass. When the school closed he was given a fine
recommendation as a model pupil and all the teachers parted with him
reluctantly.
[Illustration: LEE TUNG FOO