GOOD AND BAD “MAESTRI”
As to the absolute necessity of a teacher there can, I suppose, hardly
be two opinions. Much can be learnt from books, no doubt; by listening
to other singers; and by working things out for oneself, so far as
possible. Also it is a fact, doubtless, that some of the world’s
greatest singers have had remarkably little formal instruction.
Mario, for instance, never had a lesson in his life except when
Meyerbeer taught him the part of Raymond in “Robert le Diable”--and
Meyerbeer, it is hardly necessary to say, was not a singing master.
But such cases are the exceptions, and in the ordinary way there cannot
be the slightest doubt that the services of a teacher are absolutely
essential to sound progress. There are exceptions, of course. One of
these is the great Chaliapine, who represents his own school and has
never had any instruction as we understand it. He is by nature endowed
with a beautiful voice, and obtains his fine effects by long hours of
deep thought and reflection. I have asked him when and how he prepared,
and he replied: “I think out my work in the silence of my bedchamber,
when I am waiting for sleep, or in the mornings before I rise. In fact,
during all my hours of wakefulness I am always visualising the stage,
the actors, the audiences, and contriving how best to obtain effects
emotional, sentimental, dramatic.”
Grave indeed are the risks run by any student who attempts to supply his
own requirements in this matter and to dispense with the skilled advice
which only the trained expert can supply--entailing possibly the ruin of
his entire career.
It was for lack of such advice in her earlier days that Jenny Lind’s
voice was almost ruined at the outset, so that when she went to García
for advice his verdict was: “It is quite useless for me to think of
teaching you, since you have no voice left.”
Fortunately rest and proper training saved the situation in that case,
as we all know, but how easily it might have been otherwise. Other fine
voices have, indeed, been irretrievably destroyed by faulty methods
continued too long.
A famous case was that of Duprez, a well-known tenor who flourished some
seventy or eighty years ago. “I have lost my voice,” he wrote in despair
to Rubini, “how have you kept yours?” Rubini replied: “My dear Duprez,
you have lost your voice because you have sung with your capital; I
have kept mine because I have sung only with the interest.” And there is
a world of instruction in this pithy way of putting it.
See to it at all costs, therefore, that you put yourself in the right
hands. By which I do not necessarily mean a teacher of world-wide
repute--for there are many equally good who do not happen to be so
generally known. The supremely important thing is that whoever you go to
shall be a man--or a woman, as the case may be--of honour and integrity,
who can be trusted to deal faithfully with you, and not a quack or a
charlatan.
The teaching of singing is indeed a much simpler matter--though
difficult enough--than is commonly supposed, especially nowadays when,
as the result of scientific study and research, the underlying
physiological principles are so much more thoroughly understood than
formerly. Yet there will always be those, I suppose, who find it to
their advantage to deal with it as something mysterious and occult; and
apparently there will always be those confiding souls willing to take
these folk at their own valuation and to put good money into their
pockets.
Wonderful indeed are the tales which are told of some of these gentry.
In New York, for instance, there is said to be a practitioner of this
type who sells to his pupils, in order to give timbre to their voices,
bottles (at two dollars each) of Italian water. Beware of the confidence
tricksters of the musical profession who claim to transform your voice
by some quack method or theory of “nasal resonance” and so on. These
people have ruined more voices than one could enumerate.
But one need not go to America to find examples. I am afraid, indeed,
that even in my own native land the same sort of thing is not entirely
unknown. I have even heard of a teacher in Milan who makes his pupils
swear on a crucifix not to reveal the secret of his wonderful “method,”
and I have heard of another whose practice it was to make his pupils tie
to the legs of the piano pieces of elastic which they were instructed to
pull out and let go again, in order to “feel” the gradations of
_crescendo_ and _diminuendo_.
But even he seems to have been excelled in invention by another
“Professor”--again hailing from the Land of the Stars and
Stripes!--whose custom it was to illustrate the art of _mezzo voce_ by
means of an umbrella which he opened and closed as his happy pupils,
standing before him, swelled and diminished on the chosen note.
Such things, you may say, sound laughable enough, but they are no
laughing matter for the unfortunate pupils who happen to be the victims
of such monstrous quackery, and I cannot urge too earnestly upon all my
readers the supreme importance of choosing a teacher who is above all
suspicion--for preference one possessed of a satisfactory diploma
obtained at a recognised institution.
Then you may be sure that whether the teacher be better or worse in the
purely technical sense, he will at least be an honest man and not one
who makes his calling a mere pretext for the plundering of the ignorant
and unwary.
Another important question which arises in this connection is as to the
advisability of studying at home or abroad, and this, I am afraid, is
one of those perplexing matters in the case of which there is a good
deal to be said on both sides. I myself have naturally a prejudice in
favour of my beloved Italy, the traditional Land of Song, where, I am
proud to think, the art of Bel Canto still finds its finest exponents
and teachers, and where also there are greater facilities, I suppose,
for hearing fine singing than in any other country in the world.
At the same time I am quite prepared to admit that there is a good deal
to be said on the other side. It is a great undertaking and
responsibility, for instance, sending a young girl to study abroad. The
teacher selected may not be a good one, or may not be suited to her
particular requirements, when she gets there--although by saying this I
do not mean to express agreement with those who contend that a special
kind of teaching is required for the singers of every nationality.
Whether you study at home or abroad, let your teacher be the best you
can obtain.