singing are excellent, in their simpler forms and methods, for the
speaking voice. In carrying out this idea in voice training, the
selections here given for the earliest exercises, are such as naturally
call for some slight approach to the singing tone. Some are in the
spirit and style of song or hymn; others are in the form of address to
distant auditors, wherein the reciter would call to a distance, or
"sing out," as we say. This kind of speaking is a way of quickly
"bringing out" the voice. Young students especially are very apt in
this, getting the idea at once, though needing, as a rule, special
cautions and guidance for keeping the proper vocal conditions, so as to
prevent "forcing." The passages are simple in spirit and form. They
carry on one dominant feeling, needing little variation of voice. The
idea is to render them in a way near to the monotone, that the student
may learn to control one tone, so to speak, or to speak nearly in one
key, before doing the more varied tones of familiar speech or of
complex feeling. We might say the passages are to be read in some
degree like the chant; but the chant is likely to bring an excess of
head resonance and is too mechanical. The true spirit of the selections
is to be given, from the first, but reduced to its very simplest form.
Difficulties arise, in this first step, in the case of two classes of
student: those who lack sentiment or imagination, or at least the
faculty of vocally expressing it, and those with an excess of feeling.
The former class have to be mentally awakened; for some motive element,
aesthetic appreciation or imaginative purpose, should play a part, as
has been said, even in technical vocal training. The latter class must
be restrained. Excessive emotion either chokes off expression, or runs
away with itself. Calmness, evenness, poise, the easy control that
comes from a degree of relaxation, without loss of buoyancy,--these are
the conditions for good accomplishment of any kind. This self-mastery
the high-strung, ardent spirit must learn, in order to become really