s who have very weak and imperfect vocal organs;
in their cases, even good attention cannot overcome physical inability.

In repose the vocal bands are separated to allow the free passage of air
to and from the lungs. At phonation the bands are drawn toward each
other, meeting just as it commences. There need be no preliminary escape
of air. Also the resonance cavities above should be open, that the
vibrations generated at the vocal bands may find expansion and
resonance. The mouth and throat should then be opened a moment before
tone is attacked, when, if the pitch to be sung is clearly pictured in
the mind, both the "slide" and "hum" will be avoided.

_Tone-Formation._

Beauty of tone implies absence of disagreeable qualities, and freedom
from unpleasant sounds. Faulty tones are called nasal, guttural,
palatal, throaty, muffled, and so on, the peculiar timbre of each
suggesting the name. If the throat is relaxed, and if the soft parts of
the vocal tube lying between the larynx and the teeth are kept out of
the way, most of the disagreeable qualities of voice enumerated
disappear. Certain requisites are necessary to good tone-formation.

First, a movable lower jaw.

It is astonishing that so many of young and old will, when they wish to
open the mouth for song, try to keep it closed. Paradoxical as the
statement is, it nevertheless describes a very common phenomenon-- the
"fixed jaw," it may be called. As soon as the teeth are parted slightly,
the muscles of the face and neck which control the movement of the lower
jaw contract, holding it in a fixed position, and incidentally
tightening the muscles of the throat until the larynx is in a grip as of
rubber bands. The mouth must not be held open as if the jaws were pried
apart. It is opened by the relaxation of the closing muscles and should
hang by its own weight, as it were. If then the lower jaw drops easily,
and with no accompanying muscular contraction of face or throat, the
tone may be formed or shaped well forward in the mouth, unless the soft
parts referred to obstruct it.

These soft parts are the tongue and the soft-palate. The soft-palate is
a structure which hangs from the posterior edge of the hard-palate. The
uvula, the pillars of the palate, and the tonsils are parts of the
structure.

The tongue which, when the mouth is closed, nearly fills it, should in
vocalization lie as much out of the way as is possible. If the tip be
pressed against the lo