ible.

A great musical gift is of no value unless it is protected by those
elements of character which are in themselves fundamentally right.
Innumerable instances could be cited of gifted men and women who have
failed utterly because their gifts were not protected by honesty,
industry and perseverance.

I have spoken at some length of the importance of the right mental
attitude toward study and the necessity of correcting false conceptions.
Continuing, it must be understood that the work of the teacher is all
that of training the mind of his student. It is developing concepts and
habits of mind which when exercised result in beautiful tone and
artistic singing. It must also be understood that the teacher does not
look at the voice, he listens to it. Here voice teachers automatically
separate themselves from each other. No two things so diametrically
opposite as physics and metaphysics can abide peaceably in the same
tent.

Let me emphasize the statement that _the teacher does not look at the
voice, he listens to it_. The teacher who bases his teaching on what he
can see, that is, on watching the singer and detecting his mistakes
through the eye, is engaged in an activity that is mechanical, not
musical. No one can tell from observation alone whether a tone is
properly produced. A tone is something to hear, not something to see,
and no amount of seeing will exert any beneficial influence on one's
hearing.

The process of learning to read vocal music at sight is that of learning
to _think tones_, to _think in the key_, and to _think all manner of
intervals and rhythmic forms_. It is altogether mental, and it is no
less absurd to hold that a knowledge of anatomy is necessary to this
than it is essential to the solution of a mathematical problem. The
formation of tone quality is no less a mental process than is thinking
the pitch. If the student sings a wrong pitch it is because he has
thought a wrong pitch, and this is true to a large extent at least, if
his tone quality in not good. He may at least be sure of this, that _he
never will sing a better tone than the one he thinks_.

A large part of the vocal teacher's training should be learning how to
listen and what to listen for. This means training the ear, which is the
mind, until it is in the highest degree sensitive to tone quality as
well as to pitch. When there is a failure in voice training it may be
counted upon that the teacher's listening faculty is defect