singer's throat action, and that was contained in the sound of the
tones. There must therefore have been something in the sound of the
tones which conveyed this information to the critical listener. For many
years this gentleman had been in the habit of listening closely to
singers, and he had found some way of estimating the singer's throat
action by the character of the tones produced.

This same means of judging the manner of production from the sound of
the tones seems to have been utilized nearly two hundred years ago.
Speaking of the most frequent faults of tone-production, Tosi remarks:
"The voice of the scholar should always come forth neat and clear,
without passing through the nose or being choked in the throat." Mancini
also speaks of the faults of nasal and throaty voice: "Un cantare di
gola e di naso." A throaty tone, therefore, impressed these writers as
being in some way formed or caught in the singer's throat. It may be set
down as certain that no pupil ever explained to either of these masters
how the objectionable sounds were produced. How then did Tosi and
Mancini know the manner in which a throaty tone is produced?

We need not go back to the early writers to find out what is meant by a
throaty tone. Fully as many throaty singers are heard nowadays as the
old masters ever listened to. What do we mean when we say that a
singer's voice is throaty? The answer to this question seems at first
sight simple enough: The tones impress us as being formed in the
singer's throat. But what conveys this impression? Something in the
sound of the tone, of course. Yet even that is not enough. How can a
tone, merely a sound to which we listen, tell us anything about the
condition of the singer's throat during the production of the tone? Here
again the answer seems simple: The listener knows that, in order to
produce a tone of like character, he would have to contract his own
throat in some way.

Here we have a highly significant fact about the voice. On hearing a
throaty tone, the listener can tell how this tone is produced; he feels
that he would have to contract his own throat in order to produce a
similar tone. Let us carry this discussion a little further. How does
the listener know this? Certainly not by actually singing a throaty
tone. When seated in a concert hall, for example, and listening to a
throaty singer, the hearer cannot rise from his seat, sing a few throaty
tones himself, and then note how his thr