the breath; to this end he contracts his throat and stiffens his
tongue and jaw. His tones are forced, harsh, and breathy; they lack
musical quality. His voice runs away with him and he cannot control or
manage it. In the attempt to obtain some hold on his voice he 'reaches'
for his tones with his throat muscles. The more he tries to regain
control of the runaway breath the worse does his state become."

This extreme condition of throat stiffness is unfortunately by no means
rare. So far as concerns the sympathetic sensations awakened by this
kind of singing the condition is graphically described by the
breath-control advocates. But the conclusion is entirely unjustified
that this condition indicates the lack of breath-control. Only the
preconceived notion of breath-control leads to this inference. The
sympathetic sensations indicate a state of extreme muscular tension of
the throat; this is about the only possible analysis of the condition.

* * *

Empirical impressions of vocal tones determine the character of most
present-day instruction in singing. This means no more than to say that
throughout all vocal training the teacher listens to the pupil's voice.
The impressions of tone received by the teacher's ear cannot fail to
inform the teacher of the condition of the pupil's throat in producing
the voice. For the teacher to seek to apply this information in
imparting the correct vocal action to the pupil is inevitable.

Almost every teacher begins a course of instruction by having the pupil
run through the prescribed series of mechanical exercises and rules.
Breathing is always taken up first. Breath-control, laryngeal action,
registers, and resonance follow usually in this order. The time devoted
to this course of training may vary from a few weeks to several months.
This mechanical instruction is almost always interspersed with songs and
arias. The usual procedure is to devote about half of each lesson to
mechanical doctrines and the remainder to real singing.

Blind faith in the efficacy of this mechanical training is the teacher's
only motive in giving it. Very little attention is paid to the sound of
the pupil's voice during the study of mechanical rules and doctrines. It
is simply taken for granted that the voice must be put through this
course. Once the mechanical course has been covered, the pupil's voice
is supposed, in a vague way, to be "placed." From that time on, whether
it be at the end of two months