ubject
of registers, may ask: "How am I to distinguish between one register
and another? How am I to know when I am singing with chest, middle, or
head voice?" The answer is: "By sensations"--chiefly by hearing, but
also by certain sensations (less properly termed "feelings") in the
resonance-chambers and to a certain extent in the larynx. Of course,
before one can thus identify any register, he must have heard a singer
of fairly good voice form the tones of this particular register. One
who has never heard sounds of a particular color or quality cannot, of
course, learn to recognize them from mere description, though by this
means he is often _prepared_ to hear, and to associate clear ideas
with that hearing.

As the registers are of such great practical importance, especially
for the female voice, there is no period when it is of so much value
to have a lady teacher as just when the voice is being "placed"--which
should mean the recognition of its main quality, and the teaching of
registers by imitation as well as description. The student should be
made to understand, by practical examples, the subject of "covering,"
or modification. Certainly, the training of a vocalist cannot be
adequately undertaken by even the most learned musician, however good
an instrumentalist, if he has paid no attention to the voice
practically. Much of the teaching done by those ignorant of
voice-production, however well meant, may be a positive drawback, and
leave the would-be singer with faults that may never be wholly
eradicated.

The author would recommend all students who have begun a serious
practical study of the registers to hear, if possible, some singer of
eminence who observes register formation strictly. In this way more
can often be done in getting a clear notion of their characteristic
qualities, in a single evening, than by listening to an ordinary
amateur, or to such a voice as an otherwise excellent vocal teacher
can bring to her work, on many occasions; better one hour listening to
a Melba, with her observance of registers, covering, etc., as set
forth by the author in this chapter, than a score of vocalists of
indifferent, even if not incorrect production. One then has before her
an individual who, after long and careful training, attains results
not, indeed, within the reach of all, but such as may be approached if
the same methods are pursued long enough; and in Madame Melba, and
others that might be named, the stude