re or less unnatural.

One often has the opportunity to observe how the effect is lost when a
reader bends his head downward to look at his book or manuscript; and
he himself, if the process is long-continued, will almost certainly
feel the injurious influence of this acting on his vocal organs.

CHAPTER XIV.

SOME SPECIFIC APPLICATIONS OF PRINCIPLES IN TONE PRODUCTION.

It is no doubt valuable, indeed for most singers essential, to employ
a series of elaborate exercises, or _vocalises_, which in some cases
differ from each other only by slight gradations; but it is to be
borne in mind that all the actual principles involved can be expressed
practically in a very few exercises. These are: (1) The single
sustained tone; (2) the tones of a scale sung so as to be smoothly
linked together; (3) the same, sung somewhat more independently of
each other; (4) the same, but each tone beginning and ending very
suddenly. If the execution of any vocal musical composition be
analyzed, it will be found that these four methods cover substantially
the whole ground. As one other is very extensively used in giving
expression in the form of shading, it is worthy of special
mention--viz., (5) the swell. All others are modifications of the
above.

As these methods of tone-production are of so much importance, it will
be worth while to analyze them. It will be found that in each there is
a characteristic use of the breathing mechanism. The larynx and the
resonance-chambers are of course intermediate, as usual, between the
breath-stream and the result, the tone; without them there could be
no tones. But if the student have clearly in mind the memory of the
tone he wishes to produce, including its various properties of pitch,
volume, quality, etc., it will be found that the point requiring
strict attention, in production, is the breathing, especially the
manner of using the expiratory current.

1. The sustained tone requires an amount of breath proportional to its
length, and the great aim in its production should be to convert, so
to speak, all the breath into tone, as we explained in a previous
chapter. This sustained tone, which may be practised with advantage on
every one of the notes of a scale, is, in the nature of things, the
very foundation of all good singing and speaking.

2. In the second and third exercises the differences in the method lie
in the attack and the manner of using the breath. The smoothly linked
tones