Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music; President of the Tonic Sol-fa College. London: J CURWEN & SONS, 8 & 9 WARWICK LANE, E.C. NEW YORK: CHARLES SCRIBNER AND SONS. Price Two Shillings and Sixpence. 1891 LONDON: J. CURWEN AND SONS, MUSIC-PRINTERS, PLAISTOW, E....

T he value of this little book, as the reader will soon discover, depends less upon my own work than upon the large number of choirmasters whose experience I have been fortunate enough, directly or indirectly, to lay under contribution. The conditions of the choir-trainer's work vary, in an endless way, according to his surroundings and opportunities. And it is just when work becomes difficult that contrivances and hints are most fruitfully evolved. Hence I have given in great detail the experie

T he boy's voice, though an immature organ of delicate structure, is capable of much work, providing only that its mechanism be rightly used and not forced. Some people are unnecessarily nervous about boys; as a rule, under competent guidance, they will get nothing but good from vocal work. A cathedral organist wrote to me the other day:— "Our best solo boy, who has a splendid voice and who sings beautifully, has been unwell, and the Dean and Chapter doctor (who has an idea that every choir-boy

B reathing in singing is a matter of the utmost importance. The breath is the motive power, the primary force, to which the larynx and the resonance chamber are but secondary. In speech we can manage with short breathing and half-filled lungs, but in sustaining the sounds of song, we need to breathe deeply, and to breathe in a right way. Manifestly the act of breathing consists of two parts—(1) the drawing in, and (2) the letting out of the breath. When we speak of modes of breathing, however, w

T o some choirmasters the management of their boys is a perfectly easy matter; to others it is a constant source of trouble. Everything depends upon knack. Max O'Rell has some wise maxims on the subject which it may be well to quote. "Face the boys," he says, "or you will be nowhere. Always be lively. Never show your temper: to let the boys see that they can ruffle you is to give them a victory. Allow no chatting. Never over-praise clever boys; never snub dull ones. Never expect any thanks. If a

B efore commencing to train a voice the choirmaster must make sure that it is a voice worth training. He must take the boy alone, test his voice by singing scales, and try especially his notes in the treble compass, say, image [ Listen ] He must test his ear by playing phrases, and asking the boy to sing them. He must enquire into his theoretical knowledge, if any, and ask if he has had a Tonic Sol-fa or any other systematic training. The ear of the choirmaster must decide upon the voice. It is

I am indebted to the Rev. W. Miles Barnes, rector of Monkton, Dorchester, for the following information, recently obtained by him on the subject of voice-training. It appears that for the information of choir instructors (some 200 in number) in union with the Salisbury Diocesan Choral Association, the advice of precentors and organists of cathedrals was lately sought as to the best way of correcting a very common fault in the singing of country choirs. The following questions were proposed: The

I t is impossible to emphasise too strongly the importance of clear pronunciation in singing. The English, as a rule, pronounce indistinctly. "We carry on our talk," says Mr. H. Deacon, "in mere smudges of sound," a graphic and true way of putting things. The Scotch, Welsh, and Americans pronounce better than we do. Indistinctness and bad dialect arise, roughly speaking, from two sources—impure vowels and omitted consonants. The impure vowels are generally due to local habits of speech, such as

M any choirmasters maintain that, considering the short musical life of the choir-boy, it is not worth while to teach him to sing by note. The quickness of boys' ears for music, they say, is astonishing, while their memories are equally good. Between the two faculties—ear and memory—we are told that all things necessary are supplied. The boys, it is said, don't like theory, and it saves time and patience not to have to teach it to them. I am altogether at issue with this view. I believe theory c

T he trainer of adult voices has constantly before him the problem of making his pupils sing in tune. With boys this matter is less of a trouble, for this reason. Many adults have fine voices which, if their intonation can be improved, will do great things. Others have incurably bad voices, but possessing the ambition and the means for studying singing, they come under the hands of the professor. In the case of boys, however, there is a preliminary process of selection by which the teacher rejec

By W. H. Richardson , Formerly Conductor of the Swanley Orphanage Choir.{*} {*} Mr. Richardson has responded to my request for hints with such fulness and weight that I devote a separate chapter to his essay. In writing, he has specially had in view the difficulties of choir trainers in rural districts. A ll that a writer on the training of voices can do is to lay down general lines, and give comprehensive suggestions. The teacher, to make any use of them must be indeed a teacher , not a mere me

M y object is to help those whose difficulties are greatest; who, so far from being able to pick out boys of musical talent and fine voice, are obliged to accept the material that offers, often of the poorest musical description. The country boy is a more healthy animal than his brother of the town, and there is no fault to be found with the natural volume of his voice provided he can be taught to place his registers rightly, to avoid straining the thick or chest register, to pronounce and phras

I S ummarise here information obtained, chiefly by observation and conversation, from various trainers of boys' voices at cathedrals and collegiate churches. CHAPEL ROYAL, ST. JAMES'S . Some years ago I attended a practice of the boys, under the late Rev. Thomas Helmore. It began with slow scales sung to a light pianoforte accompaniment. These were followed by rapid runs, the key gradually rising until the highest note touched was C above the treble staff. The vocable used was "ah." After this c

I n the course of journeys and interviews extending over many years I have gathered much experience from choirmasters, and have watched and noted their plans. Here follow some of the results of this work. The churches described are some of them small, and but little known. This fact, however, does not affect the value of the experience. The highest degree of credit is due to the choirmaster who obtains good results from poor materials, and this book is especially intended to help those who have

H ow is the alto part, in a church choir consisting of males, to be sung? In our cathedrals this part has been given, ever since the Restoration, to adult men, generally with bass voices singing in their "thin" register. For this voice our composers of the English cathedral school wrote, carrying the part much lower than they would have done if they had been writing for women or boy-singers. For this voice, also, Handel wrote, and the listener at the Handel Festival cannot but feel the strength

M usic is now recognised as one of the professions, taking its place by the side of Law, Medicine, and Divinity. Parents who have boys to start in life look for avenues of entrance to these various occupations. And there can be no doubt that to be a chorister-boy is one of the very best ways of serving an apprenticeship to music. Hear what the late Sir George Macfarren says on the subject:— "A cathedral choir is the best cradle for a musician our country affords. I say this from the conviction,

I n this list I have included songs with innocent, hopeful, joyous words such as boys may honestly sing. Words dwelling with sadness on the past, or speaking of life as bitter, I have excluded. Convivial and amatory sentiments have also been ruled out. As to the music, I have excluded songs with difficulties of vocalisation. The keys chosen are those best suited to treble boys, bringing the melody as nearly as possible between F and F 1 , with an occasional G 1 . The list is by no means exhausti