dear karen and the rest of you grumpy vocalisters,
one could legitimately criticize my knowledge of physiology as being
incomplete, inarticulate and, at times, even scatter-brained. so, i shall
quote richard miller on the subject of vocal agility.
in his book 'training tenor voices' on page 88 in the chapter
'developing agility', mr. miller says:
"it is clear that the tenore di grazia (tenore leggiero) requires
facility in negotiating rapid running passages. not so widely recognized is
the need for agility from all catagories of tenors who sing roles from the
romantic and even verismo lteratures of the nineteenth century and early
decades of the twentieth century. passages such as rodolfo's opening lines
from the first act of la boheme must be agile, supple, and flexible.
the ability to be flexible is a requirement not only of running-note
passages, however. unless a tenor of any vocal weight or catagory can move
his instrument with ease, he will lack freedom in singing sostenuto." one
would assume this applies to all other voices as well.
not only does miller suggest that all voices are physiologically capable
of agility, he insists that it is required. the examples in the chapter are
'il mio tesoro', 'ev'ry valley' and 'ecco ridente'. so he is talking about
the same type of coloratura we have been bickering about.
it seems logical that any voice capable of giggling or chuckling would
also be capable of coloratura. miller says one of the things that happens
to tenors who are mistaken for baritones is they have difficulty with agility
as they have been attempting to artificially darken their voices. it is not
unusual to find singers calling themselves a voice of a lower fach when they
have difficulty with their tops. in order to validate their claim, they
often find themselves artificially weighting or darkening their voices.
i am not one who would say if you can't do it for real, don't do it.
my motto is 'do what you can and fake the rest' but, know the difference.
still praying for world peace,
mike
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