Vocalist.org archive


From:  Reg Boyle <bandb@n...>
Date:  Wed Jun 14, 2000  2:39 am
Subject:  Re: [vocalist-temporary]Training Methods.


from me..Reg.
>> You appear
>> to advocate this in preference to the dual one of
>> both learning from the top down: the lieder training
>> method, and the bottom up.

from Isabelle B
>Actually, I am advocating having a young singer spend
>5 or 6 years in the studio, concentrating on NOTHING
>but technique (and perhaps language study, if they
>have extra time) so that the technique is the first
>thing to learn.


Dear Isabelle,
This is flipping to the other approach.
Apart from jeopardising the sustained involvement of the
student it is slowing down the development and
extending the training duration.

>In fact, I think that lieder, in many ways, is much
>more demanding of an individual instrument than opera,
>which is why I totally disagree with the practice of
>giving young singers a steady diet of lieder until
>they are mature enough to "handle" arias and roles.

I'm sorry I interpreted what you wrote as
an opinion that lieder should not be included in the
intense training approach. The top down one. I would
have to disagree. On the contrary it is the demanding
character of the work that makes it so valuable.

I absolutely agree that technique is the first
thing to learn and if the other, bottom up involvement,
(experience), gets in the way of adequate advancement
in technique, then the bottom up would need to be trimmed
but not curtailed. It's the absolutes of songs and lieder
that call into action the deepest vocal and bodily activity
to stir the pot: apply the theory: interpret the teachers
input to achieve an easy and correct performance of the
work. Whether this is scales, arpeggios, Concone, songs
or leider. Perhaps I need to define bottom up and top down
for some.
If bottom up is to 'just get out there and do it',
'put it across' then we leave the way open for anything
that passes as a satisfactory performance, which may
depart considerably from the original intention and still be
declared wonderful. No problem here if that same singer
can also accurately perform exactly as the composer
intended. If not, the singer is programming himself for
a career of sloppy performing.

Top down implies not a learning by doing,
but a learning by listening. Listening to what the teacher
has to impart: to what the exercises require and what the
piano is saying in the lied. If your technique cannot meet
these needs then it's like a bolt from the blue as to which
part of your technique needs work. This held up to the
requirements of your bottom up involvement discloses
the liberties being taken in that singing, and that's good.

>If by "bottom-up" you mean that the singer begins with
>the voice, studies only the voice, and THEN (after a
>few years of technical study) gives attention to the
>other details -- then that is exactly what I advocate.

No. You describe top down. Sensitization.

>I find it is not a popular proposal, since many
>singers are impatient (they want to begin performing
>when young, in lieder recitals and workshops, before
>the voice is under control),

Exactly. So if they want to do that, and they do, then
why go overboard with a bottom up approach that will
do little but reinforce bad habits and reveal inadequacies.
I don't mean to eliminate it. It has to be a productive
balance that will speed progress, lead to vocal
comprehension and achieve a social balance.

>conservatories want to show their students performing,
>and thus push them into developing "performing" skills
>(and musicality, which is not a bad thing but it can
>take away a singer's time/energy which should be
>devoted to technical study) before the technical
>singing skills are finished. If singers would just
>realize that they have to invest some years into the
>vocal aspects of singing before they are ready to go
>out into the world, there would be FAR fewer
>burned-out singers (since I see burn-out as a result
>of a singer with imperfect technique who was trying to
>perform before the voice was ready).

Like I said, you're worth your weight in GOLD
Isabelle. I find myself reducing the practise I'll do on a
day that happens to clash with a night of choir
singing. If technique needs the practise then perhaps
the choir time should be reduced or removed but then
there are social pressures that need balancing.
Despondency is just around the corner if we
set out artistic and social goals beyond our reach.

My teacher tells me it takes five to ten years to
re-programme a vocal technique to which I respond I
don't have that amount of time. Thinking back I remember
how difficult it was to juggle the demands of family and
singing and wonder how it is that some can retain an
equilibrium while still being detached sufficiently to
become vocally proficient.
So obviously there are advantages in getting it
right first time.

Best Wishes Reg.

P.S. We seem to have another point of disagreement
here Isabelle!
"Lieder and lighter rep make it
too easy to "slum" and slip into bad habits "







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