I think Dre has come close to hitting the nail on the head. It's all very
well requiring people to sing as they speak, but many people do not speak
well. (I think I talk like a duck, but I rather like my singing
voice.)Perhaps the process should go: learn to speak properly and then sing
as you speak! But that would be adding an extra step to a process which can
be arduous and appallingly subtle anyway.
On the subject of dialects: most Europeans (including British) are very
sensitive to dialect as a clue to not only location but also social
background. People singing in a way that is too coloured by their native
speech, in my opinion, distort the intentions of both librettist and
composer for those listeners, unless there is a specific requisite for a
kind of regional of class dialect in a role.
I note that British (and even some American) actors of an earlier
generation even *spoke* with vibrato - a very affected sound, to be sure,
but wonderfully clear and attractive, as may be heard in many British, and
some American, films of the 1930s and '40s. john
John Blyth
Baritono robusto e lirico
Brandon, Manitoba, Canada
|
|  |
