The Child-Voice in Singing | Page 7

fifteen years. The girls will still use thick tones up to
[Music: b' c'' d'']
The pitch at which the break occurs will vary in individual cases according to physique or ambition to sing well; but the boys (excluding those whose voices have begun to break) will manifest the utmost repugnance to singing the higher notes. "Can't sing high" will be the reply when you ask them why they do not sing. And they are correct. They cannot, not with the thick voice. Even when putting forth considerable exertion, they will pass to the thin voice at
[Music: g' {or} a']
and lower, if they sing softly. This phenomenon, then, is the "movable break" of the child-voice. The pitch at which the child-voice passes from the thick to the thin voice depends first upon the age; second, upon the amount of physical energy employed, and third, upon the bodily vigor of the child.
It may also be added that boys' voices break lower than girls' during the year or two preceding change of voice. When, now, it is remembered that the adult female voice leaves the chest-register at
[Music: f' f#']
it will be admitted by everyone who has had actual experience in class singing in schools or elsewhere, that the facts set forth in reference to the ability of the child to carry the thick voice from one to eight tones higher than the adult, has a very important bearing on the subject of training children's voices.
But, is it physically injurious? It may be said that, as regards upward forcing of the vocal register, authorities upon the adult voice are united. Leo Kofler, in "The Art of Breathing," p. 168, says: "I have met female trebles that used this means of forcing up the chest-tones as high as middle A, B, C, and (one can hardly conceive of the physical possibility of so doing) even as far as D and E flat. The reason why this practice is so dangerous lies in the unnatural way in which the larynx is held down in the throat, and in the force that is exercised by the tension muscles of the vocal ligaments and the hard pressure of the muscles of the tongue-bone.... I have examined with the laryngoscope many ladies who had the habit of singing the chest-tones too high, and, without exception, I have found their throats in a more or less diseased condition. Laryngitis, either alone or complicated with pharyngitis, relaxation of the vocal ligaments, and sometimes paralysis of one of them, are the most frequent results of this bad habit. If a singer is afflicted with catarrhal trouble, it is always aggravated by this abominable method of singing."
Emma Seiler, in "The Voice in Singing," p. 54, after describing the action of the vocal ligaments in the production of the chest-voice and alluding to the fact that such action can be continued several tones higher than the proper transitional point, goes on: "But such tones, especially in the female voice, have that rough and common timbre, which we are too often compelled to hear in our female singers. The glottis also in this case, as well as parts of the larynx near the glottis, betrays the effort very plainly; as the tones ascend, they grow more and more red. Thus, as at this place in the chest-register, there occurs a visible and sensible straining of the organs, so also is it in all the remaining transitions, as soon as the attempt is made to extend the action by which the lower tones are formed beyond the given limits of the same." And again: "In the ignorance existing concerning the natural transitions of the registers, and in the unnatural forcing of the voice, is found a chief cause of the decline in the art of singing, and the present inability to preserve the voice is the consequence of a method of teaching unnatural, and, therefore, imposing too great a strain upon the voice." Quotations innumerable might be made, to give more emphasis, were it needed, to the evils of register forcing.
The only point remaining is the one very often raised. Is it not natural for children to use the chest or thick voice? If their vocal organs are so flexible, may they not carry such tones higher than adults, and younger children higher than those a little older, and so on?
It is quite obvious, for reasons herein set forth, that children do not experience the same degree of difficulty in continuing the use of the thick voice to their higher tones as do adults, but as to the effect upon their vocal organs there need be no reasonable doubt. A. B. Bach, in "Principles of Singing," p. 142, says: "If children are allowed to sing their higher notes forte, before the voice is properly equalized, it will