Joiner provides the invaluable historical context of early voice study, and includes musical examples and original drawings from Charles Amable Battaille's (1822-1872) dissections, which were included in his original volumes. No other studies or translations of Battaille's work exist in English, making this book an essential addition to the literature of vocal science and vocal pedagogy; it will serve as a valuable resource to singing teachers, students, and scholars in the field.
The name of Pauline Viardot Garcia was well known during her lifetime, but after her death in 1910, she passed into obscurity. She was born in Paris in 1821, the youngest child of the Spanish tenor, Manuel Garcia; her sister was Maria Malibran, and her brother, Manuel Patrizio, was an eminent teacher of singing. The first volume of her biography ranges from 1836 until 1863 and covers the most important years of her operatic career. Several composers wrote for her, including Meyerbeer, for whom she created Fidès in â ~Le Prophèteâ (TM); Saint Saëns modelled the role of Delilah on her and Brahms composed the Alto Rhapsody, which she premiered in 1870. She encouraged Gounod to write his first opera, â ~Saphoâ (TM), and sang the title role in the premiere at the Paris OpÃ(c)ra and at Covent Garden. Schumann dedicated his Liederkreis Op.24 to Viardot, and FaurÃ(c) dedicated several of his songs to her. She launched the career of Jules Massenet, and gave valuable assistance to Sullivan, Bizet, Stanford, Arthur Goring Thomas and several other musicians at the beginning of their careers. Although she was not good looking, she had a fascinating personality and great charm and several men fell in love with her, including Alfred de Musset, Gounod, Maurice Sand, Ary Scheffer, Berlioz, and Ivan Turgenev, who loved her devotedly for forty years, although she was married to Louis Viardot for the whole of that time. She was a linguist, artist, composer and talented pianist who studied with Franz Liszt, as well as being a superb singer and actress. Liszt admired her songs and said that she was the first woman composer of genius. Her talent for friendship was great, and she counted Chopin and George Sand as two of her most intimate friends. From 1863 until 1870, she lived in Baden-Baden where she became a celebrated musical hostess, as well as a fine teacher and composer. This book traces the life and work of one of the most important sopranos of the nineteenth century, Pauline Viardot Garcia. Her influence on figures like Meyerbeer, Turgenev and Liszt alone makes this volume, the first comprehensive biography ever published in English, indispensable to the musicologist with an interest in the nineteenth century.
If classical singers and vocal pedagogues are to be prepared adequately for performance, teaching and co-operation in inter-professional relations, then an holistic education entailing multi-disciplinary study is essential. In this important new book, Karen Sell examines the disciplines pertinent to vocal pedagogy, tracing the lineage of views from the ancient world to the present day. In the process important diverse roots are exposed, yielding differing and even conflicting tonal ideals which have a bearing on the consideration of different singing methods and the interpretation of songs and arias. Ethics and psychology are identified as central to the entire pedagogical process along with the scientific basis of singing: encompassing acoustics, anatomy and physiology, with special reference to the bearing of the latter two upon vocal health and hygiene. A detailed consideration of singing technique is the centrepiece of the book, and an understanding of good technique and scientific awareness is shown to be fundamental to good vocal pedagogical practice. This leads to a discussion on performance and aesthetics, contributing to the education of the fully equipped singer. No study to date has demonstrated the inter-relationships between all these individual disciplines and the ways in which they influence singing pedagogy. Sell‘s holistic, multi-disciplinary approach will be of particular benefit to singers and voice teachers, and will also appeal to music educationalists and professionals in cognate disciplines.
Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (1782-1871), the composer of La Muette de Portici (1828) and Fra Diavolo (1830), was once regarded as one of the great figures of music, a staple of the operatic repertoire in France, and indeed around the world. It is now almost impossible to understand the extent of his once universal fame, his influence on contemporary composers. His operas were in the theatre repertories of the world until the 1920s, and innumerable arrangements of them were published and sold everywhere. The ubiquity of his overtures—Masaniello, Fra Diavolo, The Bronze Horse, The Black Domino, The Crown Diamonds—once as popular as those of Rossini and Suppé, and the influence of his melodies and dance rhythms on piano and instrumental music, and on Romantic comic opera, was overwhelming. In his operas Auber avoided any excess in dramatic expression; all emotion and expressiveness, any vivid depiction of local milieu, were realized within his discreetly nuanced tones, always stamped with a Parisian elegance. His operas were loved in his native France until the years before the First World War, with Fra Diavolo and Le Domino noir last performed at the Opéra-Comique in 1909. Auber’s career was a record of this success and appreciation. His appointment to the Institute (1829) was followed by other prestigious posts: as Director of Concerts at Court (1839), director of the Paris Conservatoire (1842), Musical Director of the Imperial Chapel (1852), and Grand Officer of the Légion d’Honneur (1861). During his lifetime, six biographies appeared contemporaneously, with another six appearing posthumously in the period up to 1914. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, however, reactions to Wagner, Impressionism and the Neo-Classicism of the Ballet Russe resulted in a growing lack of interest in the ancient traditions of opéra-comique, with its charming plots, melodic directness and rhythmic élan. Boieldieu, Hérold, Adam and Auber were relegated to the dustbin of history. Only in Germany did the genre continue to flourish; Auber’s most enduring work is still performed there. His death in pitiful conditions during the Siege of Paris (1871), in the city he always loved, marked the end of an era. Auber now occupies a shadowy niche in the general consciousness as the name of the metro station nearest the Palais Garnier, and remains unknown and neglected (apart of course from Fra Diavolo), although his impact on the nineteenth-century operatic theatre was just as great as Rossini’s. The time has surely come for Auber’s life and work, especially in association with his life-long collaborator Eugène Scribe (1791-1861)—master dramatist and supreme librettist, a determining force in the history of opera—to be reassessed. Perhaps then the world will begin to hear more of Auber’s elegant gracious, life-affirming music, written to Scribe’s words. The aim of the present study is to offer an overview of the life and work of Auber by close examination of his forty operas, with consideration of origins, casting, plot, analysis of dramaturgy and musical style, and reception history. This is presented in the context of Auber's relationship to the dominant genres of early nineteenth century French culture, opéra comique and grand opéra. The three evolving periods of Auber's unique involvement with opéra comique are of principal concern. This analysis of the operas is made in the context of Auber's crucial working relationship with Scribe, who provided 38 of his libretti. Their cooperation is unique and of great importance on several literary, musical and cultural levels. The nature of their interaction and personal friendship is assessed by a translation of the extant correspondence between them, some 80 letters that have not appeared in English before. The presentation of each opera is illustrated by musical examples from all the scores, prints from the complete works of Scribe and other theatrical memorabilia. The study also contains bibliographies of Auber’s works and their contemporary arrangements, studies of Auber’s and Scribe’s life and work, their artistic and historical milieux, and a discography.
The Vocal Athlete, Third Edition is written and designed to bridge the gap between the art of contemporary commercial music (CCM) singing and the science behind voice production in this ever-growing popular vocal style. Revised and expanded, this edition is a “must have” for vocal pedagogy courses and speech-language pathologists, singing voice specialists, and voice teachers. Heavily referenced, this text is ripe with current research on singing science as it relates to the CCM voice. Anyone who trains singers will gain insight into the current research and trends regarding commercial music artists. The text distinguishes itself from other academic pedagogy texts by incorporating comprehensive chapters on the physiology of belting, current peer reviewed literature in vocal training for CCM styles, and application in the voice studio. Included is the current information on our understanding of gender affirmation treatments and potential implications for singers. New to the Third Edition: * New comprehensive chapter titled Overview of Black American Music: History, Pedagogy & Practice by Trineice Robinson-Martin and Alison Crockett * Extended and revised sections in several chapters, including: The Singer’s Body Motor Learning Exercise Physiology Laryngeal Physiology Acoustics Phonotrauma Belting Research * Reference grid depicting where specific content areas for both the proposed NATS vocal pedagogy curriculum and the PAVA-RV can be found within the text * Updated references throughout the text
Volume 3 covers a time span that preeminently represents the period in the composer's life known as The Years of International Fame (1850-56). Confirmed as the major figure on the operatic scene, and freed from the more onerous duties of his official position, Meyerbeer was able to enjoy his most remarkable period of stability and renown, as the detailed and absorbing diary entries reveal. These years saw the composing, rehearsing, and staging of L'Etoile du Nord (1854), and his personal supervision of major productions in London, Dresden, Stuttgart, and Vienna.
