An Innovative Approach: Group Classes to Achieve Individual Progress

While I was receiving my own Bel Canto singing instruction in both London, England and Bologna, Italy my teacher Julian Miller frequently invited me to sit in on his lessons with other students. We would all open our imaginations to discuss what was happening in the student’s voice as well as ideas to make further progress towards VOCAL FREEDOM. Sometimes we would gather several students together in a discussion. It was a most rewarding and exhilarating exercise. I saw the potential for us all to learn from one another and build each other up.

When I began to teach singing in Germany and in London I followed in that tradition by getting my students together in groups of two or three and encouraged similar types of discussions. I soon found that I was gathering larger and larger groups together in addition to each student’s individual sessions with me. The students enjoyed collaborating with one another and encouraging one another about their singing.

Now it is my regular policy to hold group classes at the Bel Canto House School of Singing in Dublin. Led by myself or my associate teacher Edwin Williamson, the students learn from each other in a relaxed setting, each taking turns singing a variety of songs from Irish ballads to showband classics operatic arias. The cardinal rule of my school is that every person’s statement or comment must be positive and constructive. Negativity is simply not allowed at the Bel Canto House. My school is a place of learning and growth and joy where each person is made to feel welcome and encouraged.

Problems Inherent in “Method” Teaching

I have talked previously on this blog about the advent of "method" teaching, where teachers instruct their students in "breathing exercises" and "vocalizations" and other tasks set upon the overphysicalization of singing. The first and most obvious effect that such “method” had upon students of singing was to outright rob them of the natural synchronicity and balance that they would need to express their art. They were taught to separately “watch” their breathing, their tones and their pitches all at the same time.

Now, I ask you to consider what would happen to you if you tried to watch your feet each time you took a step to walk. You would fall right on your face as soon as you got up out of your chair, wouldn’t you? You wouldn’t get anywhere, and in fact all that you would be accomplishing would be to teach yourself to be anxious about something that you never before considered to be a worry.

The second deleterious effect of the “method” teaching was to mislead aspiring young singers towards the false conclusion that singing was a primarily physical activity that could only be done properly after being trained with strengthening exercises like an athlete, or even like an animal. The fact of being a whole person was removed entirely from the concept of singing.

The “maestros” invented “vocal callisthenics” which really only taught their students to imitate sounds and tones and to imitate the voices of others, as well as to embellish the sound of their own voices in unnatural and awkward ways. But the exercises were intended to “build them up” as singers. Only a person with a well-developed physique (as relates to “singing muscles” and “breathing muscles”) was believed to be able to sing well– singing “correctly” meant being strong enough to follow a precise set of physical movements to produce a specific sound.

If the “maestro method” were an effective path to proper singing, then the best singer in the world would be a computer or a robot, not a human artist.

The “maestro method” cheapened the art of singing by (1) reducing singing to the level of a “product” that could be mechanically churned out of the body and (2) reducing the singer himself to a collection of “pieces and parts.”

When “Science” Defeats True Singing: “Parts... Nothing More”

Scientifically based medicine (the kind of medicine that your family M.D. practices) was a great benefit to mankind, bringing new technologies and the ability to overcome many terrible diseases and other health problems, but it also tended to have an unforseen effect on the way that people generally understand what it means to be human.

Much of the “new science” of medicine developed from microscopic observations of pathogens and from the study of dissected human corpses. Where earlier health practices were holistic, treating the whole person as a whole person, scientifically based medicine tended to isolate different pieces of a person and to treat just the parts of the person that seemed to be directly involved in the health problem. The resulting school of thought gradually introduced an idea that human beings could be understood as “parts, nothing more,” as one of the doctors in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein aptly remarked.

As time went on the world of singing also became infected with the concept of treating a person as “parts, nothing more.” Understandably, singing practitioners were interested to learn all they could about the function of the voice, the vocal cords, the vocal resonators and the breath and the new technologies in scientific medicine opened up a wealth of information that hadn’t been available before. But the sad fact is that some very inferior “teachers” began to build up a following for themselves by using the new physiological data to overshadow and replace the true work and art of singing which the great singers had always practiced.

Manuel Garcia II is regarded as one of the greatest singing teachers of all time, a place in history which he rightly deserves. He is also credited with having invented the first laryngoscope during the 1800's, which for the first time made it possible to actually observe the vocal cords in a living person. This technology introduced singers to new and very valuable treasures of knowledge. But unfortunately that knowledge was misused over time by certain “teachers” who failed to understand the singer as a whole person and fail to treat singing as art, not athleticism. Manuel Garcia II lived to the ripe old age of 101, and in all his years he never compromised the precept that artistry (not physical exercise) is what singing is all about:

Most of the great singing teachers say that the less you know about the physiology of signing the better. Santley wrote (in The Art of Singing): ‘Manuel Garcia is held up as the pioneer of scientific teachers of singing. He was– but he taught singing, not surgery! I was a pupil of his in 1858, and a friend of his while he lived [to 1906], and in all the conversation I had with him I never heard him say a word about larynx or pharynx, glottis, or other organ used in the production and emission of the voice.”
(from page 956 of Percy Scholes’ The Oxford Companion to Music, Tenth Edition, emphasis added)

Despite the great example of singing teachers like Garcia who faithfully upheld the authentic art of singing, the music industry continued to put pressure on singing performers to force and push their voices. Singers were called upon to produce sounds with blasting volumes which added nothing to the expressiveness of the song but only offered empty notes and tones and unnatural embellishments. They were challenged to unnaturally stretch their voices to sing at a pitch level far too high or too low for their true voices. The great Italian composer Rossini described such singing as “the squawk of a capon having its throat cut.” (In case you didn’t know, a capon is a castrated domesticated male bird fattened for eating.)

Bel Canto– Simplicity and Clarity in a Complicated World

During the 1800's the newly commercialized music industry was producing more and more complicated and "enlightened" gimmicks to dazzle audiences– bigger and louder orchestras, loftier and more complex verses, singers performing tricks with their voices by making various sounds with increasingly forced amplitude and unnaturally stretched vocal range, and so forth. Productions increasingly became much more a function of visual hype and verbal acrobatics– much less a presentation of true artistry and real substance.

But there was a minority group of Italian composers who resisted the trend towards needless and unartful complications in music and in singing. Composers such as Bellini and Donizetti took a stand for the purity of their art. They knew the timeless beauty of a lovely story performed by singers who had studied and developed VOCAL FREEDOM, and they insisted that the traditional ways were the true path to artistry and expression.

These composers were called "Bel Canto" composers. "Bel Canto" is an Italian phrase that means "beautiful singing." The Bel Canto composers made it a special point to contrast their works against the overcomplicated compositions of their contemporaries. They promoted simple, straightforward melody and clarity which could only effectively be performed by singers who had achieved VOCAL FREEDOM. By making such a determined point to demonstrate expressiveness and clarity, the Bel Canto composers and the singers who performed their works presented incredibly beautiful singing that was envied by all.

The "maestro-method" way of athletically training singers gained more and more prominence over time. This did not necessarily mean that the maestro teachers were more effective than the traditional professori.

Teaching positions were not always awarded on merit. For example, the Milan Conservatory promised its chief teaching position to Amicarle Ponchielli. He was the artist who had proven to be the most able and accomplished in artistry in a competition for the post, but the Conservatory then revoked the appointment in favor of a less qualified individual with more political savvy and connivance.

The traditional way that singers had always studied singing with a professori gradually declined in the face of changing Western society. Instead of being called "singing studies," the traditional way became known as "Bel Canto" singing, after the composers and singers who made it their mission to preserve the traditional ways.


Even with a bastion of singers and teachers who knew the value of the natural and holistic study of singing as an art (not an acrobatic endeavor), true exponents of "Bel Canto" singing were becoming fewer and fewer. Great singers like Jean de Reske began to grow concerned that their true art may soon become lost to the world.

Bel Canto needed a Redeemer– someone who would carry the standard of VOCAL FREEDOM forward for new generations to hear and enjoy. That is why Jean de Reske was so delighted and gratified to hear the clear, expressive singing of Irish tenor John McCormack– he could finally rest easy that the true art of Bel Canto was indeed going to live on for another generation.

BEL CANTO- A Human Touch, A Living, Evolving Art:

It’s not often that someone can say that they have made a real contribution to the art that he or she serves. I am both proud and humbled to add my own human touch to the enduring and ever-evolving art of Bel Canto singing, as my teacher did before me and his teachers did before him. My gift to the art of Bel Canto is the message of storytelling.

Bel Canto is a singing art that can only be imparted from teacher to student over time and intensive study. There has never been a book or an instruction manual that could adequately describe the necessary steps to sing with VOCAL FREEDOM the Bel Canto way, and there never will be.

In the historical manner of study, the Bel Canto instructor would have the student sing an aria or other song until he or she brought forth a particularly beautiful phrase sung with crystal clarity. At that point the student was instructed to repeat that word or short phrase over and over exactly as he or she had just done it, in order for the student to become accustomed to singing so clearly. Intensive work was also done with regards to pronunciation of words, particularly the vowels in the words. The teacher continued to guide the student with these disciplines until the student finally achieved the ability to sing clearly and consistently without vocal difficulties every time– until he or she had reached VOCAL FREEDOM.

Approaching the Wonderment of Bel Canto

Because it is passed from teacher to student in such intimate and personal disciplines, Bel Canto is and always will be a mysterious, almost secret art. Many attempts have been made to explain the greatness of Bel Canto, and none have been truly adequate.

I liken it to the old parable about the group of blind men who were introduced to an elephant for the first time, and then they were asked to explain to others what an elephant was. The first blind man approached the elephant from its side and touched the animal’s large body with tough skin. He reported that an elephant is like a house. The second blind man felt one of the elephant’s legs and said: "It is a tree." The third blind man found the elephant’s tail and claimed that an elephant was a rope. The fourth blind man ran his hands up and down the elephants tusks– a spear! And the last blind man caught hold of the animal’s trunk and proclaimed that an elephant is a hosepipe. All of the men had good reason for their explanations, but none of them could fully comprehend all there was to know about an elephant.

So it is with the wonderment of Bel Canto. Various teachers and even accomplished Bel Canto singers have written about their understanding of Bel Canto as an art. In each book or article it is fairly easy to see that every person has managed to find something of themselves inside the art of Bel Canto, and they share that part of themselves as part and parcel of their respective definitions of "Bel Canto."

It was the same for me when I was a young lad studying Bel Canto with my teacher Julian Miller. I meditated continually about the work we were doing to clear away my vocal difficulties. I strove for consistency to be able to sing with the ease and clarity and well-pronounced phrases I was learning. I wanted to find a way to keep hold of those skills throughout my career without ever straying from the true meaning of Bel Canto.

And finally I found my answer within myself. I discovered I could get hold of all of the phrasing, inflection and precision inherent in Bel Canto singing and integrate them with ease as soon as I realized that singing Bel Canto was all about telling the story.