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.