Page images
PDF
EPUB

trary, should be kept as open as possible, to allow the voice to come freely out from the seat of its formation.

The LIPS, too, influence the tone of the voice. The best remedial advice for any peculiarity arising from a faulty disposition of the lips, is, never to use these organs in speech where their action is not indispensable. The most common faults, are projection, and pursing of the lips; keeping them in contact at the corners; and making the oral aperture incline unequally to one side. By these ungraceful and deforming habits, the quality of the voice is variously affected. The lips should take the form of the range of the teeth,-but without constraint,-and move with the teeth, in a vertical direction only. Any great deviation from this rule, is inelegant, and injurious to the tone.

Weakness of voice, we have thus seen, is owing to a faulty formation of voice,-to insufficient glottal vibration; and peculiarities of tone arise generally from modifications of the channel through which the vocal current flows. Many of these are perfectly controllable by art: well directed practice never fails to produce a very considerable effect. Exercise, conducted on natural principles, will be found to be the best specific for the improvement of the voice, the strengthening of the lungs, and the regulation of all vocal action.

Before entering upon the Theory of Vowel Formation, we shall give-as fundamentally connected with the production of voicesome directions for the management of

RESPIRATION.

THE importance of knowing how to regulate the breathing with ease and efficiency, in public speaking, cannot be over-estimated. Many a zealous speaker has cut short his career of usefulness, by injurious action of the chest in respiration; and complaints are most numerous-especially among clergymen-of uneaseinss in speaking, great exhaustion after vocal effort, pain in the chest, expectoration of blood, and other symptoms of serious pulmonary affections, which manifest the prevalence of fatal ignorance on this most important subject.

Here is one serious practical evil arising from the neglect of preparatory training in speech, as a part of the necessary education

for the English articulations M and N; in forming which, the voice escapes by the nose only, but reverberates in the mouth; where it is shut in, by the lips for the former, and by the tongue and palate for the latter element. The action of the soft palate demands the attention of all who would speak with purity of voice, and propriety of articulation.

Let the student place himself before a glass,-his back to the light,—and, opening his mouth, inhale breath strongly, but noiselessly. If he do not, in this process, elevate the soft palate, and depress the tongue, so as to form a visible arch of nearly an inch in height and breadth, he will be the better of practice for that purpose. A little patient exercise will give him the requisite power. He must strive to retain the velum at the elevation he obtains, as long as possible, dwelling on the open vowels ah and aw, without allowing it to fall. He will distinctly see the position of this organ in sounding these vowels, and he may be able, by sensation and partial observation, to maintain it in the same position in sounding the closer vowels, e, eh, oh, oo, &c. By this sort of exercise, a nasal tone of VOICE will be purified, and that most disagreeable blemish of speech removed.

A GUTTURAL tone of voice arises, in a great measure, from the too close approximation of the tongue and velum, by which the uvula is laid in the way of the vocal current; frequently from enlarged glands, (tonsils;) and from contraction of the arch of the fauces, from whatever cause arising. The nature of the peculiarity indicates the means of cure. The more the arch can be expanded, the less guttural vibration can there be. So far as faulty habit is the cause of the guttural tone, it will be susceptible of easy correction, by observation of the formation of the open vowels, and the practice of similar means to those recommended for the nasal tone.

The quality of the voice is affected by the position of THE TEETH. All the vowels may be sounded with the teeth closed, and they may all be sounded with the teeth considerably separated; but the tone of voice is very different in these cases. When the teeth are close, the vocal current strikes against them, and becomes deadened, muffled, and deprived of both purity and power. In the close vowels, e and oo especially, it is frequently still farther deteriorated in quality by a degree of vibration in the teeth.

The teeth should never be closed in speech, but, on the con

trary, should be kept as open as possible, to allow the voice to come freely out from the seat of its formation.

The LIPS, too, influence the tone of the voice. The best remedial advice for any peculiarity arising from a faulty disposition of the lips, is, never to use these organs in speech where their action is not indispensable. The most common faults, are projection, and pursing of the lips; keeping them in contact at the corners; and making the oral aperture incline unequally to one side. By these ungraceful and deforming habits, the quality of the voice is variously affected. The lips should take the form of the range of the teeth, but without constraint,—and move with the teeth, in a vertical direction only. Any great deviation from this rule, is inelegant, and injurious to the tone.

Weakness of voice, we have thus seen, is owing to a faulty formation of voice, to insufficient glottal vibration; and peculiarities of tone arise generally from modifications of the channel through which the vocal current flows. Many of these are perfectly controllable by art: well directed practice never fails to produce a very considerable effect. Exercise, conducted on natural principles, will be found to be the best specific for the improvement of the voice, the strengthening of the lungs, and the regulation of all vocal action.

Before entering upon the Theory of Vowel Formation, we shall give-as fundamentally connected with the production of voicesome directions for the management of

RESPIRATION.

THE importance of knowing how to regulate the breathing with ease and efficiency, in public speaking, cannot be over-estimated. Many a zealous speaker has cut short his career of usefulness, by injurious action of the chest in respiration; and complaints are most numerous-especially among clergymen-of uneaseinss in speaking, great exhaustion after vocal effort, pain in the chest, expectoration of blood, and other symptoms of serious pulmonary affections, which manifest the prevalence of fatal ignorance on this most important subject.

Here is one serious practical evil arising from the neglect of preparatory training in speech, as a part of the necessary education.

of clergymen. They are set to the performance of their arduous public duties, with the mere instinct of speech; and, in consequence, many sink under the self-inflicted injuries of zealous but misdirected effort. We see young men-consumptive looking, and with their chests almost collapsed-who work themselves into vehemence in the pulpit, by dint of sheer bodily labour. For want of a principle of emphatic expiration, which might have been, and should have been, acquired by them before the delivery of their first sermon, they are compelled to throw a bodily motion into every accent, so that, to avoid monotony and drawl, they must be constantly in action-tossing and swaying the bodyrising and falling on the heels-nodding the head-swinging and jerking the arms-kneading the cushion-or hammering on the pulpit frame. Some, with little taste, or tact, fall into a regular set or rotation of actions, which they perform as uniformly as automata; and others, gratifying their sense of the necessity for variety, yield to every impulse, and indulge in the most out of place extravagance; under which they steam, and drip, and froth; while the cataract of strained, ranting sound which is poured forth, exhausts the powers of nature, and the o'erwrought speaker, panting and breathless, sinks into a state of complete prostration.

The ordinary amount of air inspired for vital wants, is quite insufficient for vocal purposes. The lungs must, therefore, before speech is commenced, and during speech, be made to contain a far greater than ordinary supply of air. For breath, let it be remembered, is the materiel of speech.

To make the speaker's respiration healthful, the act of inspiration must be full and deep. No effort of suction is required to effect this: the chest has but to be freely expanded, and the air will rush into the lungs, and distend them to the full extent of the cavity created within the thorax. The chest must then be held up; and the glottal valve must prevent wasteful emission before speech is commenced and, during the whole flow of speech, the chest should fall as little as possible. The upward pressure of the diaphragm, bearing on the lungs, will expel the breath sufficiently, without the laborious action of the bony structure of the chest.

:

There needs no muscular straining or effort, to elevate, or keep raised, the framework of the chest: the wave of breath inspired,

should buoy it up, and frequent replenishings should keep it, as it were, afloat, on the surface of the body of air in the lungs.

The breathing must be conducted inaudibly: an inspiration, to be full, must be silent. Noisy inspirations are necessarily incomplete, as their sound arises from constriction of the glottal aperture, which, of course, lessens the volume of the current of air that can enter. But even were such breathing as effectual as the noiseless flowing-in of a wave of air, the hideous effect of it would be enough to keep every speaker of taste from so outraging the feelings of his auditors. This sort of strangulatory inspiration is most common on the stage, among the melodramatic heroes, whose element and forte are coloured fire" and "desperate combats."

66

The common Scotch bagpipe gives an excellent and most convincing illustration of the comparative efficacy of a partial, and of a complete inflation of the lungs. See the piper, when the bag is only half filled, tuning the long drones! how his arm jerks on the wind-bag!--and hear the harsh and uneven notes that come jolting out from the pressure! Then see him, when the sheep-skin is firmly swelled beneath his arm!-how gently his elbow works upon it! while the clear notes ring out with earsplitting emphasis. Let the public speaker learn hence, an important lesson. He but plays upon an instrument-one, too, like the bagpipe in construction. Let him learn to use it rationally; in consciousness, at least, of the mechanical principles of his apparatus. For, as the instrument of speech is more perfect than anything the hand of man has fashioned, it surely must, when properly handled, be “easier to be played on than a pipe!” Many exercises for prolonging the expiration will be found in different parts of this volume.

A very useful exercise for strengthening the respiration we may note here. It is Reading in a strong, loud WHISPER. This will be found very laborious at first, but it will give good practice, and will strongly manifest whatever fault of breathing there may be to be overcome.

The following outward index of correct respiration will serve to keep the student right in his practice.

A full inspiration elevates and expands the chest, and, by the descent of the diaphragm, slightly protrudes the abdomen; and a correct vocal expiration manifests itself, first, in the flattening

« EelmineJätka »