The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1914-02-08

he Girl OF the Golden West.
/ heavily on his acting than his singing.
( II was 4 really fine piece of theatrical
! Improvisation that he gave us.
only master of stage craft could
/ have united the mild humor Of the sit
| udtions with their pathos. Let it be
said without reservation that the pa
| thetic cloqucnce of the scene in the
! fourth act was more than two-thirds
Mr.. MarCouX's. What the librettist and
Massenet contributed to 1t would have
| looked small indeed without the splendid
| acting Of the barytone. And let us not
forget that he had To enact Henri
Bain's QWTotc, not that OF Cervantes.
How much greater Mr. Marcoux
might have made his impersonation If
| he had possessed better voice and
power to modify is tones by the use Of
that somewhat indefinite word "Color."
It is hard to conjecture Color. as II
has to be called. plays an important part
IN vocal Interpretation, and very few
artists have any command of it, The
term is, as already said. Indefinite. but
in this 1t is like many other dsscrip
tiv" words used in talk about music.
ployed in discussing music and its per-
Torrance because the technical termin-
u.ogy OF the art ~ unknown To- the lay
reader. There are stupid people who
insist that flgura;!ve language s..ould Ice
barred from the field ~ musical writing.
but as il il not excluded from any other.
even that OF medicine. this demand
seems To rest on an extremely insecure
foundation and to have very little likell-
hood of being fulfilled.
The word color is employed to des-
guate the sum total OF those minute
variations OF quality Intentionally used
by the singer for expressive purposes
Many singers rob themselves of these
resources by adopting method OF tone
emission which makes changes OF color
impossible.
II a singer Cultivdtes the white"
voice he VIII never be able 10 sing an
expressive mezza VoCe and still less
able to sing with dark" tone. Some
singers start out in life with the dark"
, tone as their norma! voice. They also
have no wide range Of color.
Tn" truth ia that really great singer
should be able to sing with q thick or
thin tone, IA white or dark one, a brill
liant or sombrc one or "A mixed one at
Will. He should be able To vary the
tones of his voice just as readily and as
''7 ,''''' "'''S % - va "~'o' "''S az"
with the same results.
-, -, 49, -a
,,i,T,s,,s 49, ~. +, 49, ,a..,,a,,,s 49,,
nI,.h.I ,,,,,ch ~ th, live ., on,ar H..
, sl,i,ruI CONDITION -, tho COCA -, W.
tones h., ala much hut 81 n. cor,a INV.
added color he wo,,ld done far more
or course the .bIg tone" mon seldom
show much variety of color. The great
,st of them can. hut perhans that "a
what makes them the greatest. The
Young singer starting out on his ar
tistic career should get these matters
thoroughly cleared in his mind. II IS
not III. enormous loudness OF the "big
tone" man that makes him great. but
the things he expresses with his tone,
and expression is reached chiefly by
nuance and color
In fine the art OF operate impersona-
ton Is one which embraces many i'm
portant elements. The acting OF a
singer does not, as We are led by some
kinds of critical comment to suppose,
consist Of the poses. gestures and facial
expression alone. 1t consists first OF all
"i what the speaking actors call tho
reading OF the lines The singers
/ reading Is ms SINGING ana he must act
with ms voice Just as inuch as MS
brother OF the dramatic stage does
something or this must nave neen
connected with the secret or kubini
art. w" nave to depend on the writings
or MS cohtemporaries for Information
but certainly chorley writes with calm
tells US That Rnblni put into some OF
the tehuous music or Beliini so much or
III" spirit OF the scene that the nearer
forgot that the music itself was feeble.