In the preface of the first edition of Garcia’s
École de Garcia : traité complet de l’art du chant en deux parties Garcia introduces himself.
The son of an artist generally appreciated as a singer, and who is recommended as a master by the merited reputations of several of his students. I have collected his instructions, fruits of a long experience and of a most cultivated musical taste.
It is his method which I have wanted to reproduce by trying to reduce it to a more theoretical form and by attaching the results to the causes.
translation: Donald Paschke Da Capo Press
He says a lot in very few words. I remember thinking “How clumsy can old style language get?” Now, tenors really need to take special care about thinking anything. It took a while, but I realized that my problem was me. There are gems hidden in these preparations for getting down to business.
The understatement of his father’s reputation is so nice to read in this age of hype. It leads me to my indebtedness to James Radomski for his hard work and good writing in Manuel García (1775-1832) Chronicle of the Life of a bel canto Tenor at the Dawn of Romanticism. I already knew that “Daddy Garcia” was really something else before I ever heard his name. When Renata Booth handed me Rossini’s “Barbeire”, I took it home and played a little of it on the clarinet Peru Central School let me use to play in the Band. I reported to Renata: “I can’t sing that, with all those notes the page might as well be all black.” I could not follow the vocal line and assumed that the singer who could follow it had to be a minor god. This is how I was introduced to the music written for Manuel that still stands as an indelible witness to Garcia Senior’s formidable abilities. Dr. Radomski has done me a great service and also for the world of singing by giving us a picture of the person that was Manuel Garcia Sr. The man was not perfect, the singer not universal. His legacy, however, is magnificent and Dr. Radomski’s work puts “Daddy Garcia’s” historical significance into much better focus .
Garcia wanted us to know that his method is not his own invention. Garcia Jr. marked his dad as the real starting point for his observations. Some could say that invoking the authority of another can be a great technique for shielding oneself against criticism. Criticism of Garcia and his “Method” was and still is easy to find, but I believe his attribution of responsibility to his father for the method he published is a humble admission that his dad was primary and the son was secondary.
Moving through life in the big shadow of his dad was, no doubt, difficult in many ways for Manuel Jr.. He could be forgiven for riding youthful rebellion to denunciation of his father. Happily he was faithful to “family values” and carried his father’s efforts forward in such a manner that even today we are arguing about all the same things that surrounded the Garcia “Method” from its first publication. That argument is now much muted by PC concerns and University policy.
The effect of this “party line” consensus does have results. I received a note from a new friend on Face Book that I quote in part:
“Modern singing has developed an idea of what technique is that results in monotone singers: where coloration is tacked-on or added rather than resulting from the freeness of the voice.” Ronald Carter
I think it’s about time to push back on the tide of muted consensus that gives us such notable results.
“The human voice submits to the influence of age, sex, constitution, and undergoes innumerable modifications. Independent of the outstanding differences which distinguish the voices of various individuals, there are also an unlimited number of nuances belonging to the organ of a single individual. In fact, each voice can conform to the inflections of the most varied passions; it can imitate the cries of animals and nearly all the sounds which our ears can perceive.”
(translation: Donald Paschke – Da Capo Press)
“In our considerations, we will not concern ourselves with the different timbres which characterize and differentiate the voices of individuals, but only with the diverse timbres which the voice of the same individual presents.”
(translation: Donald Paschke – Da Capo Press)
Let’s get the words worked out. TIMBRE is really the best word to use in the technical sense, but I really like common language better…. Well, you know where I come from. Let’s just say that TIMBRE equals color. Now I feel better.
What Garcia does with these quotes is to divide the generic category, VOCAL COLORS, into two subsets.
The first subset is the specific color mix belonging to the vocal gift I told everyone about in Merry Christmas 2011. Each voice has its own color mix which distinguishes it from all other voices. If the color mix is beautiful it is a great treasure, indeed. This subset of colors I think of as being as unique as a finger print.
The second subset is the vocal colors artists should use for interpretation. Each singer has at his or her disposal, according to Garcia, an unlimited range of colors with which to interpret. Garcia chose to discuss these colors. This is also the stuff by which artists like Mel Blanc and Bobby McFerren make a living.
I find it meaningful that Garica won’t discuss the identifying characteristics of individual voices. He didn’t need to make a case for what everyone understood. Different voices sound different. And they’re supposed to. Duh!
Which brings me back to Mr. Carter. His lament is understandable. You only need to read just a little of the stuff that comes off the presses of University Publishers to find hints on why he is dissatisfied. One can find books that talk about a new “Tonal Ideal” celebrated as the new “International Standard” of singing. Interesting though they may be, I consider these books to be a real threat to the voice student, because their goal is to unify, homogenize, standardize and ultimately to monotonize voices.
Mr. Carter’s comments are encouraging to me in that he has noticed the same vocal results that I’ve noticed over the span of my career. Today singers are arriving on the stage sounding more and more similar and less and less different.
That’s why: Garcia!