Today’s confusion surrounding “Falsetto” is only one good reason modern times should make room for questions about the future of Classical Music.
On my first day in Rovereto, a big strapping young tenor, Mr. Gao Si Chen, baptized me with enough falsetto for a whole season of French repertoire. Not that he seemed to have any idea what falsetto was. I took particular pleasure in meeting this challenge and dragged most of his singing out of falsetto. Mr. Chen has an interesting voice but, submerged as it was in “Falsetto”, who could tell? Mr. Carlo Vitali, one of my fellow jury members for Premio Ferrari, came to observe our progress in the master classes and noticed Mr. Chen’s results. Mr. Chen’s singing improved so much that Mr. Vitali convinced the full jury to invent a special prize just for this tenor.
After Rovereto, Falsetto held center stage in my thoughts, and in short order two E-goads appeared from the Internet to inspire this blog. The first one emerged from Face Book:
Caro Maestro, ieri ho discusso via facebook con Enrico Stinchelli della barcaccia, ieri nella trasmissione hanno fatto ascoltare diversi tenori nella cabaletta dell’aria vivi tu, tra i quali lei. Lui sostiene che lei usava il falsettone. Mi sono molto arrabbiato perchè non si possono dire stupidaggini così grosse in pubblico. Se lei usava il falsettone, allora non ho capito nulla di canto!!! Sbaglio??? La saluto con tanto affetto
My English translation:
Dear Maestro, yesterday I communicated on Facebook with Enrico Stinchelli of barcaccia, yesterday in the broadcast they let us hear various tenors in the last part of the aria vivi tu, among whom there was you. He (Stinchelli) maintains the idea that you used a large falsetto. I am very angry, because one should not say such incredibly stupid things in public. If you used a large falsetto, then I understand nothing of singing!!! Do I make a mistake??? I salute you with much affection
The guys at La Barcaccia are lots of fun, and love good singing, but they seem to be lost in some kind of Falsetto fog. My Face Book pal is correct to disagree with their suggestion that my singing in the pirate recording of ANNA BOLENA they aired on RAI 3 included an example of me using a “falsettone”. Whatever a “falsettone” might be, it was not what I produced. I sang a very high pitch in Chest Voice. There was no falsetto on display at all, but why not make the assertion? It makes for lively controversy, doesn’t it? It inspired my Face Book friend to write to me and I welcome all goads toward doing good things.
The next E-goad that impacted my virtual hind parts came by Email and I excerpt a bit of it here:
When I sing up, I feel quite well a resonance shift in the passaggio-area (so somewhere middle b-natural to g). But its not like a different register and there is no “break”, so thats fine.
Until half a year ago, I could never sing higher than bflat though. I would push and strain and my throat would close up or I would crack horribly which was always good for some amusement but nothing more :-). I thought that the remaining high notes would come with time and patience…
Then suddenly I discovered some sort of “click” around that high bflat/bnatural which brought me in what I thought was falsetto – so I never thought, this could be any acceptable sound. Someone then pointed out to me that this sounds just fine and nothing like falsetto because it still kept a metallic twang and even that from outside its not an audible change in “register”. But it always felt to ME like a different register. Its a bit like a scream of a baby but it is comfortable and I can “sing” up that way to super high d or higher without hurting myself (there is no blood coming out of my mouth :-).
Now, my questions:
1. Do you understand me and this sensation I feel? Do you remember feeling something similar when learning your fantastic technique?
2. You say that boys (and clearly I am a boy) stay in the same register (chest) all the time, so how should I explain this sensation?
I hope you find time to answer me! I know its hard to talk about it without hearing, so I could send a recording or something.
My tenor friend is on the right track. He needs to know that the trick of the “click” he has discovered is a simple thing to explain, but is a difficult maneuver to do. He is not switching from Chest Voice to Falsetto. He begins at his “click” to reverse the “resonance shift” (Dark Timbre application) he did in the “passaggio”. That is to say that the “scream of a baby” character of the sound he has “discovered” in the vocal mesosphere is not falsetto. It is Chest Voice. Had he not done the “resonance shift” (Dark Timbre application) in the “passaggio” (transition between troposphere and stratosphere), he would have discovered the inevitable “scream of a baby” on much lower notes. 19th Century composers expected Chest Voice function from us boys when they wrote f, ff or fff in their music. It didn’t matter whether their notes were written in the vocal troposphere, stratosphere or mesosphere.
I believe we could burn off the fog surrounding falsetto today in a minute if we would just get the facts straight. Garcia himself mixed the voices of boys and girls together when he first published his theories. No one likes to admit that they are wrong, and Garcia did not admit he had changed his opinion about falsetto when, in later editions of his Treatise, he changed his descriptions. We modern types have to untangle the web of conflicting texts, because Garcia did not straight forwardly admitted that he was wrong in his first assertion that girls’ and boys’ voices move from Chest to Falsetto on the same pitches. This idea of sex synchrony disappeared when he invented the laryngoscope. With his little mirror on a stick he could finally see the vocal chords operate, get a clear view of vocal function and complete his vocal theories.
His Laryngoscope pierced this Falsetto fog and changed his mind.
How fun is History!!!!!?
I hate Foggy knowledge and Falsetto fog is just one component of the greater fog surrounding the art and craft of singing. I happen to love real fog when found where it belongs, like Venice:
I’m glad I’m not the only one to like fog for fog’s sake.
Pierre Auguste Renoir liked fog in Venice, too.
Turning full circle back to the future of Classical Music, this link will give you a chance to hear some movers and shakers wonder about how the future will support Classical Music.
I will be back to talk about these movers and shakers again because Falsetto fog figures fundamentally in the Opera example played near the end of that show. I hope to be able to shine enough Sun light on this fog to burn it up. I’ll use mirrors if I have to.