Scientific Principles of Singing Chapter 4: Artistic application of the voice.

Abstract

ABSTRACT- In Chapter 4 of The Scientific Principles of Singing (Lin, 1962/1996), introduced here far the first time in English, pioneering Chinese vocal scientist Dr. Jun-Qing Lin (1914-2000) discusses the application of vocal science (acoustics and physiology) to singing. The chapter provides advice about singing effectively in different genres and evaluating vocal performances of different genres from the perspectives of both science and the arts. Dr. Lin notes ine consistent metaphorical descriptions often agreed on by voice experts, and he points out that such consistency must have an underlying scientific account which this chapter begins to provide. The Chinese traditional singing method, which might be of particular interest to western readers, was discussed here, comparing it with Western singing. (ProQuest: ... denotes non-USASCII text omitted.) JUN-QING LIN (1962) Translated from the Chinese1 by Bing-Yi Pan ISSUES CONCERNING THE ARTISTIC APPLICATION OF THE VOICE From the perspectives of the sciences and the arts, different conclusions may possibly arise regarding methods far vocal production All the previously mentioned elements of breathing, voice-production, resonance, and articulation arose from scientists who observed singers with strong voicing capabilities and superior singing technique. The notions of correct or incorrect singing, here, are based purely on science. However, artists of some schools might disagree with these statements, due to the fact that the preference and requirement of a voice are different from artistic and scientific perspectives. From the perspective of the sciences, the concept of in the methods of voice production is based on the following elements: the effect of acoustics, the physiological maturity of the voice, and the degree of harm to vocal health. From the perspective of vocal music arts, the of a type of method for voice production is mainly based on whether or not the voice meets vocal music artistic demands. In circumstances in which brighter and louder voices are required stylistically, aspects of correctness as viewed from the sciences should also be considered. In the art of vocal acoustics, there are different demands for the voice; hence, there are many different images of good voices. For instance, western singing commonly requires a relatively dark timbre; Chinese native singing usually requires a relatively bright and open timbre. Even within one given singing style, there are usually different demands of singing for different vocal parts or different characters. For instance, within the same style of western singing, a bass always uses a relatively dark voice; whereas, a tenor when singing lower tones would make efforts to use a relatively bright voice. As another example, in the Beijing Opera, Lao Sheng (Older Male, Chest Voice) and Hei Tou (Righteous Male, Rough Voice) need to use different means for voice production. Even for the same singer, changes of timbre must follow certain regularities when singing piano or fortenotes and higher or lower pitches. For example, as a western soprano, in general, there are certain rules regarding how dark the timbre should be for the given pitch of her ascending scale; if one breaks this rule, the style will consequently be out of form. This means that the correct voice viewed by the sciences might not be completely suitable for vocal music arts; a correct voice viewed by vocal music arts sometimes is one that does not necessarily have the highest efficiency, or has not been produced by healthy methods. From this point of view, we know that the demands for voices viewed by sciences and demands for voices viewed by vocal music arts share certain similarities but also have differences. The application of the voice in vocal music arts should mainly target stylistic considerations How to deal with the controversy on vocal correctness? …