Voice, song and speech : a practical guide for singers and speakers : from the combined view of vocal surgeon and voice trainer / by Lennox Browne and Emil Behnke.

  • Browne, Lennox, 1841-1902.
Date:
1884
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Voice, song and speech : a practical guide for singers and speakers : from the combined view of vocal surgeon and voice trainer / by Lennox Browne and Emil Behnke. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by University of Bristol Library. The original may be consulted at University of Bristol Library.

    274/376 (page 248)
    3. The question of ClotJring is one treated very irration- ally by singers, but one over which they have not always entire or even any satisfactory control. We commonly see persons enter our consulting-room, class-room, and the theatre, and remain with overcoat, heavy mantle and fur which had been donned as against the cold of external air on leaving their homes ; or, on the other hand, a singer will often enter a hot concert-room or the stage in low dress and omit to cover the shoulders in coming into the lowered temperature and draught of waiting-room or wings. Of course it often happens on the lyric stage that a singer is forced to wear either too little or too much clothing, in accordance with the costume appropriate to the character represented, but even this difficulty may be overcome by care on the part of the artist and attention to his direc- tions on the part of his dresser. Oscar Guttman, in his ' Gymnastics of the Voice' (Leipzig and New York, 1882,), goes so far as to say that actors who have worn heating- wigs, &c, should not, on leaving the theatre, go out into the cold outer air merely with a hat on. Those who follow professions in which a particular dress is de rigueur, such as clergymen and soldiers, often suffer from being obliged to wear an undue or an in- sufficient amount of clothing; but here again much may be done in way of correction by attention to the amount and character of the underclothing worn. Two questions are amongst the commonest asked by the singer. 1. Should flannel be worn ? 2. Should the neck be covered ? As to the first we are of opinion that flannel or silk of varying thickness should be worn both over trunk and limbs by all English people, and all the year round, as the warmest garment in cold and the most absorbent of perspiration in hot weather. In addition an extra piece