music and what aesthetic and general culture, the teacher of singing requires. Very few persons indeed clearly understand what is meant by the education of a voice, and what high qualifications both teacher and pupil always require. The idea, for instance, is very prevalent that every musician, whatever may be the branch of music to which he is devoted, and especially every singer, is qualified to give instruction in singing. And therefore a dilettanteism without precedent has taken the place of all real artistic endeavors. Be this, however, as it may, such is the wide diffusion and popularity of music beyond all the other arts, that the want of singers artistically educated, and consequently also of a recognized sound method of instruction, becomes more and more urgent; and although we have in these times distinguished singers, male and female, as well as skilful teachers, yet the number is very small and by no means equal to the demand.

But now, as every evil, as soon as it is felt to be such, calls forth the means of its removal, already in various ways attempts are making in the department of the Art of Singing to restore it as perfectly a possible to its former high

position, and if possible to elevate it to a yet higher state. It was natural that the attempt should, first of all, be made to revive the old Italian method of instruction, and that, by strict adherence in everything to what has come down to us by tradition, we should hope for deliverance and salvation; for to the Italians mainly vocal music was indebted for its chief glory. Without considering in what a sadly superficial way music-and vocal music especially is now treated in Italy, many have given in to the erroneous idea that any Italian who can sing anything must know how to educate a voice. Thus many incompetent Italians have become popular teachers in other countries.

The old Italian method of instruction, to which vocal music owed its high condition, was purely empirical, i. e. the old singing masters taught only according to a sound and just feeling for the beautiful, guided by that faculty of acute observation, which enabled them to distinguish what belongs to nature. Their pupils learned by imitation, as children learn their mother tongue, without troubling themselves about rules. But after the true and natural way has once been forsaken, and for so long a

period only the false and the unnatural has been heard and taught, it seems almost impossible by empiricism alone to restore the old and proper method of teaching. With our higher degree of culture, men and things have greatly changed. Our feeling is no longer suf ficiently simple and natural to distinguish the true without the help of scientific principles.

But science has already done much to assist the formation of musical forms of art. Mathematics and physics have established the principal laws of sound and the processes of sound, in accordance with which our musical instruments are now constructed. Philosophical inquirers have succeeded also in discovering the eternal and impregnable laws of Nature upon which the mutual influences of melody, harmony and rhythm depend, and in thus giving to composition fixed forms and laws which no one ventures to question. And more recently Professor Helmholtz, in his great work, "Die Lehre von den Tonempfindungen," has given to music of all kinds a scientific ground and basis. But for the culture of the human voice in singing science has as yet furnished only a few lights. The well-known experiments of Johannes Mül

ler upon the larynx gave us all that was known, until very recently, respecting the functions of the organ of singing. Many singing masters have sought to found their methods of instruction upon these observations on the larynx, at the same time putting forth the boldest conjectures in regard to the functions of the organ of singing in the living subject. But they

have thus ruined more fine voices than those teachers who, without reference to the formation of the voice, only correct the musical faults of their pupils, and for the rest let them sing as. they please.

This superficial treatment of science, and the unfortunate results of its application, have injured the art of singing more than benefited it, and created a prejudice against all scientific investigations in this direction among the most distinguished artists and teachers, as well as among those who take an intelligent interest in this department of music. It is a pretty common opinion that science can do little for the improvement of music, and nothing for the culture and preservation of the voice in singing. And the habit of regarding science and art as opposed to each other renders it extremely

difficult to secure a hearing for the results of thorough scientific inquiry in this direction.

Science itself admits that it can neither create artistic talent, nor supply the place of it, but only furnish it with aids. Besides, with the whole inner nature of music, no forms of thought (reflection) have anything to do. It has 66 a reason above reason." This art transmits to us in sound the expression of emotions as they rise in the human soul and connect themselves one with another. It is the revelation of our inmost life in its tenderest and finest processes, and is therefore the most ideal of the arts. It appeals directly to our consciousness. As a sense of the divine dwells in every nation, in every human being, and is impelled to form for itself a religious cultus, so we find among all nations the need of music dwelling as deeply in human nature. The most uncivilized tribes celebrate their festivals with songs as the expression of their devotion or joy, and the cultivated nations of ancient times, like the Greeks, cherished music as the ethereal vehicle of their poetry, and regarded it as the chief aid in the culture of the soul.

But together with its purely internal character,

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