colour the prime requisite is
imagination and the ability vividly to call up and experience the
various emotions. It will be evident that we are endeavouring to impart
into vocal work precisely those same principles which we assert to be
fundamental to the whole of music, namely--the importance of the idea as
behind, distinct from, and manifested through, the technical means. The
vocal machinery must necessarily be in first-class order, but the
influence of the mind upon the body is so intimate and so extraordinary
that even technical acquirement hangs to no small extent upon mental
working.

Seeing that song, then, is to be the vehicle for emotion, even though
that emotion be so tenuous as almost to defy verbal expression, for the
most part we ally words and music. The timbre of a voice, singing tones
without words, might carry a message to the sensitive, just as the
inflection of a voice may be exquisite joy or suffering to a lover: but
it would be insufficient to move the average hearer to any response. The
reason is that there is always a dual process at work in mind: there is
the sense-perception of the actual sound, and a brain-recognition of its
meaning. This latter must be supplied by the hearer himself from his own
imagination or experience. The non-musical multitude has neither, and is
therefore unable to complete this second process of recognition. Thus
the hearer hears, but does not understand. It is probably for some such
reason as this that we resort to words to make the message clear. Herein
lies the importance of the words themselves, and of the diction of the
singer.

Quite notoriously, many singers entirely fail to make their words
intelligible to the listener, and in the majority of cases this is due
to insufficient stressing of the consonants. Vowel tones carry, while
consonants do not. If we want to shout to anyone we call out "Hi" or
"Hey": never by any chance do we try to reach them with a "P-p-p-p-p" or
a "T-t-t-t-t," and for precisely this reason. If, therefore, a singer
wishes his words to carry to the end of the hall he must needs
exaggerate his consonants to allow for this loss in transit: the vowels
will look after themselves. Then, although the balance of the words as
they are uttered may be a trifle distorted, they will nevertheless reach
the hearers in due proportion. Comfort in listening is greatly increased
when this sense-perception is clear and unambiguous, and the
brain-recognition