have been lost to it
entirely, for nothing hastens so much the breaking of the voice as the
habit of unduly straining it."

Mr. T. H. Collinson, Mus.B., organist of St. Mary's Cathedral,
Edinburgh, writes to me:--

"Boy altos are a fraud and a deception, as a rule, though occasionally
one meets with a natural contralto at an early age. Even then he can
generally be worked up to treble by gentle treatment, developing the
middle and falsetto registers."

* * * * *

In order to get to the bottom of this subject, I invited correspondence
in the _Musical Standard_ (until recently the organ of the College of
Organists), and several interesting letters were the result. Mr. R. T.
Gibbons, F.C.O., organist of the Grocers' Company's Schools, where
excellent performances of operettas are given, wrote:--

"As soon as a boy's voice reaches only E[b] he is drafted into the
altos, and that preserves his voice much longer."

To this statement Mr. Fred. Cambridge, organist of Croydon Parish
Church, took exception. He said:--

"I do not wish to appear to dogmatise, but I should say 'as soon as a
boy's voice reaches only E[b],' it is quite time he left off singing
altogether, _i.e._, if his voice has previously been a treble. I know it
is the custom in some choirs to make a boy sing alto as soon as his
voice begins to break. In my opinion, such a course is utterly wrong. It
is not only injurious to the boy's voice, but very unpleasant for those
who have to listen to it.

"In a school of 500 boys, there ought to be no difficulty in finding
sufficient natural altos, without having to rely on broken-voiced
trebles.

"In my own choir I frequently admit altos at 10 or 11 years of age, with
the result that I get five or six years' work out of them, and the
latter part of their time they are available for alto solos.

"I think (and I speak from upwards of 30 years' experience) that if Mr.
Gibbons will try this plan, he will find it much more satisfactory than
drafting his trebles into the altos as soon as their voices begin to
break.

"I do not enter into the question of men _versus_ boy altos, because it
is my experience that in a voluntary choir, especially in the country, a
really _good_ adult alto is such a _rara avis_, that one is obliged to
rely on boys, and if they are carefully chosen and trained, they are, I
think, quite satisfactory. The only place when one misses the man alto
voice is in a