Far from having cause for complaint, the composer
gained thereby, a more clear expression of his thought, a more
persuasive expansion of his sentiment, and the respiration appeared more
easy. It was something similar--with a greater value--to that personal
punctuation with which skilful readers often divide the text which they
translate.
It was particularly in recitative, the style, moreover, least subject to
precise laws, that Delsarte used this license; and it was in this style
that he especially excelled.
And is it not in what remains unwritten that the singer's true greatness
is revealed? What dilettante has not felt the power of a more incisive
attack of the note; of that prolongation of the note, held
imperceptibly, which, having captured it, holds the attention of the
listener?
But, to hear these things, it is not necessary, as the saying is, "to
bestride _technique_." In so far as the training of the voice is
concerned, Delsarte gave himself a scientific basis. He was the first to
think that it would be well to know the mechanism of the organ, that it
might be used to the best advantage, both by avoiding injurious methods
of exercising it, and by aiding the development of the tone by
appropriate work.
In his rooms were to be seen imitations of the larynx--in pasteboard--of
various sizes. His pupils, it seems to me, could profit but little by
these far from pleasing sights.
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