In today's lesson, I asked Marcus the question, "How long is a phrase?" We talked about how phrases are important to the flow of musical ideas, and for singers a phrase is the length of one breath. Using the pure vowel "oo," Marcus sang the pattern so-fa-mi-re-do slowly in one breath. We transposed the exercise down to extend his lower range. Then I extended the phrase by adding an eighth note do-re-mi-fa-so-fa-mi-re-do at the end. I also flipped the exercise so that it started on do, and when it got to so it descended, ascended, and descended again in eighth notes. After warming up with this exercise, Marcus sang "Au Claire de la Lune" and I asked him to identify the phrases in the song.
Next, we worked on creating expression through the use of dynamics. I showed him a chart of the six basic dynamic levels from pp to ff, numbered zero through five, with the Italian terms and English translations spelled out. To check his understanding, I had him count "1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and" out loud while he followed my visual cues for the dynamics. After this exercise, I pointed out that most students should start at mp and mf levels while singing and gradually expand their dynamic range. Singing too loudly forces the voice, and singing too softly results in an unsupported sound.
Finally, Marcus learned about using a light portamento when slurring between two pitches. I defined a portamento as a barely noticeable glide between two pitches and demonstrated the difference between sliding and gliding from note to note. I used the phrase "I am fine," descending on eighth notes with two notes to each word, so-fa-mi-re-do to demonstrate. Then I sang the question "How are you?" with the same rhythm using so-la-so-la-so, and he answered with "I am fine/blue." Next, I had him echo an improvised phrase on the word "alleluia." I identified the distinction between syllabic, neumatic (two pitches), and melismatic (three or more pitches) styles. I also asked Marcus to try improvising his own alleluia, which I then echoed. The last portamento exercise used the Italian-sounding "La-Be-Da-Me-Ni-Po-Tu-La" on the pattern do-mi-re-fa-mi-so-fa-la-so-ti-la-do-ti-re-do, do-la-ti-so-la-fa-so-mi-fa-re-mi-do-re-ti-do. This pattern is especially useful in navigating the middle register or mixed voice.
