THE PHILOSOPHY OF. THE HUMAN VOICE. SECTION I. Of the general Divisions of Vocal Sound: with a more particular account of its Pitch. ALL the constituents of the human voice, may be referred to the five following Modes: QUALITY, TIME, ABRUPTNESS, PITCH. The detail of these five modes, and of the multiplied combination of their several forms and varieties, includes the enumeration of all the Articulating and the Expressive powers of speech. It would be fruitless to attempt to give an analytic history of the voice, without the use of definite terms for its appreciable modes. It is therefore proper to inquire, how far common nomenclature fulfils the purposes of precision; and by what means any obvious deficiency may be supplied. The terms by which the Quality or kind of voice is distinguished, are,―rough, smooth, harsh, full, slender, thin, musical, and some others of the same metaphorical structure. They are sufficiently numerous and as descriptive as possible, without reference to vocal and exemplar sounds. An attempt towards this kind of illustration has been made, by variously distinguishing the singing voice, according to its resemblance to the sound of the reed, the string, and the musical-glass. The voices of inferior animals also afford analogies to the variety of quality in the human voice. For the specifications of Force we use the words,-strong, weak, feeble, loud, soft, forcible, and faint. These are indefinite in their indication, and without any fixed relationship in degree. Music has more orderly and numerously distinguished the varieties of force, by its series of terms from Pianissimo to Fortissimo. I shall, in its proper place, make some new distinctions in the manner of employing this mode. Time, in the art of speaking, is subdivided into,-long, short, quick, slow, and rapid. Music has a more precise scale of relationship, in its order of signs from semibreve to double-demisemiquaver. The single or unaccompanied sound of speech does not require that nicety in Time, which the concerting of music demands; yet there is need of more precision in designating its degrees, than the usual terms of prosody afford. Mr. Steele has given, in his work, a notation of time, sufficient for all the syllabic purposes of discourse. I shall hereafter make a division of this mode, with reference to English syllables, and to their employment in speech. I use the term Abruptness, to signify the sudden and full discharge of sound, as contradistinguished from its more gradual emission. Abruptness is well represented by the explosive notes which may be executed on the bassoon, and some other wind instruments. I have given this mode of the voice, the place and importance of a general head, not only as an expressive agent in speech, but because its characteristic explosion is peculiar, and quite distinct from the nature of Force; with which, from its admitting of degrees of intensity, it might seem to be identical. The variations of Pitch are denoted by the words,— rise and fall, high and low. The vague import and the insufficiency of this division were shown in our introduction: and as the following history of the voice makes especial reference to this mode, and gives a minute detail of its various forms, it is necessary to adopt a conformable, and more definite nomenclature. It happened well, for our assistance in developing the nature of speech, that most of the phenomena of pitch were long ago observed, analyzed, and named, in the proper science of music. Some of its varieties however, in the speaking voice, are not technically known in that science. For these I have made a language. But most of the movements of the musical system are also found in speech. It is advisable therefore, to adopt musical terms for these identical functions: since they are already known to many, and may, through elementary treatises, be easily learned by all; and since the application of different names to things of essential resemblance, would counteract one great object of philosophy; which is, to include all similar phenomena under the same nominal classes: notwithstanding they may happen to be separated, by place and name, in our artificial arrangements. For in collecting facts from Nature, who is no respecter of position or title, we must take them where we find them, and class them, just as they agree. I shall therefore give a concise account of the terms by which the phenomena of pitch are distinguished in music. In entering upon this elementary and important explanation, wherein a recognition by the ear, of sounds merely described, is absolutely necessary for comprehending the subsequent parts of this work, I must beg the reader not to be discouraged by temporary difficulty. He who has been taught the principles of instrumental or of vocal music, and is able to execute accurately, what is called the Scale or Gammut, will understand the following descriptions and divisions, without much hesitation. He who knows nothing of the relations of musical sounds, nor of the regular scale by which they have been arranged, must on this, as on so many other subjects of the school which need perceptible illustration, have recourse to a living instructor. He can generally find at hand, instrumental performers, or singing masters, or the clerk of some neighboring church, who will exemplify to his satisfaction all that is merely descriptive here. The reader is not referred to musicians and singers, for any assistance in his application of the principles of music to the analysis of speech. The system of mechanical formality to which they have in a great degree circumscribed their views, together with the wasteful industry of their perpetual practice upon difficulties, has, generally speaking, so limited their perceptive faculty, that they are often the last to see, in the relations of other things, even the most striking analogy to the principles of their art. But their own art, merely as the routine of art, they know well. To them therefore the reader is referred, merely for the exemplification of a technical nomenclature, that I have here, only the means of words and diagram to explain. The term Pitch is applied to the variations of musical sound, between its lowest and its highest appreciable degree. This variation between gravity and acuteness, is represented in the human voice, by the two extremes of hoarseness, and screaming. The different degrees of Pitch in music are denoted by what is called the Scale: the formation of which may be thus illustrated: When the bow is drawn across a string of a Violin, and the finger at the same time gradually moved, with continued pressure on the string, from its lower attachment to any distance upwards, a mewing sound, if I may so call it, is heard. This mewing is caused by the gradual change from gravity to acuteness, through the gradual shortening of the string: and as it thus rises in acuteness by an uninterrupted line of momentary changes, it is called a continuous sound. I shall call it Concrete sound. This movement of pitch, on the violin, is termed a Slide. The reader may himself exemplify this concrete sound, by uttering the single syllable aye, as if he were asking a question with the expression of earnest surprise, yet rather deliberately; beginning at the lowest, and ending at the highest limit of his colloquial voice. The gradual rising movement in this case is concrete: But as the voice, and any other tunable sound may be continued in one uninterrupted movement upon the same line of pitch, without rising or falling; it is proper to remark here, that the term Concrete, is in this essay, applied only to an uninterrupted movement in a rising, and in a falling direction. Now, the sounds of what is called the Scale in Music, are not continuous or concrete; but are made-by drawing the bow, only while the finger is held stationary at certain successive places on the string thus showing an interruption of the continuous upward slide. These places are seven in number, and their distances from each other are determined by a scientific rule for subdividing the string, which we need not consider here. Other sounds, still ascending on the string above these seven, may be made, by a similar interrupted progression. But since the second series of seven, though of higher pitch, yet adjusted by the same rule, do each to each in order, so nearly accord with the first seven, that they may be considered as a kind of repetition of them, —and as the same is true of other series of seven, that may be formed between the lowest and the highest limit of sound, the whole extent of variation in acuteness and gravity, is regarded as consisting of but the simple scale of seven sounds, in different series or ranges of pitch. : In the margin of the following page, a diagram represents the places where we suppose the string to be pressed when the bow is drawn the black disks on the line, at the places of two of the repeated series of seven sounds being marked numerically : the initials T and S, respectively denoting the terms Tone and Semitone, which will presently be explained. Upon comparing this picture with the above account of the production of concrete sound, and supposing the concrete progression upon the string to be represented by the continuous vertical line, on which these numerical places are marked by the disks, it is clear, that portions of the concrete must be unheard, when the bow is drawn, only while the finger is stationary at the several places. The sounds thus produced at these places, omitting the intermediate concrete, I shall call Discrete Sounds: And these, when heard successively in a given order, as represented by the diagram, constitute a Discrete Scale.* *This continuity and this disjunction of the line of pitch are known to most musicians, only under the respective names of Slide, and Scale. The terms con |