How to recover a lost voice? by Mario del Monaco
In this interview, Mario Del Monaco talks about the time he lost his voice due to improper training and how he returned to Melocchi to restore it.
“…Melocchi took me back and made me do six months of lessons. That’s when I understood the secret. Then I was called for military service and went to Milan. There, with my pitch pipe—which choristers use—I practiced every night when I was free. I would stand and do the vocal exercises Melocchi had taught me, exercises to deepen the larynx and find the foundation of the voice.
It’s the opposite of just doing ‘Ney, ney, ney,’ which accomplishes nothing—it’s useless. You have to deepen, deepen, to truly develop the voice. Some people say, ‘If you sing this way, you won’t last.’ No—the ones who don’t do it are the ones who don’t last, because they end up squeezing the voice.
The voice is like a muscle: if you don’t use it, it atrophies. Beyond the aesthetic and musical instinct, singing is also athleticism—it’s training the breath, the elasticity of the diaphragm, and mastering all the tensor muscles of the vocal cords. If one loses this training, they also lose their voice, because the voice is practically bound to this entire muscular training system.”
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