Lamperti's Rule

The gentleman wanted an evaluation and techniques to sing in a genre for which he had not been trained.

I gave him that and more, the whole time enacting Lamperti’s Rule.

The singer must hear/feel the start of the tone in the center of the head—and must do this quietly.

He could do it, but didn’t like it, having come for glamour and getting grit instead—the grit of hearing his own voice via bone conduction—a buzzy business and centering mechanism.

(Objective analysis—listening to a recording—reveals the singer does not hear this buzzy business, a real mind bender.)

According to Lamperti, hearing/feeling every tone emanate from the “spot” gives the student full control of their voice. Truth or fiction, that is what he taught, a teaching which can be found on these pages and in Vocal Wisdom: The Maxims of Giovanni Battista Lamperti—Giovanni Battista being Francesco’s son. Of course, someone has to show you how to breathe and form your vowels for this to happen, which is when things get interesting.

When you sing quietly you have to listen—really listen—to what you are doing. Listening being feeling—by virtue of the semicircular canals within the ear which tell us what is up and what is down, and where sound is located, in this case in your head—quiet singing reveals everything: the notes that aren’t quite right, the register changes that are being glossed over or ignored, and undisciplined emotion which has replaced technique.

Is it easy? No. It it necessary? Very much so, especially at a time when yelling and raw emotion has supplanted artistry and craft.

Photo: Francesco Lamperti with his dreaded baton.