"Alpha" and "Omega" of
Shaliapin's Phenomenon

by Vladimir Bagrunov

HYPOTHESIS
Each discovery always pretends to the role of the truth in the last instance as well as its author, the man who made a discovery or at any rate considers himself to have made it pretends to the role of Messiah. Vladimir P. Bagrunov, the author of this article, Doctor of psychological science, a member of St.Petersburg Society of scientists, scientific manager of Voice development and training Center of the Innovation Company "Bagratid" is sure that he has managed to discover the mistery of Shaliapin's phenomenon and to develop it into the method which he is now trying to test in practice. We decided to acquaint our readers with Bagrunov's arguments and let you determine if it is truth or delusion.

When you hear the unforgettable voice of Feodor Shaliapin especially his perfomance of Russian folk songs it strikes you that there is an extremely simple solution of this phenomenon to which nobody could approach during more than a hundred years. I have been trying to discover this secret for twenty recent years. It seemed that (after the thesis of V.Drankov devoted to the art talent nature and the publication of his book "The nature of Shaliapin's talent in 1973) the secret was discovered. I shall remind that the author proved convincingly that in the basis of Shaliapin's phenomenal success there is an artisitic system based on the interaction of literature, graphic, sculptural, producer and actor abilities. It is expedient to define this system as psychological component, "alpha" of Shaliapin's phenomenon. But more tnan twenty years have passed since then the time during which it would have been possible to achieve some similarity according to this system but we do not see anything similar or even close to it.

Therefore I always had an idea that there is one more unsolved mystery: the "Omega" of Shaliapin's phenomenon. This mystery is more probably physiological component of his system that must surely exist bacause singing like any art perfomance is a psychological process. However the physiological component of Shaliapin's system was probably quite different from traditional ones because he was always sceptical towards such famous to any vocalist concepts as "support of breath", "singing into a mask" key to the discovery of the physiological component of Shaliapin's phenomenon was the attentive reading of the works by Shaliapin himself and the memories about him.

The main impulse to the development of his singing talent was to my mind the fact that as a listener he came to the opera a little later than to the drama theatre. I want to mention especially that the first and therefore the strongest impressions were received by him from the perfomance where the actors performed their roles in a declamatory manner with inspiration and etc. The in a loud voice required at the perfomance of the ancient Greek tragedy "Medea". It was the phrase "I am the Queen but I am a woman and mother" that was remembered by twelve-year-all Shaliapin and constantly repeated by him to the surprise of the night guards and random passers-by in the street. Soon he got in an opera theatre where he was overwhelmed not by the fact that the actors were singing (by that time he had got enough experience of singing in a church vhoir) but by the fact that drama and singing equally dear to Shaliapin were combined here. Soon he converted his everyday life into opera. Adressing to his father at the risk of raw he was singing: "Father, get up! Te-e-e-a is re-e-ady!" So he was learning intonational singing based on alive speech from which Shaliapin's system was later born.

This system as it follows from the achivements of modern psychology is based on psychological mechanism different from the methods practised at musical schools both in Russia and abroad. Without going into details of psychophysiological mechanisms of such (phenomena first studied by Leningrad psychological school directed by its founder academisian B.Ananjev we shall speak only about the above mentioned problem itself. Snaliapin singing was in its essence vocal-mental activity, regulated by informational canals not requiring one hundredth of energy expehditure which usually takes place in singing especially when taking "ups". Proceeding from this one can suppose that the main factor of the psysiological component , "Omega" of Shaliapin was delibirate minimization of all physical efforts connected with soud formation. This is proved particularly by the fact that the specialists of vocality and vocalists who watched the pecularities of Shaliapin's breath did not find any system (collerbone, pectoral, abdominal, mixed). There appears an illusory impression as if his physiology has nothing to do with it. And this is to my mind where the problem lies. I shall try to prove it.

As it is known Shaliapin did not receive education because his family was very poor but he had a rare ability to soak up as a sponge everything the most valuable from the environ­ment which sometimes he formed for himself. It must be supposed that the lessons of Usatov - a former singer and a pupil of famous Everardy - were not in vain. Usatov probably learnt well the main secret of the old Italian school: singing at small breath and naturally he could not help teaching it his best pupil. And this in its turn was very close to the declamation manner learnt by Shaliapin since his childhood ("Father ..."). Then his friendship with the famous tragic actor Mamont Dalsky who finally convinced Shaliapin in the main role of information in singing. All this had to convince the young singer in the rightness of his approach - the work on a word, intonation, image and minimization of all physical efforts in singing.

All the above mentioned about the physiological component of Shaliapin's system will be not more than one of possible conjectures if it is not supported by scientific arguments. Minimization of all physical efforts and especially the depth of an inhale in singing is described by L. Rabotnov, a famous Russian physiologist. It should be reminded that the hypothesis about the role of bronchial system in vocal sound formation was made by him in 1932. The main conclusion of this hypothesis was the conclu­sion about minimization of the depth of breadth and minimization of the force of the exhale ("paradoxical breath"). In the deep breath , as Rabotnov thinks, the strong exhale or as he called it "leakage" of (breath takes place and as a result there is no tight closure of vocal chords that results in distortion of sound. But either this hypothesis was born in the wrong time or a sudden death of its author prevented from using it in practice or the absence of additional supporting arguments unknown to the author for various raesons, (the state of science of that time is one of them) however this hypothesis was not widely used in vocal practice.

The additional supporting factors, to my opinion, are the following facts: the main one is the fact that there is a membrane in the bronchial system and especially in traches (bre­ath throat) producing sound (the experiments on a dead trachea on Borodino in 1812 by the Russian scientist I.Gruzinov as well as by Muller in 1839 and Lerinkaiye in 1886). This fundamental fact is somehow not paid attention to, it is fallen out of scientific analysys. Attention of scientists is attracted mainly to the mechanisms of vocal chord functioningand discussions between supporters of two opposite hypotheses. The followers of mioelastic hypothesis made by Manuel Garcia in the middle of XIX century have the oppinion according to which the source of sound is vocal chords oscillated by the air brethed out while speaking or singing. The supporters of neurochronoxical system of Raul Musson made by him a century later do not give so much importance to vocal chords and on the basis of strict experiments assert that the chords oscillate (more exactly close and open) not under the pressure of air but affectedby the impulses from the central nervous system and the role of chords is limited by the mechanism of opening the vocal slot.

Using the evolutional approach which allows to find out common biological expediency of the phenomenon we shall see that birds, champions of singing in the world, have only rudiments of lungs and produce soud by means of the membrane in trachea. Nature is always economical and if there is a possibility to combine functions in one organ it does not create a special organ - voice but combine breath the function most important and vital for all systems of the organism with the anatomy of the breath organ itself as if testifying the great impor­tance of the voice function, reliability and longevity but I have such an experience myself); especially when people do not know music notes: the fine clear voice before teching singing and almost full loss of voice after training. And the reason of the loss of voice is mainly the approach to the sound of human voice as a physical phenomenon with the results of such approach.

But in living nature there are quite different laws of sound production. Built in. And therefore a new-born baby not knowing anything about the laws of sound formation emits such a clear sonant sound. Much later when learning physical laws of relation between the force affecting the object and the sound produced by the object a child begins to lose the natural voice training because he begins to apply extra efforts when shouting, loud speaking or singing.

The same is observed in singing teaching (I know it not only from the stories of people suffered and literature sources and a living human organism the mechanism of sound production is is so subtle that any effort produced by means of arbitrary muscles, diaphragm among them, violate subtle natural formation and the sound is distor­ted beyond recognition. It takes place (and can be easily observed anatomically) membrane in trachea which is a source of sound under strong air pressure begins to stick to the front wall of the gullet going in parallel with the breath throat (trachea); the sound is distorted at the smallest contact between the membrane and the gullet (due to the chan­ge of the sound source value) until it disappears completely in case of full contact between the membrane and the gullet. Misunderstanding of the nature of sound formation makes vocal teachers to throw themselves from side to side looking for the "golden key" which is seen in the development of the new methods and schools.

Following from the above mentioned one can suppose that the best Shaliapin's school was the absence of such for he had not got the wrong skills which are very difficult to get rid off. Declamational manner of his vocal sound formation received by him in his early childhood luckily coincided with the main principle of human voice formation - minimization of physical efforts in sound formation. That is why he probably worked so thoroughly on his role. Shaliapin always said that he never lost control over his actions on the stage and therefore, we may add, over his emotions as well. It is the loss of emotion control that results in change in breath and leads to all negative consequences. Shaliapin did not have them exept one case in the role of Susanin the case which proved still more the rightness of his system. This case proves clearly our idea about the existence of two components (psychological and physiological) in the phenomenon of Shaliapin's singing: simalteneous interaction of them produced the phenomenon to which nobody can approach during more than a hundred years.

One can't help remembering our famous compatriot Vladimir Stasov who wrote about Shaliapin: "He did not study at any school, he did not sit in any classes, he did not learn any prejudices. He wonderfully avoided pedagogical training, wrong tasks and experience, especially he managed to keep himself from musical Italy that devoured and disfigured so many generations."

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