MUSICAL COMPOSITION

THE TREATMENT OF VOICES 153declamation gains by crossing the parts, and the contrivanceserves the double purpose of greater ease forthe singer and clearer incisiveness for the words.Lastly, give the singers time to breathe. Longseries of notes without a break will inevitably resultin artificially broken rhythms and unsteady tempi.There is no bellows-blower for a singer's lungs. Hemust fill them himself, and the composer must providestopping places where he can carry out that operationwithout interfering with the run of the music. If hedoes not do so, the singers will perforce find them forthemselves, and will not scruple to break a phrase, oreven a word, to do it, perhaps exactly at the spotwhere it is most ruinous to the composer's meaning.If he intends the break to be taken between two notes,it is better to writethanB.especially in a quick movement. The quaver rest willbe there in any case if the singer breathes, and towrite it at A, instead of trusting to chance as at B, isthe safer policy if good phrasing is to be preserved.What the composer too frequently forgets in manybranches of his craft is, that performers do not immediatelyand intuitively know things which seem selfevidentto him, and that he has to legislate very clearlyand definitely for the most ignorant and the leastexperienced. When he means legato or staccato, hemust say so. When he wants a hurrying or slackeningof pace, he must put it down. When he writes forvoices, he must indicate the phrasing as he would bow