Shigo Voice Studio: The Art of Bel Canto (2024)

Shigo Voice Studio: The Art of Bel Canto (1)

BEL CANTO VOCAL TECHNIQUE

Welcome to the Shigo Voice Studio

Bel Canto, meaning beautiful singing, is an operatic vocal style originating from the courts of Florence and Venice. It features both the vocal technique and principles of this style.

  • The Bel Canto style of singing developed in three waves. The first wave emerged during the late Renaissance, with the teachings of Palestrina, Caccini, and Pistocchi. The second wave developed during the Italian Baroque, with the instruction of Scarlatti, Porpora, and Bernacchi. Finally, the third wave found its full flowering during the Romantic Era within the schools of Garcia and Lamperti.

  • Shigo Voice Studio's teaching methods are based on Anna Eugénie Schoen-René's documented teachings. She was a student of Francesco Lamperti and a certified exponent of Pauline Viardot-Garcia and Manuel Garcia.

Bel Canto Vocal Training

Bel Canto vocal training begins with learning how to breathe and hold your instrument, then proceeds with the formation of tone, pure vowels, and vocalization.

Opera singers master key Bel Canto vocal techniques; including portamento, legato, sostenuto, staccato, marcato, mezza voce, messa di voce, crescendo, decrescendo and trill, as well as three schools of vocalization: Spianato, Fiorito, and Declamato. This training leads to role study, career development, and artistic and personal fulfillment.

The Bel Canto style has the power to transform not only your voice but also your life, as well as those who listen. You’ll have techniques that create a beautiful, ringing tone that slices through an orchestra with unusual clarity, fullness, and depth.

Flexible Technique

Bel Canto vocal training will enable you to speak and sing in multiple vocal styles without compromising vocal function. It will make your voice flexible, strong, and resilient enough to vocalize with full voice for up to 3 hours without fatigue.

Bel Canto's vocal technique provides the singing actor with a template for complete artistic freedom, expression of emotional truth, and profound interpretive ability.

As a matter of technique, the great teachers of the past warned against two things: singing through the nose and in the throat. What did they teach? The singer who sings from the center of the head and towards the lips—fior di labbra—can sing anything.

Ertinger, Franz, 1640-ca. 1710. A scene from Act V of Lully's opera Amadis premiered January 18, 1684, at the Paris Opéra. Depicts the palace of Apollidon. Portal with inscription Arc des loyaux amants. Three figures; one pushes open the door with a sword, revealing flames.

Shigo Voice Studio: The Art of Bel Canto (2)

“Singing is seventy-five percent technique.”

Shigo Voice Studio: The Art of Bel Canto (3)

Principles of Bel Canto

  • The Italian tone is formed in the mouth and controlled by the ear.

  • The bel canto singer sings from the head down.

  • The basis of singing is the chest.

  • The pelvis is the basis of breathing.

  • Bel Canto involves listening for feeling and a feeling for listening.

  • The Italian singer has no throat.

  • AH is the father of vowels.

  • A perfect vowel combines AH, EE, and OO.

  • The Bel Canto-trained voice has a bell-like, ringing, and telling quality and carries throughout an auditorium without effort or amplification.

Benefits of Bel Canto training

  • Absolute vocal technique.

  • Prevent vocal problems and nodules.

  • Extend vocal range to two octaves and beyond.

  • Equalize registers, heal breaks and increase dynamic range.

  • Sing and speak with one voice.

  • Sing with great ease, freedom of expression, and beauty of tone.

  • Sing without amplification and without losing your voice.

  • Vocalize in multiple genres without losing your way.

  • Establish the foundation to become a great artist.

  • Sing with a youthful-sounding voice for your whole life.

Bel Canto solves problems

Do you have multiple degrees but not fundamental techniques? Have you had many teachers but been left with the same vocal problems? Can you name all the muscles of the larynx but cannot sing? Is your teaching system failing you and your students?

Did you go to a conservatory and end up hating music? Have you lost the joy of singing? Have Young Artist Programs used you up? Do you want to be able to make a beautiful tone that moves your listener? Do you want to find your unique voice?

The Bel Canto training devised by the Garcias and Lampertis and taught by Anna Eugénie Schoen-René addresses these problems.

How long does it take to learn Bel Canto?

Learning Bel Canto is like learning a language: the quicker the ear, the faster the progress. Technical mastery precedes the study of repertoire and roles. Classical singers, especially, make a long-term investment. Learn Garcia and Lamperti's vocal techniques and submit your New Client Application.

Aveele, Johannes van den, d. 1727. A scene from Act I of Lully's opera Amadis premiered at the Paris Opéra on January 18, 1684. Proscenium and curtains, five performers at the edge of the stage, and the palace of the father of Oriane in the background.

  • “Daniel Shigo is a walking encyclopedia on historical vocal pedagogy and has the singing and teaching experience to convey a trove of relevant information. Daniel’s teaching style is both warm and no-nonsense, with an impressive ability to tailor his approach to the individual before him. I recommend Daniel Shigo for voice students and impactful teacher tune-ups.”

    BARBARA SHIRVIS, SOPRANO, VOICE TEACHER

  • Every week I get so excited about where things are going and how far I've come. I can't thank you enough for that!

    KYMBERLY SANGALANG, MEZZO-SOPRANO

  • “Daniel’s teaching has transformed my voice and my experience of singing. In one year I sound completely different and can’t wait for what’s yet to come! He is patient with beginners and experienced singer alike and is adept at finding different ways to tackle complex issues. He is committed to unlocking a better sound than you ever knew you had.”

    LITA ROBINSON, MEZZO-SOPRANO, ORATORIO SOCIETY OF NEW YORK

  • “With Daniel, I have finally found the secrets to achieving a 19th-century sound in the 21st century—bel canto techniques and wisdom which have liberated my vocal potential and set me on a path toward true professionalism.”

    KYLE JACOBS, BARITONE, ORATORIO SOCIETY OF NEW YORK

Shigo Voice Studio: The Art of Bel Canto (2024)

FAQs

What is bel canto singing technique? ›

The bel canto singer sings from the head down. The basis of singing is the chest. The pelvis is the basis of breathing. Bel Canto involves listening for feeling and a feeling for listening. The Italian singer has no throat.

What is a well balanced resonance in singing bel canto called? ›

Mixed resonance is the foundation for singers of bel canto to improve their singing quality, which can organically integrate the resonance produced by singers' personalized tone in actual application process and form a universal resonance effect.

What is the highest female voice? ›

Soprano: this is the highest singing voice, with the highest tessitura. It is also the most common female voice. Sopranos are given prominent singing roles, and are often the protagonists of the opera. They can sing from the middle C to two octaves higher (that is, an interval of 15 full notes in total).

Is bel canto a true story? ›

Bel Canto imagines a scenario very much like the real Lima Crisis, a 1996 hostage situation wherein fourteen members of the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement took over the residence of the Japanese ambassador for more than 120 days, but puts a fictional opera singer at the center.

Is bel canto the same as opera? ›

Bel canto is supposed to be the quintessential way to sing opera. The style is associated with beautiful melodies, silvery voices and floods of rapid notes curling their way up and down the scale, sometimes only loosely around the framework of what the composer actually wrote.

What is the bel canto mixed voice? ›

- an old Classical (Bel Canto) exercise called the 'Messa di Voce' which is essentially sustaining a note and changing the dynamic, going from pp to ff and back down to pp in a very controlled way, without allowing the voice to 'snap' into a different gear in an obvious way.

What is an example of a bel canto style? ›

Today, some of the world's most frequently performed operas, such as Rossini's The Barber of Seville and Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor, are from the bel canto era.

What are the principles of bel canto? ›

Using a relatively small dynamic range, bel canto singing was based on an exact control of the intensity of vocal tone, a recognition of the distinction between the “diapason tone” (produced when the larynx is in a relatively low position) and the “flute tone” (when the larynx is in a higher position), and a demand for ...

What is the bel canto movement? ›

Bel canto operas often include slow, expressive movements where star singers can explore the emotions of their characters and show off their bel canto singing techniques.

What was the focus of the bel canto style in Italian opera? ›

As the name implies, the focus of bel canto is on the music, especially the voice. “Beauty” is the key word when it comes to bel canto.

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