As I explained to you earlier I started my vocal training with a lady called Isolde Hill in Sydney. Her technique was taught to her by an Englishman…, basically, although she was very fond of Italian traditions, as she understood them and so forth, so she taught a kind of a mixture of forward voice production, (seeking the mask) and some of the other i.e. a collection of Italian ideas of breathing and support. With her particular approach I was a very good light lyric tenor (with) a timbre not much heavier than Tito Schipa… someone like that. I had an unlimited high range because of the lightness of the voice but I sang in a very light lyric way. After she died and I moved onto other teachers they tended to keep me in that sort of fach. So I worked with Ron Dowd a fair bit and Ron thought I had the possibility to sing heavier repertoire.

Ron wasn't really a teacher in those days but he became a sort of mentor, took me under his wing at the Australian Opera Studio. I worked then in Europe with Ettore Campogalagni and Clemens Kaiser-Brehme. Campogalagni was about open and closed approach to the top of the voice. Clemens Kaiser-Brehme was very much about forward production in fact on one memorable occasion I remember Kaiser-Brehme saying to me ' you must think that you have the trunk of the Elephant, and you must always sing down the trunk' With that approach I certainly couldn't sing dramatically.

I had discovered a kind of quasi-dramatic voice of my own, which cut out at A flat,which I sung for Carlo Cillario.I think we were doing Parsifal (and) I was doing one of the knights in a concert performance we did in Sydney with the Sydney Symphony. Because it was a German piece I pulled out this chest voice that I'd discovered for myself, banged away at this knight role and I remember Cillario saying at a rehearsal one day 'you know you've got quite a voice there one day you'll sing Otello I believe' that's the first time I'd ever heard anyone suggest the possibility but I'd never been able to use that technique other than on my own. It didn't fit into any of the techniques that I was being taught. Kaiser-Brehme didn't want me to sing like that. He wanted me to do this thinner sound and it wasn't until I found Bandera.….He taught me to open up the sound and use all that (the more dramatic sound) and try to develop it and he had me trying to use that new sound right up to the C sharps and everything, and I was doing it too I must say...., and then later on when I came back (to study with him) he said that the voice had matured, dropped a little…, we went for it big-time then and forgot about the C sharps and the D's and just went for the heavier sound. I found by dropping the larynx and not seeking the mask I could actually get this much bigger sound and very consistently.

So, that was to do with low larynx and better support, with no forcing and not seeking the mask, Bandera used to say ' a well produced voice will sound in the mask whether you want it to or not'. Seeking the mask limits your opportunities to open up the quality of sound on the top'. If you hear a singer who uses the mask a lot they'll be very safe on the top but it will tend to get smaller and tighter on the top so his (Bandera's) technique was about opening up the top of the voice and that was very exciting for me and gave me the courage to break through to heavier repertoire which I simply couldn't maintain (previously). It just got too difficult (again previously).
So my thoughts then are, a low larynx, that's the one universal rule, use of the jaw i.e. dropping of the jaw in the passagio, (that is) during and after the passagio as a means of facilitating this low larynx. Allowing it to stay in the low position and concentration really sic on the production of the vowel and freeing up the larynx to function freely at all times. With good support, good low support, allowing the tension to stay out of the chest and any rigidity (to stay out of the area) around the larynx.

They're the big stoppers....they're the big things that stop your voice opening up and functioning at its optimum. I've learned that all from his technique. Everyone always says these things mind you, its just that his (Bandera's) technique gave me a way of doing it which I'd never had and the other techniques had never pointed me to.
OF: Did you find there were any significant changes in your thoughts on support?
GH: Absolutely one huge change was, and its a real ace, was total relaxation during breathing in. Physical total relaxation between the larynx, chest, stomach....everything...and resetting the support each time and keeping the support strong but still, and never pulling it up or things like that....that was a big breakthrough for me.