Manuel Patricio Rodríguez García (17 March 1805 – 1 July 1906), was a Spanish singer, music educator, and vocal pedagogue. He invented the first

laryngoscope Laryngoscopy () is endoscopy of the larynx, a part of the throat. It is a medical procedure that is used to obtain a view, for example, of the vocal folds and the glottis. Laryngoscopy may be performed to facilitate tracheal intubation during ge ...

Biography

García was born on 17 March 1805 either in

Madrid Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...

, as has been traditionally stated, or in the town of Zafra in the

province of Badajoz The province of Badajoz ( ; ) is a province of western Spain located in the autonomous community of Extremadura. It was formed in 1833. It is bordered by the provinces of Cáceres in the north, Toledo, Ciudad Real in the east, Córdoba in ...

, Spain. His father was singer and teacher Manuel del Pópulo Vicente Rodriguez García (Manuel García I, 1775–1832). His sisters were Maria Malibran (1808–1836) and

Pauline Viardot Pauline Viardot (; 18 July 1821 – 18 May 1910) was a French dramatic mezzo-soprano, composer and pedagogue of Spanish descent. Born Michelle Ferdinande Pauline García,FitzLyon, p. 15, referring to the baptismal name. Thbirth recorddigitized a ...

(1821–1910). After abandoning his onstage career as a

baritone A baritone is a type of classical music, classical male singing human voice, voice whose vocal range lies between the bass (voice type), bass and the tenor voice type, voice-types. It is the most common male voice. The term originates from the ...

, García began to teach at the

Paris Conservatory The Conservatoire de Paris (), or the Paris Conservatory, is a college of music and dance founded in 1795. Officially known as the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris (; CNSMDP), it is situated in the avenue Jean Ja ...

(1830–48) and the

Royal Academy of Music The Royal Academy of Music (RAM) in London, England, is one of the oldest music schools in the UK, founded in 1822 by John Fane and Nicolas-Charles Bochsa. It received its royal charter in 1830 from King George IV with the support of the firs ...

, London (1848–95). Jessie Bond, Camille Everardi, Erminia Frezzolini, Julius Günther, Jenny Lind, Mathilde Marchesi,

Christina Nilsson Christina Nilsson, Countess de Casa Miranda, also called Christine Nilsson (20 August 1843 – 22 November 1921) was a Swedish operatic dramatic coloratura soprano. Possessed of a pure and brilliant voice (B3-F6), first three then two and a ha ...

, Julia Ettie Crane, Georgina Schubert, Julius Stockhausen, Marie Tempest, Charles Santley and

Henry Wood Sir Henry Joseph Wood (3 March 186919 August 1944) was an English conductor best known for his association with London's annual series of promenade concerts, known as the Proms. He conducted them for nearly half a century, introducing hundr ...

were among his pupils. He invented a

in 1854 and the next year published observations of his own

larynx The larynx (), commonly called the voice box, is an organ (anatomy), organ in the top of the neck involved in breathing, producing sound and protecting the trachea against food aspiration. The opening of larynx into pharynx known as the laryngeal ...

and

vocal cords In humans, the vocal cords, also known as vocal folds, are folds of throat tissues that are key in creating sounds through Speech, vocalization. The length of the vocal cords affects the pitch of voice, similar to a violin string. Open when brea ...

made with a small dental mirror introduced into the throat and using sunlight reflected by another mirror. He has been credited with saving the career of Jenny Lind, who had suffered vocal damage from overwork in her early twenties. García was interested in movements connected with the production of the singing voice and did not anticipate the importance of laryngoscopy for medicine. Still, the

University of Königsberg The University of Königsberg () was the university of Königsberg in Duchy of Prussia, which was a fief of Poland. It was founded in 1544 as the world's second Protestant Reformation, Protestant academy (after the University of Marburg) by Duke A ...

conferred upon him the honorary degree of

Doctor of Medicine A Doctor of Medicine (abbreviated MD, from the Latin language, Latin ) is a medical degree, the meaning of which varies between different jurisdictions. In the United States, and some other countries, the ''MD'' denotes a professional degree of ph ...

He died in London in 1906 at the age of 101 years and was buried in the churchyard of St. Edward's Catholic church in Sutton Green, Surrey. His grave gives details of his many famous pupils and accomplishments. On 22 November 1832 in Paris García married the operatic soprano Cécile Eugénie Mayer (Paris, 8 April 1814 – Paris, 12 August 1880). They had two sons Manuel (1836–1885) Gustave (1837–1925) and two daughters, Eugenie Harouel (1840–1924) and Marie Crèpet (1842–1867). His second son Gustave García (1 February 1837 – 1925) was a singer, actor, and author of three books on vocal and stage techniques. Gustave's son, Albert García (1875–1946), studied voice with his great-aunt (

), became a respected baritone, and produced an edition of his grandfather's treatise on singing (1924).

Works

* ''Mémoire sur la voix humaine présenté à l'Académie des Sciences en 1840''. Paris: Duverger, 1847. * ''Ecole de García: traité complet de l'art du chant par Manuel García fils''. Mayence, Paris: Schott 1840 (part 1), 1847 (part 2).
''Tratado completo del arte del canto – Escuela de García''
Lucía Díaz Marroquín and Mario Villoria (eds.). Kassel: Reichenberger, 2012. (Annotated edition in Spanish). * ''Garcías Schule oder Die Kunst des Gesanges in allen ihren Theilen vollst. abgehandelt von Manuel García''. German text by C. Wirth. Mainz: Schott, 1841; also in two parts in the magazine ''Caecilia''; part 1 in vol. 22 (1843), no. 85; part 2 in vol. 26 (1847), no. 104
Digitalisat
* ''Ecole de García: traité complet de l'art du chant''. (Vols. 1 and 2). Mayence, Paris: Schott 1856. * ''A complete treatise on the art of singing'', part two by M. García II. Second part, complete and unabridged, the editions of 1847 and 1872 collated, ed. and transl. by Donald V. Paschke. Reprint of the 1872 edition. New York: Da Capo Press, 1975. . Includes bibliographies.

Genealogy

References

Notes References Sources * ; reprint: ''García the Centenarian and His Times''. New York: Da Capo Press, 1976.

External links

''Garcia the Centenarian and His Times''
by M. Sterling Mackinlay, gutenberg.org *

{{DEFAULTSORT:Garcia, Manuel 1805 births 1906 deaths Spanish music educators Spanish operatic baritones Spanish inventors Spanish men centenarians Academics of the Royal Academy of Music University of Königsberg alumni Academic staff of the Conservatoire de Paris Spanish expatriates in Germany Spanish expatriates in France 19th-century Spanish male opera singers

Biography

Works

Genealogy

See also

References

Further reading

External links