Getting vocal

IT'S early on a Saturday morning and there's a hard-fought scuffle going on in a quiet Winchester cul-de-sac.

Two figures are locked in a physical tussle and making a noisy high-pitched racket.

A woman has her fist firmly wedged in the back of another who, for her part, is pushing against it with all her might.

To a casual passer-by this looks for all the world like the opening sequence from an episode of Inspector Morse, with a murder about to be committed, galvanising the grumpy detective into action.

Yet the battle is, thankfully, in the cause of making sweet music.

In the red corner is Hilary Llystyn Jones, 46, vocal coach to English cathedrals, who's trying to make her pupil use the right back muscles to reach the high notes.

I'm in the blue corner, my feet rammed into the carpet, while Hilary proves a formidable opponent. "Go on, go on, try it again," she urges.

"You can go much higher if you lift your soft palate."

Actually, this tough treatment works, certainly if the resulting wailing noise is anything to go by.

More like a distressed fire engine than Lesley Garrett, I'll grant you - but definitely progress with the soft palate disappearing off to the place soft palates go when they're not making your voice go flat.

Hilary's enthusiasm for music and her job knows no bounds and her eyes dance during her lessons.

Such is her reputation that hers is a jet-set life-style, as she flits around the globe dispensing vocal tips that give a professional sheen to singers' performances.

Last week it was Sweden. Next week it's America.

In the meantime she'd quite like an airline to return her luggage from her Swedish trip - because she doesn't want to buy another dressing gown, thank you very much.

When at her Winchester home she coaches no fewer than six of the city's choirs, including the cathedral choristers.

Then there are other cathedral choirs, including Westminster, Wells, Bristol, Salisbury, Carlisle, St Asaph, Rochester, Ely, Manchester, Tewkesbury Abbey, Portsmouth, Rochester, York Minster, Jesus College Cambridge and St Mary's Warwick.

A chorister's schedule is punishing.

They sing services every day, perform at concerts and make numerous recordings, so it's vital they avoid vocal strain.

"I make sure these choristers are producing good healthy tones and I teach adults the science behind the sounds they are making," says Hilary.

"The vocal folds were never meant to communicate with. They're simply there to stop foreign bodies going into the lungs."

Hilary's work with Winchester Cathedral is especially close to her heart. Her former husband, David Hill, was organist there for over a decade.

Now she works closely with current choir master Andrew Lumsden - who trains the boys' choir - and assistant organist Sarah Baldock, who tutors the girls' choir.

Hilary's held in such high regard nationally that she was awarded an Associate of the Royal School of Church Music a year ago (well, she had been joking for a while that she wanted some letters after her name).

To boost her credentials further she's been studying voice craft, looking into how our vocal folds (which are actually the size of a thumbnail cuticle) operate.

"What we achieve from the voice is quite astonishing. It's the muscular energy which produces the power," she explains.

"It's not a case of open your mouth and off you go. You are only vibrating on the finest of edges - it's all absolutely fascinating. In fact your vocal folds don't stop growing until the end of your 20s.

"Singing is a sport and you need to build up muscles in the body to support the sound you make."

(It would seem that, in this respect, Sporty Spice Mel C was very much along the right lines).

"Years ago people imitated their singing teacher. Now, at long last, we have the science behind the singing technique.

"It's just knowing what muscles are being engaged in the body when you produce certain sounds.

"Your posture and being fit is such an essential part of it - and a flexible tongue is good too."

In term time Hilary often works seven days a week, criss-crossing the country. It's therefore really of no surprise when she admits "I have very little time for hobbies."

Sitting outside the room during her lessons is Hilary's dog Jamie, a collie Saluki cross with a permanent smile on his face.

Her two children from her marriage to David Hill are also both blindingly musical.

Christopher, 20, is a choral scholar at Trinity College, Cambridge - where daughter Alison, 18, is also set to start a choral scholarship in the autumn, while she studies for a degree in Geography.

Hilary herself was brought up in the small village of Deiniolen, in the heart of Snowdonia, with Welsh as her first language.

"I remember being nearly whipped for being caught speaking in English which we weren't allowed to speak, even in the playground. I still find it hard lecturing in English."

A lone daughter among five sons she doesn't come from a rampantly musical family, though her father did sing in the church choir.

"They're not musical at all. I'm definitely the odd one out. I think my career found me, though I actually wanted to sing like Mary Hopkin and be a pop star."

It was after Hilary started singing, and playing piano and harp at the famous Chetham's School of Music in Manchester - where she first met David Hill - that her interest in church music really ignited.

But where is her own singing voice in this booming chorus of sound she generates in others? Well, slightly on the back burner really.

Hilary's singing voice is classically trained to perfection, her tones both rich and clear.

She also loves jazz and especially the voices of Shirley Bassey, Barbara Streisand and Liza Minnelli.

In fact she's currently studying how to produce the 'belt' and the 'twang' with one of her former pupils, Paul Farrington, and gives an example of both techniques which wakes Jamie the dog from his slumbers.

"I sing for weddings and funerals. I don't have time to have a solo career because I like my teaching so much.

"I love seeing my pupils achieving something and being part of a bigger choir. I start training them when they're seven, so when you hear them when they're 18 it brings tears to my eyes.

"I find it very rewarding. I'm getting the best of a great world influencing so many kids.

"When I retire - which may be never - I might add up the number of pupils I've taught."

They'll be the ones with a black belt in judo after all that fighting with you then, Hilary?