Up and running!

Nica, I love your opera fantasy for Adam's future. Save a seat for me!!

WHAT SHE SAID ^^^^^ ALL OF IT!

Since it is kinda slow in Adamland these days, and I am trying to avoid doing housework and grading, I thought I would discuss the difference between opera and pop/rock singing a little.

First and foremost, it is about resonance. The ability to project one's voice. The operatic style developed hundreds of years before electronic amplification. The opera singer had to be heard above a full orchestra of perhaps 40-50 instruments. It had to cut thru that mountain of sound and float on top of it.

This called for a very specific anatomy. The singer had to have the right size and shape of vocal cords and a body and head that had the right air spaces to bounce the sound around and amplify it. Think of the orchestral upright bass. It has lonnnng, thick strings to create the low frequency vibrations strongly. Then, the strings are mounted on a huge instrument that has a lot of air space inside the cavity to amplify the sound of the strings. The wood has to be of a type that vibrates to those pitches with lots of harmonics. It has to be crafted to the right thickness to maximize that.

In rock music, the bass guitar is electric. It still has the long, thick strings to create the low frequency pitch, but it has a solid body. If you pluck a string without the bass connected to an amplifier, you get just a kind of soft, dull thunk, thunk. It is the electronic amplifier that does all the work in producing that strong, booming bass sound.

So, the opera singer had to have a body that was created with the right vocal cords and the right muscle/bone mass/air space to vibrate and amplify the sound of the voice. The rock singer does not need that. The microphone will amplify the voice for them.

But, having the right anatomy is just the beginning. The opera singer had to learn how to direct and focus the sound from their vocal cords into the air spaces to amplify and project that sound. To add the extra harmonics to make the voice rich and piercing. That required singing in a very specific way. The singer has to create this big, round mouth cavity and direct the air flow/vibrations into the mask or front of the face and into the back of their mouth to bounce up into the back sinuses and down into their chest. This meant modifying the pronunciation of the vowels. Short vowels like the A in cat, the I in hit, or the UH in touch require a more closed mouth cavity. The operatic pronunciation will modify those vowels to something approximating and AHHH or OHHH. It also required modifying the consonant production (cuz you can't SING a T or a B or an S). This meant the vowels were stretched in the word and the consonants tacked on very briefly between vowels. All these techniques and the resulting sounds we associate with an operatic voice, but, they were first developed in service of being able to hear the voice over the orchestra, in a large hall.

The rock singer today can basically sing as he/she talks. The microphone will take care of the rest. (Well, not pitch or sustain, but I am just focused on tone here.) So, the singing sounds more "natural" and less "phony" or "high brow." The rock singer can wail high notes that would sound very dull or squeaky and carry only a short distance, but the microphone can make the sound audible in a stadium. The rock singer can also sing with a breathy tone, lots of air and very little resonance, and still be heard.

Since most of us have never taken many years of vocal training to learn how to use our instrument like opera singers do, the pop/rock sound is the sound we are conditioned to in our every day life. And the sound we can reproduce. Therefore, to many, it sounds more "real", more "authentic", more accessible.

With these things in mind, listen to Pavarotti sing with Bon Jovi. Bon Jovi has a very pleasant, very good pop/rock tone, and sings the song well. When Pavarotti sings the same notes and phrases, he is using a different pronunciation and producing a completely different resonance that has a pure tone without rasp or a breathy sound. (It is also the difference you hear between Kris Allen's singing in We Are the Champions, and Adam's.)




Bringing it all back to Adam, and to the question of his ability to sing opera.... Adam has the natural body for singing. He can't take credit for that; it was in his genes. BUT, Adam has learned, like the opera singer, how to harness the resonance in his body. He has learned how to focus the sound and support it with the proper breath control.

But, here's the thing that makes Adam extraordinary ---- and it is ALL ADAM. He has learned to use that classical technique while modifying it to sound more pop/rock. He can add a breathiness to the tone, and the resonance that he loses he makes up for by good use of the microphone. He can shift the resonance away from the back of his mouth, where it would sound dark, almost swallowed, and very operatic, and place it in the middle or the front of his mouth, where the tone is much brighter and lighter. He can "squeeze" the note, tensing his vocal cords, to put a bit of buzz or grit into his voice (in MODERATION so as not to damage his cords).

His voracious appetite for music of many styles sung by many singers has trained his mind to think and hear in different styles to match the genre. So, he uses all that classical training to produce these tones that ring with life and light, but he modifies the delivery to more closely match the pop/rock or jazz/blues style as he sees fit.

That is only one of the things that makes Adam's performance so delightful and compelling. As we say, he is the total package, and there are many other aspects we love.

Well, that is the music theory/vocal masterclass for today. Now, those dust bunnies are calling me, and the dryer is buzzing for clothing removal. Sigh.

;D ;D ;D Perfect example of how auditory and NOT visual I am. I didn't even notice.

I don't know anything about microphones, sorry. Just put one in my hand and I know how to hold it to get the most out of it for my voice and its resonance at different pitches.

My totally uninformed guess is that different mics have different frequency responses. Notice how Bon Jovi sings right on top of the mic? It looks like his mouth is frequently touching it. He is directly inputting his voice into the mic, which may be necessary to pick it up with its lack of natural resonance. The mic may be adding some richness or resonance to his voice.

Pavarotti's voice produces this booming, ringing resonance all on its own. Nothing needs enhancing. It projects on its own. (In a YT I previewed trying to find a good example of a pop/opera duet, there was one showing the two in the recording studio, singing into the same mic. The pop singer positioned his mouth within a few inches of the mic for most of the song, and the opera singer stood a good two feet back. Otherwise she would have blown out the mic that was set to pick up the pop singer's vocals.)


Pavarotti just needs the mic to amplify his voice in such a huge arena. I also noticed he has that foam rubber cushion around the mic and Bon Jovi does not. That cushion is usually used to prevent the consonants from popping. Since Pavarotti is used to articulating his consonants very sharply (because he is trained to sing without amplification) he may be more prone to that popping without the cushion.

Or, maybe they just ran out of one style of mic?? : :