They can’t sing
I go to a lot of musical theatre so hear good singers all the time. Don’t get me wrong there are some great singers in the pop world. Some are fantastic even. That said and given stylistic differences, why do so many people who can’t really sing make millions while many who have a great voice just get by? Each time I have heard Robbie Williams or Katy Perry sing live on TV they are constantly missing the note. Madonna’s performance on the Eurovision Song Contest was really awful. Let’s have people who can actually sing shall we
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Strangely (or not) cover and tribute bands may have singers who make a better job of the original song than does the better-known/original singer. I heard a Deep Purple/Rainbow tribute band (Richie Blackmore's Ego or some such) and the singer managed to sound like Graham Bonnet, which is impressive!
This reminds me of a book J.B. Priestly wrote in about 1970 titles "The Image Men". It featured a couple of academics, somewhat down on their luck, who, with the aid of a well-off American widow got the science of "Social Imagistics" going, firstly in a hotl room, then at a provincial university and finally back in premises in London.
It was pretty much as you describe.
"Believe" was an experiment with autotuning. It was intended to make her voice sound robotic. Had nothing to do with her singing ability. Well-done autotuning is indiscernible. This song came out when the technology was new, and she clearly thought that it sounded cool or neat or something. It doesn't of course. But the people who are being autotuned because they really can't sing, you will never know.
ETA: Whilst there are middle of the road singers produced to sound better, what constitutes a good performer is so much more than voice.
Not sure about that. I can easily detect it in a number of singers who are not trying to make it obvious, e.g. Michael Buble, Adam Levine. It was also obvious to me the few minutes I was forced to watch that Glee show. Now there may be instances where it is not detectable but it still feels quite ubiquitous.
It’s a shame when a formerly brilliant voice begins to go. We’ve seen Jethro Tull a few times in past years and noticed how Ian Anderson had begun to share lead vocals with another band member, as here.https://youtu.be/09VqNLo05lw
We saw this first in Thick as a Brick 2 , and thought it worked pretty well; less propping up a shaky voice more an extra and enjoyable part of the spectacle.
Saw them again a couple of years later; the younger vocalist and others weren’t present, just projected up on video. It had lost all its immediacy and vitality IMO. We decided to go home after the first half.
Similarly, there is a tradition in country, folk, gospel, and punk music that allows for singers with more emotional than vocal range. Johnny Cash has been mentioned, but one could also mention Leonard Cohen, Kris Kristofferson, Bob Dylan, or Shane MacGowan. Even Joan Baez, whose voice is generally (and, I think, rightly) well-regarded sings in a very idiosyncratic fashion, by which I mean that literally nobody else sings like her and nobody else should probably try. But I'm a fan of all of them. Each sings with authenticity.*
I don't like a lot of current Top 40 hits because they seem canned and artificial. Auto-tuning probably has a lot to do with that.
My pet peeve is the trend for young girls (and I mean often very young girls, as in five to eight years old) to belt like aging contraltos. This is very popular and it seems like everyone else things these girls are simply amazing singers. They are clearly imitating a style of singing associated with, say, Whitney Houston, but without the life experience to make this kind of distinctly mature singing believable. Meanwhile, I can't help but think how beautifully, with proper training, they might sing the high notes in the Allegri Miserere or "For I will Consider my Cat Joffrey" from Britten's Rejoice in the Lamb. The pure treble voice is a thing of great and fleeting beauty, and I find the trend for abandoning it in favor of a precocious "divahood" to be perplexing and, quite frankly, vulgar.
*Literary present, as Cohen and Cash don't aren't really in a position to sing live these days.
Nonsense, they are in a quartet with Bigfoot and Elvis. Very limited engagements, though
Microphones and mixing have long been used to cover so-called singing starts' inadequacy - I recall an evening in London with Barbara Streisand when there was a power cut: the generator couldn't power more than basic lighting. Orchestra was reduced to bare minimum, playing very softly and you still couldn't hear her in the 6th row of the stalls. Refunds were handed out.
I do hope that these programmes are not put through some electronic wizardry!! They have, apparently, live audiences, so I hope it is the way it sounds.
Preach it!
I was often going on at my kids regarding this - 'divahood' is a big thing in the school gospel choir, and man it sounds sh*t. Well, at least my lot know how hard it is to hit a note hard and clean - those divas wobble to the point they just hit the note twice every vibratory cycle. In another era they might have thought they were singing scat, and in the -ology sense I might yet agree.
Teaching children to focus on a star mentality is not the most healthy route, but the rest of your comment sounds suspiciously like the creaking straps of a firmly clutched handbag.
Depends on whether they are singing solo or as part of the choir.
If every treble in the treble line is singing with a wide vibrato, then unless the wobbles are perfectly in phase, all you will get is mush. That's not a matter of aesthetics but of how sound waves work.
No one needs any excuse to not like something. We all have preferences. However, music is largely a subjective thing and projections otherwise do not deserve any respect.
Ya think? The agism accusations are in fact a fair cop.
Yep. I can take Kirsten Flagstaff recordings even when she was on the downhill slope. Birgit Neilsen is for me an acquired taste that I have not managed to acquire except for that golden moment when she was at the top of her game (1960-65).
hah! I read that as Brigitte Nielsen for 1/2 a second. I would agree, though I will admit to not being a huge fan of opera, so may not be listening in the same way you might be.
Especially as the OP ends with: All three of the people mentioned in the OP can, in fact, sing. Not perfectly on tune, no, but they can sing. Your professional experience does not make that statement anything more than opinion. It allows you to asses the quality of a voice within technical parameters, yes. But "worth hearing" is entirely subjective. Assuming the whingers are old? Yes, that is ageism. "Get off my Lawn" is not exclusive to older people.
You know you’re living in a snowflake world when no one has the balls to become a castrato.
It seems to be one of your favorite insults to fling at people with whom you disagree (more than most), regardless of their actual ages. I don't see the reverse happening in your direction.
Opera is the language of God and the angels. All the rest is the bleating of sin deluded sheep.
Even in the lesser <sniff> "musical" forms, being able to precisely hit a note is the sign of one's achieving grace with God.
The notion that any given note is an arbitrary designation or that taste is at all variable are messages from Satan!
Secondly there are roles in musical theatre that are written for those who can’t sing well and Professors Higgins in My Fair Lady is one of them. So is Sally in the stage version of Cabarete and Judy Dench’s role in A little Night Music. There is a difference between knowing you are not a great singer and being able to sell a song, and thinking you can sing when you can’t really. Performance is very important but if you claim to sing then sing.
I think the guys from Einstürzende Neubauten will have something to say about that!
Big fans of hinges, are they?
OK then. It was an experiment. Leave autotuning to NASCAR.
I happen to love opera (and have been accused of being "posh" for that sin), but of course not everyone does. It is an acquired taste, one which most people never acquire. There is nothing at all wrong with that. But singing in tune is basic. If one wants to make a career as a singer, being able to hit the notes is generally considered essential. Crappy robotic technology doesn't begin to make up for the lack.
Apparently you don't have an ear. That's fine. But please stop pretending that it's not important in the field of music. And you can take your self-important pomposity and stuff it.
Oh, dear. I happen to love that song! It's just catchy as hell and has a great drum beat. I am so sorry. I hope you will still like me, Mousethief.
The autotuned singers you malign have successful careers.
But it does. Objectively it does because what is acceptable is subjective and people pay loads of cheddar to the people you despise. What this means is that technology has indeed made up for the lack. Nothing I've said has indicated that I do not have an ear. In fact, what I've said more implies I do rather than do not.
I'm saying that what is good music is subjective and you are saying it is not. Who is being pompous here?
Well, given that you brought up cheddar, it is an objective fact that things called "cheese food" and the like exist and sell in significant quantities at significant profit. These kinds of ersatz eatables are rather looked down upon by people with tastebuds.