To heaven and Bach again!

Notice how in vocalises her vibrato continues to work. She does tend to darken a bit as she reaches toward and into her chest voice and lighten a bit as she ascends. Do you mind this? Do you think she needs to? Does it work? What else do you notice?

I really love the darker tone in her middle notes, but when she ascends and her tone is lighter, I do find myself questioning if this is necessary. I don't find her singing hard on the ears at all, however, I think that continuity of tone is important. I don't think she needs to change her color in those ways, though It sounds very effective. One glaring thing I noticed about her singing was that in some moving notes her tone had no vibrato in some spots. I wouldn't do that in a performance, but then, I don't have enough experience to say it is wrong or right, I just know I get more vocally tired more quickly when my tone is without vibrato.

Furthermore, notice his flawless sense of legato and how each sound is connected in every way to the previous sound. Vibrato? Lastly, try to figure out how he sings so sincerely.

Yes, this man's Nerdiness is quite astounding in it's complexity. However, I really enjoy his singing, it is so sincere in its nature and the legato is very apparent.

Where does the pressure go?

 The second video is of a young singer called Paul Wilt at Rice University. He’s not a bad singer but can you tell that the voice in his lower register is different than in his higher register? Can you hear the difference in vowels?

As Thomas Allen's singing is consistent throughout his performance, with some of Paul Wilt's ascending lines his vowels get more shallow, while others grow overly dark at the very top in his attempt to follow the tonal center of the ascending pitches. Words such as "Heather", "Shade", "Spoken" don't sound consistent with the notes in his lower register, and are seemingly different it seems in production and tone.

Compare that with a version by someone called Bernice Ehrlich. What happens when she’s faced with upward arching phrases?

Though I don't have much experience listening with soprano's voices, it seems like Ehrlich isn't supported as much as the previous singer. Her pitch seems to wobble at any range. As a result of her less supported singing, when she follows the upper higher high notes the seem to float and are not entirely on the voice in comparison to her lower notes. In addition she is sliding most of her notes which makes it seem like she can't get up to the higher notes without sliding.

Anderson & Presley

By the way, there is one big thing that makes her singing old fashioned in this recording (to my ears). What is it?

Though some of Marian's diphthongs in words seemed very deliberate some of her diphthongs were somewhat elongated in the word "sometimes". It sounded somewhat like, "Someti-eems" Every time she uttered this word, the contrast in diction from the word "sometimes" and her iteration were quite astounding. The only things that I really detected was this word and extremely dark vowels. 

In what ways is he doing the same things as Marian Anderson?

Well, Elvis Presly definitely doesn't exhibit the same english diction that Marian Anderson. However, he seems "bear" the note quite nicely when he slides to notes in the phrase "love me sweet" and at the end "I love you". Also, he has a pretty noticeable southern twang that I detect very minutely in Marian Anderson's rendition of "Sometimes I feel like a motherless child".

John Raitt and David Daniels

The emotion in both singers is absolutely incredible, with David Daniels there is incredible emotion and such pure diction. he gestures not only with his eyes, but also with his body and color with dynamics. You can tell just by looking at his performance, how much work he put into the song to emote each emotion and phrase to display it honestly.

John Raitt has a slightly different performance tactic, as he is very stern and walks around quite differently on stage as he shows a range of emotion from happy to surprised, sad, and determined. His confidence and intimidation is quite clear as he embodies his character. He also displays his emotion realistically and honestly. Especially how elated he seems at some points in the song.

English Diction Blog 2

What else do you notice?
Other than the notes and syllables, of which we dilineated upon greatly in our last blog, Tony's HAS phrasing. As opposed to David, whom as you pointed out sings every word and phrase with a similar volume and emphasis, Tony crafts each phrase with a line that has a play, such as "in delay there lies no plenty", but also bends the rhythm and tempo to add even more emphasis to certain words, as well as to draw out the meaning of the phrase.

What are the aspects that make one singer sound professional and accomplished and the other, though talented, less so?
Again, the vastly different phrasing, singing of notes, and syllables make a huge difference, but as the singers fall into diction, to name a few things, Tony's English is more clean and clear. With David's singing, words like "endure" and other simple things like how in the phrase "where are you roaming", how he puts together the words where and are to be "whereare" make it less pleasing to the ear. Another word, "Kiss" is also sounds like "ih" as opposed to Tony's "kiss" which is rounder and more full, instead of chopped off and shallow like David. Finally, a touch different between the two singers is how David scoops into many phrases, in contrast to Tony's clean notes that are more clean in their approach.

It’s easy to say that one sounds better but why is it?
Well, it certainly isn't the recording. Overall, the reason for one sounding more professional (better) is the combination of all these harmonious techniques, such as shaping of vowels, playing, but not too much, with the phrasing, and finally the different emphasis in each syllable, as oppose to David's equal emphasis.

Between two ashen grooves... err... groves

What do you hear that's different in the two singer's approaches to diction?

The most obvious choice that is made per Peter Pears singing is his clean diction. It is very simple to understand what he is saying because of the way he uses each vowel and consonant clearly and cleanly, without sloshing them together into notes and syllables. In contrast, Ms. Lemiux's diction isn't as easy to understand, as she reserves the right to explode into any of her constants, they are barely noticeable. Her singing is more concerned with the sound and vowels and less of the text.

Can you understand one more than the other?

Between the two singers, it is much easier for my ear to perceive the diction of Peter Pears over Marie-Nicole Lemieux.

Does one appear to be singing notes and syllables whereas one is singing words?

Marie-Nicole Lemiux is most definitely singing notes and syllables over words. Though the sound is pleasant, it is very difficult to understand what she is saying per her diction. Peter Pears is definitely singing words, which, for me at least, makes it easier to understand the meaning of the song in the context of the words.

http://clementenglishdiction.blogspot.com/