RIP Whitney, RIP the "Oversinging" trend?

[tridim]

Don't get me wrong, I think Whitney had a great voice and made some good music back in the day, but IMO she did start the trend of oversinging, specifically with the hit song, "I will always love you".

Christina Agulara, Mariah Carey and others ran with it and ended up making horrible music that sounded worse than fingernails on a chalkboard, at least to my ears. I can't watch American Idol because of it. I am sure some of the oversingers are actually good singers, but they ruin it with their warbles, octave runs, pitch bends and overblown vibrato. It's exactly why I hated heavy metal guitarists in the 80's. It's pretty much the same thing.

Again, I don't want to start a fight about Whitney's talent. It is pretty much indisputable, but enough with the oversinging please.

Try dynamics and nuance instead, your listeners will thank you.

just in case.

[lillypaddle]

1. Not in the mood for bait

Think I'll have some nachos instead. Thanks anyway.

[CakeGrrl]

2. I'll take oversinging over Auto-Tune any day, though. -nt

[Tx4obama]

23. Looks like the song Adele sang at the Grammys was a rip off from Cee Lo Green's 'Crazy' song

Gnarls Barkley original song 'Crazy' here:

Adele's 'Rolling in the Deep' here:

Last night during the Grammys I thought her song sounded familiar. I did some searches today and there are TONS of articles about her song sounding a lot like Cee Lo Green's song.

I wonder if he will file a law suit.

[laundry_queen]

36. IMO not close at all

And songs that sound alike are a personal pet peeve of mine (and I do have an ear, played several instruments by ear, skipped several grades in piano through the Royal Conservatory and was told by several music teachers and cousins who sing professionally that I have a great ear - just can't sing and don't I know it, lol). There are so many others that are much closer and there hasn't been lawsuits - I highly doubt there will be one coming for this....despite what people on the internets say.

[blue neen]

50. IMHO, Adele's song does not sound like "Crazy."

Different groove, unique syncopation.

[FSogol]

56. Lawsuit? Get real, all forms of art imitate and copy from other sources.

The only form of art where this practice is prohibited is writing (copyright violations).

[Withywindle]

83. Not really prohibited in writing either.

Tons of works of literature quote from and riff off of other works. Pastiches, parodies, re-imaginings, re-tellings, and other forms of response are common.

[FSogol]

84. True. n/t

[rollin74]

61. not even close nt

[Texasgal]

4. Have you ever listened to

Aretha Franklin?

Etta James?

Bessie Smith?

They all have powerful voices and sing in vibrato!

This style of music is nothing new.

[tridim]

5. None of them oversang. Think Agulara.

Where one note becomes twenty in the span of a few seconds.

[Texasgal]

6. You haven't listened to them

then.

[pipi_k]

28. huh. I guess

my understanding of oversinging was wrong?

I had always thought it was when someone tried too hard to sing with a "power voice" when the song clearly didn't call for power, or when the person's voice range didn't allow clarity and/or versatility, so the person yelled instead.

Anyway, if it's what you describe, I can deal with a lot of vibrato and other little tricks as long as it's not someone screwing with classics like "The Star Spangled Banner".

Whenever someone gets tricky with that, I feel like hitting the person and yelling at him/her to just SING THE DAMNED SONG already.

[roguevalley]

54. I agree too. A lot of good singers believe that expresses emotion and showcases their

voices but I change channels. It really peeves me out.

[SwampG8r]

75. etta james was used as an example

etta

&feature=fvwrel

christina agulara ruining the same song

i agree with you
just sing the damn song!
recently steve tyler sang the national anthem and everyone went "oh that was terrible"
it was tyler and he sang like tyler does and he sang the damn song
and that was all
he didnt add anything he didnt subtract he just sang the song
sing the damn song people!

[Solomon]

80. And neither did Whitney. What a riduculous thing it is

to blame Whitney for someone else's oversinging.

Ever hear Patti Labelle sing? Did she get that from Whitney? No. She was singing before anybody ever heard of Whitney.

This post is just bad taste.

[gratuitous]

8. It's not the vibrato . . .

It's the oversinging, taking a note and running with it through a couple of octaves, a key change, and a trip to the bathroom and back. While other singers have done it before and since, I agree with the original post that after Whitney Houston did it to such terrific effect in "I Will Always Love You," it's become a singing cliché, on a par with the movie cliché of a character raising his fists and shouting "Nooooooooo!" when given bad news (with the obligatory "ceiling shot" to emphasize the character's puniness against cruel fate).

May this musical fad be interred with Ms. Houston's bones.

[unblock]

10. there are techniques, and there are reasons for using them.

by "oversinging", i take the o.p. as referring to the overabundance of singers who are overly eager to show of their technique, and in the process demonstrate their lack of understanding of how to properly marry a technique to a musical moment.

different instrumentation, techniques, or vocal qualities convey certain emotional or story-telling qualities. randomly bandying about the techniques in complete disregard for the music or the lyrics demonstrates musical ignorance and can be very annoying for the audience.

good for showing off technical capabilities, but not good for listening.

in the sense it's not terrible in the early rounds of american idol, but by the later rounds they should show the ability to put it together properly.


note also that what many claim to be vibrato (fluctuating pitch) is actually tremolo (fluctuating volume). the singers you mentioned were not only skilled at actual vibrato, but they knew when to use it and when to not. not so with today's "oversingers".

[tridim]

11. You said it better than I did.

That's exactly what I'm talking about.

[gkhouston]

47. I would call that over-ornamentation, or some such. "Oversinging" is pushing, i.e.,

singing so loudly and with so much force that the sound is borderline ugly because you're losing the pitch.

[TexasProgresive]

40. +1

It is the same thing as a lead guitarist running completely away from the song to show off his/her incredible talent to the detriment of the piece. Not all singers or lead guitarist but there are those who are all technique but lack real musicianship.

Jazz which is all about improvisation will hold together no matter how far out the musicians get. I can't do it but there you are.

[unblock]

43. jazz only works when the rules are observed

you can have the same phenomenon with jazz -- a singer or any musician taking his "turn" overdoing it without reason, lurching somewhere without taking the steps to get there. music is a journey, it takes you some place. in jazz, when you take your turn, the "rule" is that you introduce yourself (musically), you take the audience someplace, possibly quite far away, then you take them back home, and hand it off to the next musician for their "turn". you can't just start in some far away place, you have to GO there.

good music starts off introducing a theme in a simple, largely unadorned form, then build on it, plays variations, increasing tension, complexity, orchestration, volume, frills, etc. until you've arrived at wherever it is you're going -- at which point you can really show off, but only because you've built your foundation first. then you tone it down, bring it back, return to the basic rhythm and theme, laying the groundwork for the next musician to take it somewhere else.

in whitney's "i will always love you", she did just start out with that full-throated, step-up modulated chorus, there was a long soft, sweet foundation that laid out the theme gently and built up the passion before she could tear it loose for the part that they love to clip out and use on its own.

mariah carey is my favorite example of doing it wrong. she's got an absolutely astounding voice, range, and technical talent, but so much of her music is show-off stuff; the frills have no rhyme or reason.

[Hippo_Tron]

67. Vibrato is actually very easy to produce

Anybody can sing with or without vibrato. It's often harder to NOT use vibrato on long sustained notes and if you use a purely straight tone it often sounds very ugly. Singers in most genres will generally need to find a happy medium between Herman Cain's vibrato (see below) and a purely straight tone for the sustained notes. This requires some technique and practice, but it's not rocket science.

You may be thinking that vibrato is mistaken for tremolo because often singers fluctuate in both volume and pitch when they sustain a note.

[Ecumenist]

18. Thank you. I hear this kind of singing in almost every black church every Sunday.

OVERSINGING? What the hell is that supposed to mean?

[markpkessinger]

7. Whitney didn't start the trend . . .

. . . it is something that has its roots in the Black Gospel tradition in which Whitney was steeped. And to the extent she made use of it, she did so in a restrained, tasteful way, unlike the others you mention.

That being said, one if the things I found so refreshing about Adele's performance last night is that she was able to stand on stage and deliver a song, simply and compelling, absent any physical or vocal gymnastics!

[justiceischeap]

13. Or any physical gymnastics period

She stood there and let her talent speak for itself. I've grown quite tired of watching dance routines take importance over actual singing talent.

[Hippo_Tron]

26. I agree, but I think that theatrics are an important part of a good live show

The degree of flashiness can certainly vary from act to act, but one does need to be a good PERFORMER to do a good live show. For example, here's Billy Joel being a totally awesome performer with no glitter, fancy costumes, or explosions...

And don't get me wrong, I like glitter, fancy costumes, and explosions. But I like it a lot more when there's good music beneath all that.

[Arkansas Granny]

32. OMG! thanks for the memory.

I'd almost forgotten what he looked like with a full head of hair.

[justiceischeap]

53. One of my fave's in Bruce Springsteen

I know all about showmanship, and many good bands/performers have it. But when you watch some of those acts on the Grammy's last night, with all the dancing, you could just tell they were lip synching. Didn't Milli Vanilli lose their Grammy's for that sh*t?

Oh, and "Get off my lawn!" <-- Apparently I've gotten so old, I'm complaining about the "youngsters." Wonder when that happened?

[unblock]

58. lip-synching a live performance is one thing. lip-synching a studio album is something else.

[Hippo_Tron]

62. Yea the lip synching pisses me off too

And still being in my 20's I'm still a youngster for sure.

Lip synching actually pisses me off even more now that science has progressed to the point that we understand the voice a lot better. The truth is that the right voice instructor can really teach anybody how to sing fairly well. They might not be able to turn you turn you into the next Celine Dion or Barbara Streisand, but you don't need a one in a million voice to be a pop star. Plenty of people who didn't come out of the womb making angelic sounds with their voices make their living as singers. They got to where they are the same way that everybody else does for just about anything... teaching and practice, practice, and more practice.

[justiceischeap]

64. What REALLY pisses me off about lip synching

is paying $60+ for a concert ticket (not that I would) to see someone who is going to lip sync through most of the show. It's ridiculous to charge those kinds of prices and then not actually sing. If I wanna listen to someone's record, I can turn on the christmas lights, blast my stereo and save some money.

[adigal]

85. Did you ever see the video where Beyonce fell down the stairs

and kept singing all the way down!!! LOL!! Here it is:

[laundry_queen]

37. Ha! she cracked me up

when in an interview she said she's not going to be shooting anything out of her boobs, she's just going to sing TYVM. LOL.

[northoftheborder]

9. I'm not criticizing Whitney, she had a remarkable and unusually broad range in her voice.

Her singing of the National Anthem is one of the few that I can applaud. However, I liked Dolly Parton's original version of her own love song very much.

[laundry_queen]

38. My dad, who has no ear for music

actually had a pretty good critique of Whitney Houston - she yells too much. That's what I found in that song, and I also like Dolly's version better. Whitney did do a great National Anthem that one time though.

[SwampG8r]

76. compare

dolly

whitney

dolly wins

[izquierdista]

12. Music has always had gimmicks

And I'll stick up for autotune (at least a bit of it) here. It was interesting the first couple of times Cher did it; but now it's overdone too.

It didn't take me too long listening to Whitney "oversinging" for me to want her to put a sock in it.

Before these gimmicks, there was the lounge singer gimmick. When the Rat Pack did it, it was still fresh. When Bill Murray did it on SNL it had become embarrassing.

Before the lounge singers, or maybe at the same time, there were the doo-woppers. Then that got tired.

Before the lounge singers and the doo-woppers, there were the scat singers and the crooners. But Cab Calloway and Rudy Vallee are dead, so no one needs to bring them back. If you want to see them, they are on YouTube.

There's only one singing style that will never go out of style -- opera. Something classic about it that will always be worth listening to

[REP]

31. I think you mean "bel canto"

Opera is sung in the bel canto style.

[gkhouston]

48. Whitney and bel canto -- one of these things is not like the other. n/t

[izquierdista]

57. Not only that, it's good singing.

[Hippo_Tron]

35. Even Opera does somewhat go in and out of style

People will always pay money to see and hear the classics. But the classical style of singing applied to popular music goes in and out of style just like everything else. Pavarotti and Bocelli's albums have sold better at some times than others, I'm sure.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

73. Andrea Bocelli does not have the chops for opera.

I've seen him try, and he doesn't hold his mouth right; he will let it go slack when it shouldn't.

Pavarotti was a great singer in the 1970s when he was young. When he was old and doing the Three Tenors bit, he had one volume level: BLAST. He was a clown by then, sadly. It's too bad that a lot of people have never heard him when he was young and had one of the great voices of the 20th century, which was full of subtlety.

That's my two cents.

One example:
Pavarotti performing A Furtive Tear, from The Elixir of Love:

[AngryOldDem]

14. I certainly hope so.

Most of the people who try to hit those high notes are, sadly, talented only in their own estimation. I do watch talent shows like American Idol and X Factor (yes, I admit it), and am tired of having my ears bleed with some of these singers who think singing equals screeching.

I've often wondered how this trend started, and Whitney Houston is just as good an explanation as any.

I've never been a fan of "I'll Always Love You," and now, after hearing it ad nauseam since Saturday night, I downright loathe the song. That said, I could listen to her "Star Spangled Banner" any time.

[goddess40]

15. I agree 100%

Can't stand the yowling and howling that passes for singing today. And the louder they yowl, the more the audience cheers. Don't get it.

[chrisa]

16. Agree on the over singing, but autotune is much more obnoxious

90's singing is Hall of Fame worthy compared to crap like Ke$ha.

[gkhouston]

49. +1. I assume that anyone who auto-tunes probably can't hold pitch. n/t

[Johonny]

69. +1

[Capitalocracy]

17. ...

[tridim]

30. Beautiful, it's not oversinging if it adds to the feeling of the song.

Imagine how bad that song would be with Christina Agulara singing instead.

[Capitalocracy]

42. Yeah, I was just being contrarian...

that would be horrifying.

Like this:

Smells Like Teen Spirit performed by someone who actually does.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

45. What in the name of fuck was that??!! Didn't that poor man suffer enough while he was alive?

[WiffenPoof]

63. Thanks For Posting This Great Song

Always loved PF and especially when they would take creative risks. Well done.

-P

[MadHound]

19. So I guess you don't like opera either.

I'm not a big fan of Whitney's, but she employed classic operatic tricks, including what you call "oversinging". It is an established form, and with her wonderful voice, she pulled it off well. Just because others, without the same talent, try to do the same and fail miserably doesn't mean that you should blame somebody who had the talent to do it well.

[tridim]

29. Not really, but I do like R&B and Jazz when it's done without the oversinging.

And again I don't blame her, she didn't know she was starting a pop music trend. Her method was a hell of a lot more listenable than the modern versions, at least until "I will always love you" was released.

[REP]

34. Ms Houston had the range for bel canto, but she did not perform in that style

[malaise]

20. I'm with you

Profound

[wildbilln864]

21. "oversinging"?

WTF is that?

[Liberal_in_LA]

22. Jennifer Hudson will keep the trend going

[Hippo_Tron]

24. I disagree with you ALMOST entirely

First of all, I take it that given your critique of Whitney and 80's shred guitarists, you probably didn't care for much of 80's or even 70's rock singers and prefer the two decades of mellow toned down stuff that Kurt Cobain spawned. Frankly I'll take Robert Plant, Freddie Mercury, Steve Perry, Lou Gramm, Steven Tyler, or Jon Bon Jovi over anything Kurt Cobain and after. Rock music was AWESOME back then, largely because those guys had BIG VOICES and used vocal effects (and by effects I mean effects produced with the larynx, not produced with a synthesizer or a computer).

What I would say about "I will always love you" is that I think it would've been better if it started slower and more toned down and built up to the bigger stuff. For example, maybe the first chorus should've just had one pitch per word except at the end of the phrase, and then moved into the more complex vocal runs on the second or third chorus. But eliminating it entirely would be ridiculous, IMO.

Vocal music, especially live vocal music, should be big, it should be exciting, and it should be FUN. And of course a good singer or a good band will throw in some less flashy tunes in the mix to change things up so it's not full blast for the entire show.

And frankly I can't freaking tell what kind of voice anybody has these days. Everybody's recordings have the autotune re-tune speed set close to zero so that they sound like a fucking robot.

[Bluenorthwest]

25. Sorry, that's a long standing Gospel style, Whitney did it up, she far from originated it.

Allow Patti to spell it out for you...

[Quantess]

27. R Kelly

oversinging

oh, and lots of Americal Idol singers, too.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

33. Dolly V. Whitney.

Great original. Great cover.





Lean towards Dolly because she was shitting on her manager.

[Great Caesars Ghost]

39. I totally agree.

And also watch how they try to equate Whitney to Billie Holliday. At least Billie lived to the end, while Whitney killed herself with prescription meds and booze.

[kwassa]

55. Billie Holiday died from booze and drug use. Sound familiar?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billie_Holiday

In early 1959 she found out that she had cirrhosis of the liver. The doctor told her to stop drinking, which she did for a short time, but soon returned to heavy drinking.[86] By May she had lost twenty pounds. Friends Leonard Feather, Joe Glaser, and Allan Morrison tried to get her to check into to a hospital, but she put them off.[87]

On May 31, 1959, Holiday was taken to Metropolitan Hospital in New York suffering from liver and heart disease. She was arrested for drug possession as she lay dying, and her hospital room was raided by authorities.[81] Police officers were stationed at the door to her room. Holiday remained under police guard at the hospital until she died from pulmonary edema and heart failure caused by cirrhosis of the liver on July 17, 1959. In the final years of her life, she had been progressively swindled out of her earnings, and she died with $0.70 in the bank and $750 (a tabloid fee) on her person.

[Great Caesars Ghost]

70. Holiday didn't overdose is what I meant.

[GoCubsGo]

44. I kind of have to agree with you.

I always used to think, "Wow. She'd be a great singer if she didn't scream so much." But, I think she did a great job with that Super Bowl national anthem. Most people ruin what is already a horrible song musically, with all of the embellishments, warbling, etc. I really appreciated that she sang it "as is".

[DonCoquixote]

46. The problem

was not in her voice, the problem is that actual songwriting is discouraged, and therefore, songs where such voices would be anything but an obstacle.

Take Madonna. Now, she does not have the worst voice, but her range is nowhere near people like Mariah, Whitney, or Aguilera, heck, it is barely equal to Spears before Spears started imitating Madonna (hear Britney when she was on Star Search, singing Broadway tunes, and compare it to her current crap.) The fact is, pop music is just not written for people with ranged voices. Trying to put in skill ruins it, and indeed, people hate you for it. However, being able to prove you can do the trick is enough to get people looking your way, so people throw in some gymnastics to show they can sing, even though their producer would hit them if they did. For example, take Milli Vanilli. The lip syncing did not happen because those guys could not sing. One of them was trained in Opera, but, the producer realized that for a pop sound, mediocre voices were better.

Whitney made ther mistake of marrying an addict named Bobby Brown, but it should not have been a capital offense. Whitmney oversang at times, but at least she was trying to do something interesting, as opposed to people like Madonna who frankly use art the same way Catholic Bishops use religion, a means to keep a bunch of sheep ready for fleecing and lamb chops.

[TheDebbieDee]

51. Whitney oversang ONE song! ONE!

Whitney cut loose in "I will always love you........." and she sounded great doing it!

But I think that was the only song in which she actually demonstrated her full musical range and let us hear what she sounded like as she put herself through vocal gymnastics. And Whitney sang it beautifully (Dolly Parton WISHES she could have sang the song like that!).

Otherwise, Whitney did not waste time stretching a 3-minute ditty into a 7-minute aria by shoe-horning in numerous, nauseatingly-long miasmas. Whitney did not yodel (Beyonce, I'm looking at you). Instead, Whitney just sang the damn song. And she sang it so well.

I think that is what was most FUN about Whitney's early music (her first three albums) - a listener had a reasonable chance of being able to hit SOME of the notes she sang and could pretend to be singing along with her. You never have the feeling that you're yodeling....er, uh, singing with Beyonce, Mariah (listening to her hit those notes, sometimes I thought my ears would start bleeding), Cristina, etc.....These highly-talented, low self-esteem skanks re-inforce their belief that they can sing well by OVERSINGING EVERYTHING!

The only contemporary singer I can think of (off the top of my head) who could come close to singing like Whitney, that is, sing a song without oversinging the hell out of it, is a singer named Tamia and the song was "You put a move on my heart".

RIP, Ms. Houston.........

[young but wise]

59. +1

[Hippo_Tron]

65. Mariah Carey has a four to five ocatve vocal range, why shouldn't she use it?

It's an incredibly rare gift and if you've got it, why should you keep it hidden from the world? Because other people will be jealous that they can't sing your songs?

BTW, people often have much larger vocal ranges than they realize. With a bit of training, most people can sing three octaves. That would cover a good part of Mariah or Whitney's material if you're a female. And if you're a guy, you could get through some of it as well.

[TheDebbieDee]

72. Mariah can sing anyway she wants..........but don't blame Whitney for starting

the trend of oversinging. Mariah, Cristina and Beyonce have made a career of oversinging.

Mariah has mellowed out over the years, but I wouldn't waste my time listening to Beyonce or Cristina's yodellling...........

[Codeine]

68. Melisma. "Miasma" is nasty air. Melisma is all that overly-ornamented, wail-y singing.

And I still like Dolly's version better. Whitney's version is exhausting.

[TheDebbieDee]

71. Miasma, melisma, I still think it's yodelling.............. :-)

[MrSlayer]

52. I am so with you on this.

The incessant wailing gets on my last nerve. I recognize the talent, despise the material.

[Honeycombe8]

60. Yeah, I get that. All the wavering before they finally get to the note. But not Whitney, I think.

"I will always love you" is pretty much straightforward hitting one note, then the next. Not much wavering at all. But very powerful, very loud.

I think Mariah Carey started the trend. A beautiful, operatic voice (she was trained in opera, I think), but instead of infusing emotion, feeling, substance, she went for the wavering, fancy sounds for effect. The only song of hers I liked, well two...one was "Hero" and the other was a cute Christmas video with song, but I forget the song. It's a traditional Christmas song. Hall and Oates has a way cool oldie Christmas video, too: Jingle Bell Rock.

[Codeine]

66. I think the more accurate term is "oversouling."

Oversinging is usually involves overuse of vocal power (belting) or trying to go further than your actual vocal range.

[Vanje]

74. you

suck

[donheld]

77. -10000000

[unblock]

78. i think the author of this article must have read this thread:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17039208

Whitney Houston will be remembered as a master of "melisma". But what is it and why did it influence a generation of singers and talent show aspirants?

...

But perhaps what Houston nailed best was moderation. In a climate of reality shows ripe with "oversinging", it's easy to appreciate Houston's ability to save melisma for just the right moment.

"She's like a cook who never overused her spice. She was always very delicate about what she would use," Grant says.

"She never oversang, and people, therefore, were touched and moved by the emotion and the story of that song. She's the singer that would give you goosebumps."

[Blue_Tires]

79. two points

1. The "oversinging" trend didn't start nor will it end with Whitney Houston
2. Die in a fire, plzkthxbai

[flexnor]

81. no disrespect to ms whitney, but songs are not for 'demonstration' of ability

i hate it when a singer views a song as a vehicle to prove what they can do. That's what made groups like 'The Beatles' and 'Beach Boys' great. The songs were to entertain, not to prove anything

(national anthem is the WORST, and I'm not ashamed to say i dont like that song, give me America the Beautiful instead)

i have never once in my life thought 'i only wish this note could go longer, please prove to me how long you can hold it, that's how i measure you'

[cbdo2007]

82. Great singing VS Over-singing - perfect example is I Will Always Love You - Whitney vs Jennifer Huds

Listen to Whitney's performance - perfect.

Then listen to Jennifer Hudson's performance in memory of Whitney at the Grammy's - she way oversang it.

The difference may not always be obvious, but if you can sing a song powerfully and intensely and not oversing it.

[blues2bach]

86. OVERSINGING AND MELISMA ARE NOT THE SAME THING

Oversinging is when you sing everything at the top of your lungs, adorned or not. Think Michael Bolton, Michael McDonald, and Bruce Springsteen.
Melisma is the adorning of the notes in R&B music, which can be OK when used sparingly, but extremely annoying when overused, a la Cristina Aguilera.
Melisma can be expressive when used subtly. Think Gladys Knight, or Toni Braxton. Now THAT's class!
By the way, Whitney did not start the overmelisma trend, although she did contribute to promote.
To me, the worst oversinger of ALL TIME is Patti LaBelle.
Does anyone remember the finale of the Live Aid concert when all of the artists sang We Are The World?
Patti was unbearable, making a point of having her voice heard over everybody and everythihng else.