Vocalist.org archive


From:  thomas mark montgomery <thomas8@t...>
thomas mark montgomery <thomas8@t...>
Date:  Sun Mar 25, 2001  1:17 pm
Subject:  Re: [vocalist] re: Modern composers who do and who don't understand the voice



Are you aware that many works of art (the Tchaikovsky and Barber violin
concertos come immediately to mind) were thought to be unplayable in their
day? To write off some 20th century composers as 'unsingable' is a
rather premature statement. Where would we be if composers only
wrote for what was perceived as 'vocal'? I suspect we would all be
cursing about all those damn Gregorian chant radio stations the
kids play so loudly in their cars! Whether you like what you hear in the
works of these composers is different from being 'unsingable'. Personally I
find John Adams very singable. I have done his "Wound Dresser" a number
of times and find it very vocal (and very well received too).

Mark Montgomery

<message truncated>

> Adams, Berg, Previn, Tibbet... totally unsingable.
> Written all wrong for the voice.
>
> I love Adams' Nixon in China; I love to listen to it.
> But the leaps are written totally wrong for the human
> voice. Good vocal writing will propel an emotion
> forward while exploiting the beauty of the voice,
> rather than making it hard as all heck to simply get
> through it without creating an ugly tone.
>
> To mike, who believes that calling a composer
> "unsingable" is just an excuse not to work hard and
> that great art is allowed to demand only the greatest
> singers, I would say that understanding the
> limitations of an instrument does not degrade the
> quality of the art.


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