Dear Karen and List:
I wrote, "I found a web-clip of David Daniels singing Beethoven's "Adelaide." I played the clip for my wife, with my son in the room, and my wife said "Very nice" and my son said "Sounds like Miss Piggy!".
And Karen replied, "Can we even remotely hope that by "sounds like Miss Piggy!" your son meant to be complimentary of Mr. Daniels' singing? If not, I think you've gotyour work cut out in terms of teaching your son good taste in singers. :)
Well I realize the smiley means that you are kidding to an extent. But to take your comment a face value - no Karen, I don't think my son meant to be complimentary. And I don't think I will have too much of a challenge in teaching him good taste - he's a bright boy with a good set of ears, and it's ok if his taste is different than mine - especially while he's six! Maybe your point of view would change if you had children - am I correct in guessing you are not a mother?
I think what is interesting about children is that they have a different perspective from adults, and sometimes they "see" or "hear" things with a greater clarity! While the evidence is merely anecdotal, Christine (on this list) reported that most of her voice students heard David and thought him a woman, while (some of ?) the younger students that it was a man.
My point was that in saying "Sounds like Miss Piggy" my son identified David's voice as that of a man phonating in a higher register (since Miss Piggy's voice is also the voice of a man).
None of this should be interpreted as a pejorative view of the countertenor voice - I admire Daniels singing and "voted with my pocketbook" by purchasing his CD (and I have purchased CDs of several other countertenors too).
Cheers,
Michael Gordon
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