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Melismatic Vocals: Difference between revisions
trope->Useful Notes
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|'''Alexis Petridis''' [http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2002/oct/25/artsfeatures.popandrock1 reviewing] an [[Alicia Keys]] concert. }}
When it comes to singing, there are basically two approaches you can take: syllabic or melismatic.
'''Syllabic''' means that if you have lyrics, each syllable gets one note. Pretty straightforward enough. In fact, it's so straightforward it's basically the universal way of singing.
This also includes the songs where for a certain syllable the note sung goes through a bit of tremolo, or there's a glissando between one syllable and the next one. You can throw in flourishes if you want, but the rule of thumb remains "one syllable = one note".
'''Melismatic''' means that you hold down one syllable while moving through several notes. This is called ''[[Department of Redundancy Department|melisma]]''. It's very common in religious, Arab, Middle Eastern, African, Balkan, Indian and various other types of music, especially [[Folk]] music (such as the Portuguese fado).
Melisma migrated over to pop music at some indistinct point (credit for popularising it varies between [[Stevie Wonder]], [[Mariah Carey]] or some others), and now it's pretty common in R&B or R&B-influenced pop music. Remember [[Whitney Houston]]'s "I Will Always Love You"? That's melisma.<ref>Though to be fair, [[Dolly Parton]] did it in the original version, too, though not nearly as much.</ref> It's easy to see why it ended up in pop music: used properly it can have a great effect. The only problem is that there have been many singers recently who just blindly abuse it to lend their songs some sort of "soulfulness" or whatever, and it just becomes annoying, as demonstrated by the above quote. A frequent way to deride these singers is to note that they take simple words like "yeah", "I" or "whoa" and stretch it to something like [[Memetic Mutation|over 9000]] syllables. But the real problem is that some artists don't have the skill or vocal range to actually pull it off.
More info about the abuse of this technique can be found [http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6791133 here].
People who love melisma:
* Hell, throw a rock in R&B, you're gonna hit somebody who does this.
** [[Stevie Wonder]]
** [[Mariah Carey]]
** [[Whitney Houston]]
** [[Boyz II Men]]
* [[Regina Spektor]]
* [[
* [[Christina Aguilera]]
* [[Alanis Morissette]]
* Handel's ''Messiah'' takes this [[Up to Eleven]] with a ''[http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e0/Handel_Messiah_-_For_Unto_Us_a_Child_is_Born_excerpt.JPG 57-note melisma]''.
** Handel was pretty fond of melismas in
*** Something he had in common with a lot of Baroque composers. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HAUNbNSYEA&feature=fvwrel "Vittoria mio core"] is a notable example.
* "I'm Gonna Sing 'Till the Spirit" by Moses Hogan. The tenors start and it piles up with Sopranos and Altos and it has more notes than the Handel piece.
* Edward Shippen Barnes, the person responsible for the most famous arrangement of the Christmas hymn "Angels We Have Heard On High".
{{quote|
* [[Harry Belafonte]]: "Daaaay-O! Da-a-ay-O! Daylight come and I wanna go home!"
* [[Dream Pop]] bands like [[Cocteau Twins]], [[This Mortal Coil]], [[Dead Can Dance]] and [[Love Spirals Downwards]] frequently used this trope. Awesomely.
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* "[[Maroon 5|I've got the mooo-oo-oooo-oo-ooves like Jagger!]]"
* [[Freddie Mercury]] anyone? "Somebody tooooooooooooooooooooooo... LOOOOOOOOOOOooOoOoOoOooOoOOuuUuuuuhuhuhuuuuuuuuuuv."
* [[Gil Scott-Heron]]
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