I was having this conversation today with a friend over lunch, and I thought I'd pose the same question to all you BWWers. The original discussion was Sutton Foster and her tendency to modify vowels, and in some peoples opinions, to much. We were talking about the the E flat in "Astonishing" becoming astoniSHANG, and the final C sharp I think it is in "Morning Person" becoming morNANG.
I, myself, have no problem with it. Ideally, of course, a musical number should sound like sustained speech, and evolve organically and seamlessly from the spoken dialogue. However, I also expect a certain level of musicality. So if a particularly difficult vowel such as ee and ooh are modified on higher notes, I'm not so much of a stickler as long as the sound is free and clear.
My friend completely disagrees. He says it completely takes him out of the moment and that the examples we were discussing were examples of too much vowel modification.
I have a lot of respect for people like Sondheim who are so anal about this, but mostly it doesn't bother me at all, unless it makes the word incomprehensible. I think it depends on the score as well though--a pop or rock score has different expectations for me, since fake rhymes and vocal tricks like this are common to the form anyway (how many songs out there rhyme "girl" with "world"?)
Depends on whether it's the character modifying the vowel or the performer. How do I know the difference? When it distracts me, it's the performer. When it doesn't, it's the character.
If it's to rhyme, it annoys me. If it's to make the note and word actually possible to sing, then not really. The one exception is the musical theatre "yeeewww" (you), which drives me nuts as a classical singer. Heh.
There isn't one universal accent or way of speaking and singing for all characters in musical theatre. If the "modified vowel" choices serve the material, I don't care in the least.
I also admittedly give a "pass" to the old-school larger-than-life stars and always have.
Ethel Merman in Annie Get Your Gun The Cowardly Lion with a Brooklyn accent in Wizard of Oz Marlene Dietrich as a saloon gal in Destry Rides Again Hermione Gingold as Eulalie McKechnie Shinn in The Music Man
One performance immediately comes to mind, for me - Richard Kiley on the OCR of Man of La Mancha. He mangles some words in "Impossible Dream" so badly that it yanked me right out of the song. I played it over and over trying to figure out WHAT the words were supposed to be. Worst offender - "scars" which comes out sounding like "skalls" or "skulls".
What really confused me was when I finally was able to see him perform this live (Ahmanson Theater, 1967), his pronunciation was letter perfect! Which begs the question - why didn't they do a retake on the recording of "Impossible Dream"?
As a huge diction freak, this annoys me to no end. Some vowels are harder for different people, but usually, a singer will modify a vowel on a high note because he or she is doing something vocally incorrectly on whatever vowel is written. The obvious solution to this is to fix what you're doing wrong, not to choose a different vowel.
Well, a twang or slur is different than altering the word completely so it sounds like they're singing or saying something else. If they go that far with it, they need to dial it down. Maybe vocal directors or musical directors aren't catching them or saying anything about it.
Yes, with crazy high belt notes, singers often have to modify them just to get them out.
This video from Felicia Ricci cracks me up, talking about singing Defying Gravity and The Wizard and I.
Oh, and here's a short clip of her singing it live in the San Francisco company of Wicked. Her "modified vowels" actually work, as much as she makes fun of them.
That's how she can get the power behind them on the high notes.
I've just noticed that in Better Than Before on the Next to Normal CD, Bobby Spencer says "git" for "get" every time. I never noticed it before and now it drives me crazy.
If we're talking specifically about women singing/belting high notes, I'd prefer the vowel to be modified and make the note sound better than for the singer to use the proper vowel and produce an awful noise. I don't know if I'd even want to hear what Sutton Foster would sound like singing the word "astonishing" correctly on an E flat...
I hate modified vowels, most of all the aforementioned musical theatre "yew" in place of "you." If the show isn't happening in the south, stop. I don't as an audience member want to have to think about your singing, just your performance, and ridiculous modified vowels like that ruin any chance I have of being able to do that.
I think the actual answer to a lot of this, though, is secret option 3--COMPOSERS, DON'T WRITE HUGE BELTING NOTES ON DIFFICULT VOWELS. AstonishING comes to mind, as does Than BefORE (So Much Better, Legally Blonde)
Yeah modified vowels are fine, as long as no one goes overboard with them. I mean I really don't want to hear "dreams that cannot beeeeeee" on a hard e.
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joined:10/30/08
Posted: 7/26/12 at 07:02pm