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  #16  
Old 08-10-2017, 02:03 PM
KarlK KarlK is offline
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I don't admit that at all. It looks like that, for sure but - like Golffisshny says - you never see what they've been through to get to that point.

The other view is that we are ALL born with musical potential - because all humans appreciate and value music - but for most of us (in our culture at least), musical skill is not considered essential, so it's not promoted.

Research shows that early musical experience produces apparently "gifted" kids later on. Infant brains are hardwired to learn language by ear - picking up all kinds of aural nuances - and music seems to piggyback on that, if given the chance.

It's well known, for example, that there's a much higher incidence of absolute pitch among speakers of tonal languages, such as Chinese. Pitch difference - the pitch shape of a syllable - affects meaning in those languages, so infants natural pick up those finer points, and it transfers to music later. (Not all tonal speakers have AP, but that's because the languages only require good relative pitch. AP is just a by-product of that extra focus on pitch meaning.)

Of course, absolute pitch is not a very useful musical skill, but it shows that human infants are capable of learning refined pitch discrimination. The conclusion is that the potential is in all of us (as a result of the language instinct), and differences are down to cultural background and upbringing.

Of course, once one is past the age of around 6, musical skill might as well be inborn in just the lucky few. It might as well be just the way it looks, because past that age it's increasingly harder to learn. Just as it's harder for us to learn a foreign language wholly by ear than it was to learn our mother tongue when we were 3 or 4.

The problem with the "gifted" hypothesis is not that it's unsupported by science (videos of child prodigies prove nothing), but that it encourages the view that "untalented" people may as well not waste their time trying to be musical. Music is only for those "lucky" few. That's not true at all. Even if your own infancy was not blessed with the right musical environment to make performing music feel like a natural part of life (as happened to those child prodigies), you still have music in you. You might never be a "genius", but music can still (and should) be a rewarding part of your life. In any case, genius itself is a romantic western myth - as if there is only a "talented" minority and an "untalented" majority.
In parts of Africa, music is a part of everyone's lives; everybody sings. It doesn't make sense to them to claim that one "can't sing". It would be like saying you can't play soccer because you don't know how to kick a ball. You have a voice, you can speak, therefore you can sing - that's their view. Those of us in the west who feel (with reason!) we "can't sing" have just never spent enough time trying, especially when young. We're victims of the "talent myth" - the notion that music is the preserve of a professional elite, not something that is the birthright of all of us.
Music is not a profession, it's a form of recreation - like sport. We all feel we can indulge in various amateur games and sports when we feel like it, simply because it's enjoyable; we don't think it's a waste of time because we'll never be good enough to go pro!

Like anything, you get better at it the more time you devote to it. It's tougher when you're older, for sure, but there's still nothing genetic to stand in your way. Claiming lack of talent is just an excuse. Lack of interest is OK! As adults, we can't all afford the time necessary. Life forces other choices on us. It often tells us music is just an optional add-on, it's "just playing". As if "playing" wasn't something fundamental for all humans!
Well, I would agree that anyone can learn to sing, and get pretty good at it.

I think what I was trying to say, not very articulately perhaps, that it is all a matter of degree. Whether we start young, old, or middle aged, we can get better.

But talent, and I daresay inherent, in-born talent, makes a difference, in some cases a huge difference.

Singing is a strange art form -- and by that I mean any non-operatic singing, since opera requires a "standard" -- because it can be a direct function of what I would call the artist's "presence." A well trainined soprano, with the proper range and good pitch control, can do a more than passable version of say, Habanera, from Carmen or any other famous aria.

But NOBODY can sound like Leonard Cohen, or Tom Waits, or Johnny Cash, or early to mid-career Dylan. If the vast majority of the players on here, even if they studied hard, tried to be AS GOOD AS, or as ARTISTICALLY distinctive as them, we'd fail. We'd be OK, perhaps, or even pleasantly listenable, but that's about as good as it would get.

Or Paul McCartney, a more "tranditional" vocalist. He wasn't great solely because he played 6 hours a night 6 days a week in some grungy German nightclub for nearly a year, though that certainly helped

Why is this true? Because they all have a gift, and we don't.

That doesn't mean we shouldn't sing, or play, or even take a stab at being professional for some.

We can run, but we'll never be as fast Usain Bolt. We can play tennis, but we'd never take a game off of Roger Federer. We can act, but Daniel Day-Lewis will always be better.
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  #17  
Old 08-10-2017, 04:23 PM
ARiley ARiley is offline
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Default Talent or skill? Skill goes a long way.

Singing is a skill that can be learned, and like any other skill, it takes practice to get good at it and stay good at it. Yes, we all have different tools -- different-shaped larynxes and resonators (that's sinuses when they're off duty) -- but barring physical disability, we can all learn to use what we've got skillfully. Talent, whatever that is, isn't a prerequisite. Sing!

Someone like Bob Dylan or Neil Young may or may not be a skilled, trained musician, but no one can deny that they're great *interpreters* of a song. That's a whole different ball of wax. Every once in a while you get someone who's both a skilled, trained musician *and* a great interpreter of a song -- and that's when you get someone like Frank Sinatra. (One of the most beautiful things I've ever heard was an old record of Frank singing "O Little Town of Bethlehem" absolutely straight, no Nelson Riddle orchestra, like a choirboy back in Hoboken. Brought a tear to my eye, it did.)

But back to people like you & me pickin' & grinnin' out on the back porch or wherever. All we need to do is lose the idea that only the talented are allowed to sing -- and then sing!
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  #18  
Old 08-11-2017, 01:33 AM
tonyo tonyo is offline
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Originally Posted by ARiley View Post
Singing is a skill that can be learned, and like any other skill, it takes practice to get good at it and stay good at it. Yes, we all have different tools -- different-shaped larynxes and resonators (that's sinuses when they're off duty) -- but barring physical disability, we can all learn to use what we've got skillfully. Talent, whatever that is, isn't a prerequisite. Sing!

....

But back to people like you & me pickin' & grinnin' out on the back porch or wherever. All we need to do is lose the idea that only the talented are allowed to sing -- and then sing!
I fully agree. Even though I perform publicly, lets forget about that. I get a huge benefit to myself from singing. A sense of accomplishment, a pleasure to my own soul, a lift in mood. And back to the public thing, I can share it with others if I want.
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  #19  
Old 08-11-2017, 02:50 AM
Alex6strings Alex6strings is offline
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So if I'm understanding this correctly, the years, decades I've spent wishing I could sing, I should have spent practicing singing, which would have made me a better singer? I don't know, sounds a bit wishy washy...
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  #20  
Old 08-11-2017, 04:33 AM
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Hope this is posted in the right spot..

Some people can sing right out of the gate. My girl is one of them. She has a tone that is just pleasing to the ear. When she does a little work on almost any song she is key.. its just natural.

Then there is me...

I'm 6'5 and have a low voice, I have been told I should talk on the radio. But when I started singing it was laughable. I have worked very hard to just be able to be in key or close.

My singing voice isn't far from my talking one. It took years of practice to just be able to not sound ridiculous and to be able to sing to friends at fires and parties and to be able to busk. I keep working at it but wonder if I will ever be able to cross that bridge from passable to good.

Guitar I can just keep playing and improve. I hit those weeks where I just play 8-10-12 hours a day and I can just enjoy the feeling of improvement. Singing has seemed to just stay stagnant .

Has anyone had this expirinance? What did you do?
So nowhere in your post do you mention taking voice lessons. I was a terrible singer for many years. Some voice lessons, corrective action and several years of persistence, and not getting discouraged was key (Progress was slow at first)

I now like my voice and even get compliments. I am no spring chicken and realize that a future as a singer is unlikely but with some professional guidance and some persistence the joy of singing (well) is attainable, imho
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  #21  
Old 08-11-2017, 11:29 AM
JonPR JonPR is offline
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Originally Posted by KarlK View Post
Well, I would agree that anyone can learn to sing, and get pretty good at it.

I think what I was trying to say, not very articulately perhaps, that it is all a matter of degree. Whether we start young, old, or middle aged, we can get better.
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But talent, and I daresay inherent, in-born talent, makes a difference, in some cases a huge difference.
Yes, but that is where the science is ambivalent at best.
It's easy to assume a particular child prodigy "must have been born like it" (because we can't see how they could have learned it), but that assumption doesn't hold up to rational examination, any more than it does to the evidence.

There may be a genetic component to superior skills (in any sphere), but the more you look at the evidence and the research, the more you discover how much is acquired, learned mostly in infancy. Still maybe not all, but more than you might think. The infant brain is an extraordinary organ, capable of learning an amazing amount of stuff.

Moreover, there's an appealing theory - which seems to fit the facts - that the brain is actually equipped with much more potential than it will ever need. Childhood is then a process of jettisoning what doesn't seem important from day to day, and developing that which does. Paying attention and narrowing the focus.
That makes sense from an evolutionary perspective. Evolution has produced the massive neo-cortex, making homo sapiens adaptable to way more environments than other animals. We are, in a sense, over-equipped, ready for anything that experience might throw at us from an early age. We can work it all out.
If you like, the brain is like a huge computer, with an inbuilt operating system (instincts) - developed over millennia of evolution; but it's experience that writes the software. (Obviously it's more messy and organic than that.)

That's how it makes sense that we could all be born with high musical potential (as part of aural perception and language learning), but most of us - in infancy, when it counts - aren't provided with the environment which would switch it on and develop it. So we lose it - or rather it atrophies slowly through disuse. The prodigy is an example, not of someone intensively reared or hot-housed, nor with unusual genetic inheritance; they're just someone who's managed to hang on to their full musical birthright, by experiencing music as important to their lives, right from the beginning. Music is as normal for them as speaking and walking is for the rest of us. My view is that, if we had had the same experience, we would be as "gifted", because we were born (pretty much) the same.

I'm not saying everyone is a potential genius. Musical talent is a complex set of skills. It's much more than being able to pitch your voice accurately and hold a tune. It's a cultural thing. In the west, we demand a high level of musical skill from anyone who dares to call themselves a "musician"; and we tend to look down on people who treat music as a hobby. If you're not a professional, you're a time waster. (I'm exaggerating, but that's not an uncommon view.)
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Originally Posted by KarlK View Post
Singing is a strange art form -- and by that I mean any non-operatic singing, since opera requires a "standard" -- because it can be a direct function of what I would call the artist's "presence." A well trainined soprano, with the proper range and good pitch control, can do a more than passable version of say, Habanera, from Carmen or any other famous aria.

But NOBODY can sound like Leonard Cohen, or Tom Waits, or Johnny Cash, or early to mid-career Dylan. If the vast majority of the players on here, even if they studied hard, tried to be AS GOOD AS, or as ARTISTICALLY distinctive as them, we'd fail. We'd be OK, perhaps, or even pleasantly listenable, but that's about as good as it would get.
Well, you've picked some very distinctive voices!
I agree, it's pointless to "try to be as good as them" - because they're being themselves. They didn't study to be like that! (Not in the way a classical singer studies technique.)
I mean, they certainly studied, but that means copying all their own heroes while they were learning, and developing their own voice.
Leonard Cohen was unusual, in fact, because he was a poet and novelist before he decided music would get him a bigger audience. He was never a great guitarist (FWIW) - he was competent, like the others. He wasn't even a great singer. He was just a great vocalist.
Out of your four examples, Johnny Cash is the only one with a "good voice" in a generally agreed sense: a rich, well-rounded bass. The others are geniuses at delivering their songs.
Dylan is probably the best of all - and I mean in all of pop/rock music - an extraordinarily expressive voice (it's deteriorated somewhat in recent times).
All those idiots who used to say "Dylan can't sing" ...

If we want to emulate any of them, what we need to do is be ourselves, as much as possible. We're often unaware of what that sounds like, of course, unaware that our voices actually have a unique character that can be developed and strengthened.
In fact, one of the problem with guys trying to sing is that conventional rock vocals are high register - screaming tenors, like Robert Plant or Axl Rose. We know we can never match that. Our unpractised voices crack before we ever get near that range.

The bass voices you mention (Dylan excepted) are all better heroes for the average dude. We just need to improve our pitching, breathing and control, that's all. Learn to sound like ourselves, only more so.
Then - to match the success of guys like those - a much taller order - we need to work MUCH harder on our songwriting, and/or give up our day jobs, and/or tour the country gigging like maniacs for a decade or two.
That's where it get hard! Vocal quality (or songwriting skill) is one thing (or two). There's stamina too; self-belief; commitment; intelligence; arrogance even. Oh yes, and starting young.
(Cohen is the exception again there, but he just started young in a different artistic sphere. He was "too old" to be a pop success when he started singing, but he had a good USP: suave poet with sexy voice, understated charisma. The ideal sound for the intellectual student fan for whom Dylan was going through a bad patch at the time.)
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Originally Posted by KarlK View Post
Or Paul McCartney, a more "traditional" vocalist. He wasn't great solely because he played 6 hours a night 6 days a week in some grungy German nightclub for nearly a year, though that certainly helped
I'd say that really is the main reason why he's great. Of course, he had a good ear from a young age - because of his upbringing (musician for a father, and lessons as a kid). And his high register meant he could copy his heroes, like Little Richard, effectively enough while still a teenager to impress John Lennon...
Sometimes a whole mix of environmental factors come together at the same time and place. It doesn't rule out genetics, but any genetic component of talent is as likely to be in the personality, not in anything specifically musical. (I mean, outside the normal human level of innate musicality.)
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Last edited by JonPR; 08-11-2017 at 11:36 AM.
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  #22  
Old 08-11-2017, 02:31 PM
tonyo tonyo is offline
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So if I'm understanding this correctly, the years, decades I've spent wishing I could sing, I should have spent practicing singing, which would have made me a better singer? I don't know, sounds a bit wishy washy...
The more I sing, the better I get. At first I would sing song that had lyrics that came in at the chord changes. Then more syncopated songs were my next challenge. It took a bit of effort and it introduced an offbeat nature to singing along to the guitar. Your ear develops as well. Practice maybe doesn't make perfect (for me) but it sure improves the ability. Why should it be any different for singing than it is for playing.
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  #23  
Old 08-11-2017, 02:40 PM
Nama Ensou Nama Ensou is offline
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Originally Posted by Mbroady View Post
So nowhere in your post do you mention taking voice lessons. I was a terrible singer for many years. Some voice lessons, corrective action and several years of persistence, and not getting discouraged was key (Progress was slow at first)

I now like my voice and even get compliments. I am no spring chicken and realize that a future as a singer is unlikely but with some professional guidance and some persistence the joy of singing (well) is attainable, imho
Well stated. Assuming that ones voice is hopeless without even making the attempt to improve it is a tragedy. Everyone can sing, but it's up to the individual if they want to go through the effort or not.

I went through the greatest changes in my voice once I decided to actually try and do something about my voice, which I'd previously been less than satisfied with.
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  #24  
Old 08-11-2017, 06:05 PM
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Okay you want to try and sing. Here's what you do. Find a very basic song to experiment with. Like three chords. Now even though you can't sing you need to find the easiest key for you. So transpose it into several keys before you start. You don't want company or ears around so do this alone. Without pushing your voice try and find a key and a style of singing that may work. Now here's the important point. Listen to the guitar and your voice. If you are playing a G chord and you are close then try and adjust your voice to be in tune with it. If you listen you should be able to adjust your voice to be in tune with a basic G, C and D chord at least to hear a harmonizing occurring. If you can not tell if you are in tune or not then I'd suggest forgetting it. This is just to find a starting point. Good luck!
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