Summary
Objective
Musical theater (MT) performers are required to sing in several different styles,
requiring different registration (quality) and different use of vibrato. Many measures
of vibrato in MT performers are made in laboratory settings, studying a limited set
of pitches, intensities, and vowels, using amateur and not well-defined professional
singers. It is unclear if these observations are observed in well-known professional
MT singers, during live instrumentally accompanied legit and belt performances.
Study Design
Descriptive from a convenience sample.
Methods
Five well-known MT performers’ recordings of one legit and one belt performance were
downloaded for analysis of vocal vibrato. The vocal part was extracted from the recording
and each note demarcated with and without vibrato. The pitch track of each note was
analyzed for average pitch, duration, the proportion of a note sung with vibrato,
if present, and written to file. The pitch track (f0 and time stamps) was written
to a separate file for further analysis. This analysis consisted of vibrato rate (Hz),
vibrato extent (semitones), and cycle-to-cycle perturbation (jitter-local and shimmer-local).
Results
The most consistent finding was that the belt performances of the five singers had
lesser proportion of notes sung with vibrato than their legit performances. The next
consistent finding was that during belt performances, when vibrato was used, it was
for a shorter duration within a note. There was a trend for the average rate of vibrato
to be slower in the belt performances, but not to a substantial degree. There was
no clear difference between legit and belt performances for vibrato extent or cycle-to-cycle
perturbation.
Conclusions
For these five performers, the strategy for the use of vibrato most often employed
for differentiating the two singing styles was using less vibrato and when used to
engage it for a shorter portion of a sung note. We believe this study offers reasonable
ecological validity in how professional MT performers utilize vibrato to distinguish
between belt and legit styles of singing. Vibrato rate and extent are subject to a
number of factors which may not be in direct control of the singer. However, learning
to sing with and without vibrato and the duration to which it is produced within a
note may be a useful training strategy for students of MT.
Key Words
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: October 01, 2022
Accepted:
July 19,
2022
Publication stage
In Press Corrected ProofIdentification
Copyright
© 2022 The Voice Foundation. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
