Has science really discovered what causes the 'tingle' factor?

[Serial_Apologist]

Or margerine?

[Simon]

Margarine, S-A. Really - it's not good enough - it's the choir board you're on now, you know!

[Simon]

...did Britten write Flora’s part with a girl’s voice in mind?

Did Britten do anything with girls in mind?

[Wolsey]

You can't train a girl to sing with a boy's voice, or vice versa. Each voice has its unique quality - though of course you can get them to use different registers, or adjust any vibrato, or change the tone somewhat.



Yes - and most of the time I bet you can! But that was my earlier point - some girl ensembles, by chance, seem to sound so like boys that one can be mistaken, at least in the short term.

It's sixteen years since the gauntlet was thrown down by the Salisbury Cathedral CD Canticum Novum (Guild) which marked the recording debut of the girls' choir there: the CD booklet challenged the listener to guess which tracks were sung by the boys or the girls. You can find sample tracks here http://www.guildmusic.com/shop/wbc.php?sid=8623700e7f5&tpl=produktdetail.html&pid =60&recno=2&recno={wbc.srecord}# and on iTunes, but their identities are shown - which, of course, defeats the challenge originally set in 1994. Can you really tell the difference?

[Paul Sherratt]

Jonathan Miller included the voice of Tammy Wynette in a list of sounds that tingled his factor.
I'm with him on that score.

[Mary Chambers]

Thinking about the difference between boy’s and girls’ voice, did Britten write Flora’s part with a girl’s voice in mind?

He auditioned young girls for the part of Flora, but couldn't find anyone he thought good enough, so eventually abandoned the idea of casting a child. He probably made the part a bit more difficult once he decided on a small adult (Olive Dyer) - but since then at least two girls in the 13-15 age range have sung the part very successfuly.

[doversoul1]

Mary

Thank you!!

[kernelbogey]

Can you really tell the difference?

Many thanks, Wolsey, will listen to this when I have a chance - not for a day or two alas. BW, kb

[decantor]

Did Britten do anything with girls in mind?

A fair question, I suppose, allowing for the LOL. But the Ceremony of Carols, now usually regarded as firmly in boys' territory, is dedicated to Ursula Nettleship (director of an Aldeburgh choir with women's voices), and was first performed in Norwich in 1942 by the women's voices of the Fleet Street Choir. On the other hand, it is inscribed "For treble voices" - possibly a trained boys' unit was hard to come by in the middle of the war (though I doubt that was the reason Britten went to America!)

I belong in the company of those who prefer boys' voices for liturgical music. Given notes around Middle C, where the chest register is usually unmistakeable, or some high blasts requiring great power, I can distinguish boys from girls. Without those clues, my innocent ear can easily mis-identify, both ways round and for both solo and chorus, despite nearly 60 years of listening; yet I still choose to believe that boys pack a special punch. But there is rarely any difficulty in distinguishing children's voices from mature women's voices - that is the really meaningful watershed. I'm therefore intrigued by the 8kHz 'shimmer' that started this thread: might there not even be an evolutionary advantage in children's voices (screaming, perhaps) having an unambiguous sonority?

[kernelbogey]

....might there not even be an evolutionary advantage in children's voices (screaming, perhaps) having an unambiguous sonority?

What an interesting idea. It's almost impossible to ignore the cry of a baby: I understand that we are programmed to find it disturbing.

[DracoM]

Exactly agree, Simon.
The under/overtones in boys' voices are usually unmistakable. Interestingly, boys have just a tad more strain producing / reaching for certain frequencies and in that tension you can detect the masculine. Girls generally sail through more evenly and in the process actually flatten out tensions and excitements by finding it usually easier to sing certain parts of the stave. Don't ask me why, I don't know. Just that composers of yesteryear intuitively knew where these tension points are and exploited them to dramatic effect. Besides the fact that the boy voice is what they heard every day and thus wrote for, responding again intuitively to the topography of it.

[Simon]

re: #19 - I'd have a go Wolsey - if the web address you provided could be contacted! Could you have another look, please? Cheers!

[ardcarp]

Simon and Wolsey. I've probably posted along these lines before, but I can remember being bowled over by Salisbury's first CE broadcast with girls. I was expecting (unjustly) a somewhat effete sound, but on the contrary a strong and confident performance was elicited by Richard Seal, indeed a pioneer. The tone had an 'edge' to it, and was by no means pure 'head voice', as I recall.