I can totally see that. But I'd pitch a fit if MLB ever allowed them, not that I think there's any danger of it.

t xposted

Going back a bit, a dear, dear classmate of mine at NCSA had the absolute worst singing voice I'd ever heard. He had no conception of tune. He could hear music, he loved music, but he opened his mouth and, the sad truth was that his singing voice, unlike his melliflouous speaking voice and enormous acting talent, was purely painful to listen to: harsh, grating, all over the scale. It took a full semester, patience from the class, and dedication of the teacher and much, much extracurricular work by the student, but by the end of the semester he could follow notes on a page up and down the scale. He actually almost achieved on-tune for a couple of very familiar simple melodies. He worked so hard to acheive that, we were all so proud of him. Not a one of us hoped he'd go into musical comedy, though, since his singing voice remained about as pleasant as scraping metal over gravel.

Edited to add my point, which is, technique can be taught. But if there's no talent there, it can be a pretty pointless exercise.

Bev, as you know, the female protagonist in the Weaver series, Penny, has precisely that issue. It was her reason for choosing Jacobean and Elizabethan drama as a career; iambic pentameter is as close as she gets to singing.

It was rereading bits of Weaver that brought my friend to mind, Deb. "It's all connected!"

Huh, how does that happen, that some people have beautiful speaking voices and can't sing at all? Cause you'd think it would follow.

erika, isn't that weird? My sister Alice is the model here. I have a superb speaking voice - no modesty on this one - and in fact, my entire family have deep, melodious voices. That includes Alice - her voice, among the three female children, is very slightly higher than mine or Frieda's.

Her singing voice - even an attempt to hum - is an atonal twangy drone. She's taken singing lessons, she's taken breath and diaphragm control lessons, she loves music with a passion that makes her cry. She can't reproduce a single note of it.

And she's the same with dance. She takes yoga, has done for decades. She's very light and graceful while walking.

And despite attempt after attempt to learn dance, she can't. Not at all. But on that one, I think she herself has the reason why - she feels it's a control thing, that it comes from the same space in her psyche or spirit that makes her impossible to hypnotise. She refuses to let go of herself enough to trust what she can do.

The singing, though, no. Just - something gets lost in the translation between ear and throat and brain and whatever.

And she would kill for it to not be the case. My father was a jazz musician, I play a mess of instruments and sing (had my own band for awhile), other siblings sing. She got my mother's talent (drawing) but it's no solace to her.

WHOOHOO!

Too early to post this in Beep Me, but I think I'll post it here and in Literary, just to let people know early:

I've just spoken to Delancey St. Foundation and there will be a READERVILLE WRITERS EVENING on Satuday, January 24th, 5pm. My friend was very excited and immediately started brainstorming the marketing/advertising of the event. It could be an enormous crowd!

These are the authors to date:

Danyel Smith, Kevin Brennan, Ellen Sussman, Sandra Gulland, Meg White, Anne Ursu, Susan Ito, Deborah Grabien, Russell Rowland, Marta Randall, Ayelet Waldman, Rosemary Graham, Michelle Richmond, Victoria Zackheim

I am soooooo pleased about this. I'll post as we get closer.

I don't think either one of my voices either singing or speaking would get tomatoes thrown at me.(Or roses, either.) But I carry a tune a little. My dad wanted to be a musician once.

Well, for a speaking voice, the controlling is much different.

My speaking voice sounds just about as I'd wish it. My singing voice doesn't obey simple commands like "up" or "down". I suspect this has something to do with me badly re-learning how to use my vocal chords after losing my voice for a couple weeks, since I had been in the choir, unappallingly, in grade school.

It's like watching people learn martial arts techniques. I'm thinking "well, roll over your hips" and, although rolling over your hips isn't precisely difficult, they can't integrate that into the rest of the motion. Whereas me, my problem is that I don't always remember to put all the pieces together. But I can.

ita, it's a damned good analogy.