# One Thing Leads to Another.....



## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

In the Classical Music general forum, Reichstag aus LICHT started a small thread on Strauss's _EIn Heldenleben_. This set the big opening melody to going in my head and I began to muse on some of my Rock and Pop favorites that had melismatic soaring swooping vocals that echoed or rather were suggestive of that grand Straussian passage. I thought of McCartney and Wings' _Jet_, ELO's _Livin' Thing_, Kate Bush's _Night of the Swallow_, and noted that these were British artists and no American examples popped into my mind. I have not bothered to exhaustively run through umpteen Rock or Pop songs, but I speculate that British and continental artists may have more familiarity and comfort with a broader European spectrum of influences--including CM--from which to draw inspiration than the older but more restricted American Rock 'n' Roll/ R&B/ Blues wellsprings. I also think of ABBA's sound as being distinctly non-American (but engaging!) when I first heard it.

One of the great sources of the richness of 20th century Rock and Pop was the conjoining of American and European approaches to the music. I think of the actor William Hurt's remark that he chose to follow the American path of the passion seeking the form rather than the British path of the form seeking the passion. But both approaches together helped form the glory decades of Rock and Pop.

I would be interested in examples that spring to mind of melisma in American Rock and Pop.


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## Conrad2 (Jan 24, 2021)

Strange Magic said:


> In the Classical Music general forum, Reichstag aus LICHT started a small thread on Strauss's _EIn Heldenleben_. This set the big opening melody to going in my head and I began to muse on some of my Rock and Pop favorites that had melismatic soaring swooping vocals that echoed or rather were suggestive of that grand Straussian passage. I thought of McCartney and Wings' _Jet_, ELO's _Livin' Thing_, Kate Bush's _Night of the Swallow_, and noted that these were British artists and no American examples popped into my mind. I have not bothered to exhaustively run through umpteen Rock or Pop songs, but I speculate that British and continental artists may have more familiarity and comfort with a broader European spectrum of influences--including CM--from which to draw inspiration than the older but more restricted American Rock 'n' Roll/ R&B/ Blues wellsprings. I also think of ABBA's sound as being distinctly non-American (but engaging!) when I first heard it.
> 
> One of the great sources of the richness of 20th century Rock and Pop was the conjoining of American and European approaches to the music. I think of the actor William Hurt's remark that he chose to follow the American path of the passion seeking the form rather than the British path of the form seeking the passion. But both approaches together helped form the glory decades of Rock and Pop.
> 
> I would be interested in examples that spring to mind of melisma in American Rock and Pop.


Does "Do or Die" by Thirty Seconds to Mar count as melisma singing? 




It start at around 1 minute and 58 second.


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## Conrad2 (Jan 24, 2021)

There is also an article by the BBC about Whitney Houston using melisma in her song. 
Link:


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Conrad2, your two examples do display melismatic singing, each in a somewhat different sense than the three songs I put forward. Thirty Seconds to Mars uses short anthemic phrases which sound very much like U2 was an inspiration, whereas Whitney uses melisma as an embellishment, a sort of decorative icing spread all over the skeleton of the basic melody. The examples I hope to find--or remember--would have the melisma more of an integral part of an extended melody, similar to the British songs. Thank you for your contributions.

I just remembered a Doo-*** classic, _Starlight_, by the Moonglows. Doo-*** may be a fertile genre to look into further.


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