# Timbre and Voice Type



## BalalaikaBoy (Sep 25, 2014)

the more I listen to female opera singers, it seems like timbre is correlated more with how lyric/dramatic the voice is rather than the range. more specifically, it seems like the timbre of the middle voice is more correlated with vocal weight while the timbre of the head voice is more correlated with range. this is most noticeable when listening to the differences between dramatic sopranos and dramatic mezzos. in the middle range, they often sound virtually identical, but going higher and higher, the dramatic soprano can stay up their longer and has more ring to the voice, while the dramatic mezzo will want to come back down. 

for male opera singers, timbre and fach seem much more closely related, with the exception of really dark baritones who sound like basses and the occasional spinto tenor with a dark, baritonal middle voice *looks at Jonas Kaufmann*


----------



## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

I want to respond to this but I'm having some trouble understanding it. Maybe it's just me? I'll make a stab anyway, and you can tell me if I'm off base.

Dramatic sopranos do tend to sound more mezzo-ish than lyrics. Bigger voices do tend to have a fuller sound in the middle and lower ranges. This has partly (mostly?) to do with the demands of composers, who in writing serious, highly dramatic roles require the ability to express strong emotions in all parts of the voice. It's unusual to have a full, mezzo-ish sound down low, suitable for dramatic parts like Aida, Gioconda, or Isolde, and also the capacity to achieve sustained, floating lyricism in the upper range. Lighter, more slender voices which are comfortable for long periods of time in the high range suggest youth and lighter emotions, and are less suited to, and have less capacity to express, violent, tragic emotions. Composers know this and tend to write for one type or the other, more or less. As the orchestra became a bigger factor in 19th- and 20th-century opera, and coloratura vocal display a smaller one, bigger-voiced sopranos with stronger lower ranges were required. Wagner's hochdramatische roles make as great a demand on the low voice as on the high, and some of his roles - Ortrud and Kundry, for example - are sung by both mezzos and sopranos (he called both of these, and Brangaene as well, soprano roles).

I think, then, that the correlation of timbre with dramatic capacity is partly a result of the historical evolution of musical style. Great voices of the mezzo-ish dramatic soprano type in the 20th century were Flagstad, Traubel, Farrell, and Norman. Nilsson was interesting for having a more slender, less mezzo-like timbre and a higher overall range, but she had such power and brilliance that the lack of fullness and weight in the lower midrange hardly mattered. 

Of course some of the most demanding bel canto roles ideally require the full range of vocal effects - dramatic, lyric, and coloratura - and a few singers, such as Callas and Ponselle, could more or less do it all, at least for part of their careers. Ponselle had a somewhat limited top, but with the rich timbre and power of a true dramatic soprano, the ablity to float the voice effortlessly, and a highly accomplished coloratura technique, she could sing virtually anything for soprano effectively except stratospheric coloratura. No accident that she was the only soprano Callas cared to listen to.


----------



## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

That said, I don't prefer mezzos who have a bright, soprano sound. I like a darker color.


----------



## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

BalalaikaBoy said:


> the more I listen to female opera singers, it seems like timbre is correlated more with how lyric/dramatic the voice is rather than the range.
> 
> for male opera singers, timbre and fach seem much more closely related, with the exception of really dark baritones who sound like basses and the occasional spinto tenor with a dark, baritonal middle voice *looks at Jonas Kaufmann*


Continuing the discussion, I see the relation of timbre and fach in dramatic tenors to be pretty similar to that in dramatic sopranos, and for similar reasons. It appears that "dramatic" or "spinto" tenors as we know them didn't really exist before the 19th century, if we accept the general wisdom that tenors had previously sung high notes with some kind of "voix mixte." But certainly the demand on tenors for increasing power and the need to compete with heavier orchestration led to a fatter, weightier sound. In the case of Wagner, in roles like Tristan, Siegmund, and Siegfried, we find the same tendencies we see in his dramatic soprano parts, namely a general lowering of the tessitura and a greater demand for a strong lower voice, putting a lot of climactic passages around the passaggio, which can be stressful for normal tenor voices. This is why several noted Wagnerian tenors, such as Melchior and Vinay (and even Domingo, if we want to confer on him that distinction - and why not?) have begun as baritones who found they could handle Wagner's rather modest demand for notes above A. Melchior, of course, developed an astonishing, trumpet-like upper register, but felt uncomfortable in a role like Walther in _Meistersinger_ which, he said, keeps the voice high too much of the time. I suppose the most famous dramatic tenor role outside Wagner is that of Otello, which requires not only power and resonance throughout the voice but frequent high notes such as Wagner rarely asks for, which probably explains why great Otellos are about as rare as great Tristans.

The relationship of timbre to fach in lower male voices seems to me not as close, except perhaps in the so-called Verdi baritone, where we want exceptional brilliance and power in the upper range. Actual timbre, though, might vary considerably, as we hear in recorded examples ranging from the more slender, almost tenorish quality of a Battistini to the deep roar of a Ruffo. Similar requirements, though with a slightly lower tessitura, may apply to the bass-baritone roles of Wagner, such as Wotan or the Dutchman, which make great demands on power and range and are best served by a voice of darkish timbre such as Schorr, Hotter, or London.

Timbral expectations we have of other low-voice male fachs are, I suspect, determined more by conventional associations with certain character types (villains, fathers, etc.). A dark, cavernous commendatore or Hagen, or a warm, mellow Sarastro or Gurnemanz, is dramatically ideal but not required by the physical demands of the music.


----------

