"Analysis of voice tracks isolated from full band recordings suggested that the singing voice range
was 37 semitones within the pitch range of F#2 (about 92.2 Hz) to G5 (about 784 Hz)."
They obviously didn't listen to live recordings. He sustained Bb5's (3 semitones higher than G5) easily during live improvisations.
EDIT. They said that vocal improvisations weren't available as data material for this study. I wonder why.
They said that it wasn't clear whether Mercury had whistle register or not as they couldn't identify if the E6 in It's Late was sung by him. Freddie did do whistle register in one of the Impromptu's and one Under Pressure during the Works tour. Also, Save Me has whistles during the guitar solo "ooooah (full voice), aaaaw, aaaauuuh, yeah (full voice again). If one hasn't heard the isolated version, his screams are buried in the mix and sound like a guitar.
Biggus Dickus wrote: "Analysis of voice tracks isolated from full band recordings suggested that the singing voice range
was 37 semitones within the pitch range of F#2 (about 92.2 Hz) to G5 (about 784 Hz)."
They obviously didn't listen to live recordings. He sustained Bb5's (3 semitones higher than G5) easily during live improvisations.
EDIT. They said that vocal improvisations weren't available as data material for this study. I wonder why.
Because they didn't bother to look for them.
BradF wrote:
So, what piece of audio demonstrates the highest note Freddie ever hit?
Several live clips from 1979 has Freddie hitting E6s and F6s during the improv middle-section of Get Down, Make Love
Biggus Dickus wrote: "Analysis of voice tracks isolated from full band recordings suggested that the singing voice range
was 37 semitones within the pitch range of F#2 (about 92.2 Hz) to G5 (about 784 Hz)."
They obviously didn't listen to live recordings. He sustained Bb5's (3 semitones higher than G5) easily during live improvisations.
EDIT. They said that vocal improvisations weren't available as data material for this study. I wonder why.
Because they didn't bother to look for them.
BradF wrote:
So, what piece of audio demonstrates the highest note Freddie ever hit?
Several live clips from 1979 has Freddie hitting E6s and F6s during the improv middle-section of Get Down, Make Love
London 5/9/1984 - Under Pressure has an F6 during the "Why" section.
Tokyo 25/4/1979 - Don't Stop Me Now has a few whistle notes during the instrumental section.
Just to name a few :)
-Chin
It's strange to me for this to be a massively in depth study of his voice, only to limit their research to a relatively small seletion of easily available recordings. Did they not also consider things such as 'Exercises in Free Love', and Barcelona demos where Freddie mimicked a soprano?
cmsdrums wrote:
It's strange to me for this to be a massively in depth study of his voice, only to limit their research to a relatively small seletion of easily available recordings. Did they not also consider things such as 'Exercises in Free Love', and Barcelona demos where Freddie mimicked a soprano?
They clearly only looked at some of the Queen albums.
Also, as cool as this may be, I really have to call BS on it. It's not in-depth scientific, when their subject of interest is dead, and they have no actual, scientific, stuff to base their "study" on.
cmsdrums wrote:
It's strange to me for this to be a massively in depth study of his voice, only to limit their research to a relatively small seletion of easily available recordings. Did they not also consider things such as 'Exercises in Free Love', and Barcelona demos where Freddie mimicked a soprano?
They clearly only looked at some of the Queen albums.
Also, as cool as this may be, I really have to call BS on it. It's not in-depth scientific, when their subject of interest is dead, and they have no actual, scientific, stuff to base their "study" on.
I think they primarly went for the tracks that had an acapella version available. That's probably why they declared the highest note of Freddie as the G5 from Let's Turn It On. I remember that acapella version is on the Freddie Mercury Collection box set. Obviously they didn't bother going for the live notes or the backing vocal notes.
also if I'm not wrong the article doesn't mention Freddie's extra four wisdom teeth. It seems like the resulting shape of Freddie's mouth could be considered another factor. hope I'm not splitting any mustache hairs lol
By the way, Dr Bri was quite nasty with the authors of the article, and then he received a letter from one of them, realised his error and apologised.
It's relatively easy to get things right, way too easy to get things wrong and even easier to deny your mistakes or get defensive about them. What he did, on the other hand, shows what a top bloke he is.
Well done BHM.
Sebastian wrote:
By the way, Dr Bri was quite nasty with the authors of the article, and then he received a letter from one of them, realised his error and apologised.
It's relatively easy to get things right, way too easy to get things wrong and even easier to deny your mistakes or get defensive about them. What he did, on the other hand, shows what a top bloke he is.
Well done BHM.
Indeed - great to see Brian's humble response.
Now, if he can just admit he is wrong to continue employing someone as his archivist that 'talks' to his customers in the way the current one does, we can all move along!! :-)
Sebastian wrote:
By the way, Dr Bri was quite nasty with the authors of the article, and then he received a letter from one of them, realised his error and apologised.
It's relatively easy to get things right, way too easy to get things wrong and even easier to deny your mistakes or get defensive about them. What he did, on the other hand, shows what a top bloke he is.
Well done BHM.
Indeed - great to see Brian's humble response.
Now, if he can just admit he is wrong to continue employing someone as his archivist that 'talks' to his customers in the way the current one does, we can all move along!! :-)