Here he is singing “Cara Mia”. Any male popular artists with that range singing today?
Not that I know of. Jay Black was a mutant. I once heard him sing that song live, and he held the note (starts at 1:45) for at least twice as long, and drop right back into the song without a pause.
Weird… I just listened to that song while I got my hair cut yesterday (and it fit the ambiance; salon was decorated in 1962 and never “updated”).
He shifts into falsetto for that octave, but I’m not sure many American Idol contestants would know what I mean, much less how to do it effectively.
ETA: Except I was listening but not writing;
I had not heard that. That was schmaltz-errific; what a vocal talent. His vocal style is more grounded in opera-ish techniques than your average rock/pop performer, but from a range/vocal quality standpoint a few guys that have similarly high-quality voices today could include Bruno Mars, **Jim James *of My Morning Jacket, **Colin Melloy **of The Decemberists (who sounds like a prog John Denver to me) and Prince…oh, and **Thom Yorke **of Radiohead, easily.
ETA: And what about that flamboyant American Idol guy - Adam Lambert?
*I really need to listen to more of MMJ; I only know snippets.
Prince - How Come You Don’t Call Me Anymore. I love Alicia Keys’ cover, but her version doesn’t compare to the original B-side here. Simple piano accompaniment, a bit of echo on the vocal at key spots. Bam.
It ain’t operatic, and in this song, he stays mostly in falsetto, but his vocal technique and fluid range are just amazing. I love the stretch from about 1:40 or so, the second verse - “I stilllllllll like it better when you’re holding me tight.”
That’s just a very high, controlled falsetto. Lots of people can do that - I know a countertenor who can still go baritone - but maybe not so many these days in contemporary music. Freddie Mercury perhaps. And he’s got the most amazing successor - if you’ve never heard him before, you have got to watch this: Marc Martel doing Somebody to Love. Here’s him talking about singing, falsetto, and doing Nessun Dorma explaning that he’s tuned it down a semitone so he doesn’t have to use falsetto.
How about Justin Hawkins from The Darkness - best exemplified by “I Believe in a Thing Called Love”?
No longer with us, not as operatic, but Gene Pitney had some range.
The Range Place is an entire forum dedicated to discussion of singers’ vocal ranges you might check out.
Honestly, I would argue that his range isn’t really that special. he’s got a mid C* in falsetto, and a G in full voice, and only goes down to E an octave below that G. Even with the falsetto, that’s not even a two octave range, which is the norm for most singers, I believe.
*It’s the tenor high C, but for falsetto high C usually means the octave above that, i.e., the soprano high C.
Been looking at a few of the comments and I notice someone mentioned Jay Black goes into a falsetto for part of Cara Mia. And that a lot of singers can do that and for the most that’s true. But to do it as good as him is something else! But if you wanna hear someone who doesn’t go into a falsetto, listen to Gene Pitney’s version of Cara Mia! But getting back to Jay Black, he simply has a great voice no matter what! Wayne Arthur