There’s been a bit of back and forth between my husband and another fella on Happy Rhodes’ Wikipedia page. We had a link to a portion of a live song that I think is the highest note Happy has sung (at least, it’s the highest note we have a recording of). Someone else took it out, saying it was wrong. The “citation needed” is understandable, but why take out the musical clip which provides the proof? My husband just put it back, but neither one of us is versed in musical notation. Would somene who knows about notes take a listen and tell us what note that is she sings? How can we prove it, to add the citation that’s requested? We want the Wikipedia page to be correct.
If this person takes it out again, the song can be found here. A video of the performance is here. The note she sings is at the very beginning. In fact, it’s a mistake because she started the song in the wrong key.
Assuming the MIDI on my computer is on pitch, that’s a D. Which octave, I’m not sure, (a vocalist or a musician who works with vocalists could probably tell you*), but I think it’s, as they say, “Three D’s above middle C.”
As to how to prove “that note is a D in such-and-such octave,” I think the soundclip is sufficient. I can’t think of what else you could add.
-FrL-
*I’m having trouble figuring out how to explain why its hard for me to say what octave she’s singing in. When I do music, its on guitar, or on my computer, and I’ve not really worked with voice notation before. I don’t have a grip on which C is considered “middle C” for voice. I’m not sure why it is, but I can’t just hear a new instrument and immediately tell you what octave it’s playing in. Its as though, for me, octaves are not commensurate across instruments. I don’t know if that’s actually the case but its how it is for my little-trained ear.
Thanks for checking it out Frylock. If someone else could tell me the octave, that’d be great. Here’s a screenshot of the note being played in the program Transcribe, used to transcribe music. The way we’re reading this is D comes after C in every octave, so that note is D6, two octaves above middle C. Is that not right?
Did you say “I now know” because I said that or because you checked it out elsewhere? Because we could be wrong. We know dick-all about musical notation, and it could be named Bob for all we know. We just thought, in a common-sensical world, the note would be D6, since it comes right after C6. This other fella insists she hit a D5, not a D6, so I’m all confused. Like you, that screenshot from Transcribe looks pretty straightforward, but since the note itself is not named, I just want to make sure it is, in fact, D6.
I know now that the way to actually write down what I was calling “Third D above middle C” is as follows: D6.
You’re reading the keyboard right. The note just to the right of C6 is D6. (Hast to be. Its certainly not D5. And the only other option is, what, D7? That would just help your case!)
The only thing I wouldn’t have been sure about without looking at a keyboard with labels on it was which number is associated with which octave. I didn’t know if middle C was C1, C2, C3, or what.
The sound recording itself is a citation. If anybody says otherwise, tell them to speak to me Seriously, though: If somebody wanted a citation that the Mona Lisa has dark hair, you’d link to a photograph of the painting, not to a description of it.
Edit: aide memoire for C3/4/5 nomenclature: A440=A4
That’s a very confusing page, but this caught my eye:
“Some MIDI documentation uses C3 to represent middle C”
We think this fella thought middle C was C3 instead of C4, and that’s why he said she sang a D5 instead of a D6. It’s the only thing we can figure.
I agree, 100%, which is why we found it so odd that he would delete the music clip as well as saying that we’re wrong. My husband put back the music clip, and added a screenshot of Transcribe, so I hope that’s good enough. I wish more singers whose fans claim they have an impossible range had such proof as music clips and Transcribe screenshots, sheesh!
So many people claim a “4 octave range” and Happy has one of the widest ranges we know, so we went on a quest to find her highest and lowest notes. I actually think she’s sung higher but I’m not sure where it is. The ‘singing in the wrong key’ note on Queen’s “Lily of the Valley” is the easiest one to point to. She sings both high and low all the time, but we think her lowest note is in the music sample linked on the page. If I could trouble people to please listen to that short clip and confirm (or correct) our conclusions, I’d appreciate it so much.
My husband put up another screenshot of the low note at the Wikipedia page, in the Vocal Range section. That is A2, right?
From what we can gather, she does not in fact have a 4 octave range, at least not in our samples. We want to be absolutely sure that our claim of three and a half octaves is correct.
Once we’re absolutely sure we know how to read this program correctly, Chris wants to use the program on people like Minnie Ripperton, Yma Sumac and Mariah Carey (all of whom probably do have a 4 or greater octave range) to find out their true ranges. Kate Bush too, because people claim that Kate has a “4 octave voice” but Happy’s range is wider than Kate’s and if Happy doesn’t have a 4 octave voice, then neither does Kate.
I’m no trained singer, not by a long way. I’d normally describe my voice as a typical bass range (E2-E4 on a good day). I just tried fiddling around with the piano, and managed to sing an ascent through to A5 with little effort. I’m pretty sure that the ability to do this is far from unusual - it’s just that it’s rarely put into practice or developed enough to have reliable and musical control.
Seriously, though: If somebody wanted a citation that the Mona Lisa has dark hair, you’d link to a photograph of the painting, not to a description of it.
