No doubt Mariah has musical chops, but her inability to hold a single note without being compelled to throwing in embellishment after embellishment for no discernible purpose other than showing off really detracts from her listenability as a singer. She’s a great vocalist, but she’s a piss poor singer, in my opinion. OK, maybe piss poor is hyperbole, but she definitely falls towards the bad side of the spectrum.
I disagree. Just because she doesnt hold notes doesnt make her bad. It’s just a different style, and shows excellent dexterity.
That’s one way of looking at it. To me, dexterity is nothing. It’s like saying Yngwie Malmsteen is a great musician. He’s a dextrous guitarist, but he’s a shit musician. Mariah falls in the same category for me–soulless pyrotechnics.
Nico makes Lou Reed sound like Pavarotti.
Why has no one mentioned Fred Durst? I believe that’s who I’m thinking of – the guy from Limp Bizket – He almost makes Wesley Willis sound like Pavarotti.
The problem with this list is that each different genre has a different standard of good. I’ll admit that there may be circles in which F. Durst is considered a great vocalist, but there are those who feel the same way about Sid Vicious and Johnny Rotten.
I am a total fan of Bob Dylan, and (the master) Leonard Cohen, but they are not truly “singers” by any traditional definition, but they make a song work for both themselves and their audience. Tori Amos kind of falls into this category too, but her songs are so cryptic I don’t always follow them (though I enjoy listening).
Pet peeve are people who do the Mariah Carey thing and trill on endlessly and pointlessly – to me it often says “I can’t really hold this note, so I’ll just throw a bunch of runs in to cover that.” It may not be true or fair, but that really truly annoys me.
So who belongs on a list of people revered as great singers, but aren’t – don’t know because we don’t have a common groundwork on which to base any evaluations.
Is what is a good singer determined within a particular genre? Is there some absolute “this is a great singer” measure? Generally speaking, staying on pitch and singing a recognizable melody would be something I think you would need, but Dylan disproves that as he is able to convey things powerfully with his particular vocal style (not something I’d choose to just listen to as music, but powerful and affecting, I’ll give him that).
Basically what I’m saying is “No criteria, no argument” people will only post vocal styles they don’t like and there’s nothing wrong with that.
(Peter Cetera sucks too)
hear hear! The big difference, for me, between say Carey and Frank Sinatra is Sinatra understands implicitly what he’s singing, (he also understands who he’s singing it for) he cracks songs open and uses his voice, his tool, to get their core meaning across, while Carey could be singing a laundry list for all she seems to care.
mm
I would argue with those who say Mariah Carey is not a great singer, therefore she does all the vocal gymnastics. I would argue that she is a very talented singer; too talented, in fact, to be over-singing every single note like she does. If I were her vocal coach (and Christina Aguilera’s, too), I would slap that outta her so fast…
Take a listen to old Aretha, girls. Listen to someone who obviously has a voice as big as the great outdoors, and listen to her control and touch.
There are very, very few people who can manage the kind of range and pitch fidelity Mariah Carey pulls off during those flourishes, and Mariah does it almost effortlessly. The woman has a fantastic instrument, and knows very well how to control it. She ornaments to excess because she can. That it is often annoying a shit seems to have occurred to no one producing her recordings, which is a shame.
I am certainly in awe of Mariah’s range. She’s definitely got a fantastic set of pipes. I just think her musical appraoch is extremely over-ornamented, and that takes away from her value as a singer. As I’ve said in this thread, singing–to me at least–is more than just technique and emotion. One can be a great vocalist and a mediocre singer, just as one can be a mediocre vocalist and a great singer.
I saw a clip on TV the other day where Juliette Lewis was in the recording studio. You ever hear a sick cat howl?
Ah, I think we’re getting to the heart of the matter here. I consider vocalist and singer interchangeable - if you can’t handle the vocals, you aren’t a good singer by my standards, no matter how much passion and emotion you put into interpreting a song.
Everyone in here who is defending Mariah Carey should take a listen to Schascle if given the chance. She can belt out a tune with as much variation as Mariah or Whitney, but make it look easy. Leave 'em begging for more. Whereas the other two singers after the first two notes, just seem to be trying too hard. Which doesn’t make them bad singers.
However, I do think a good subjective test for if a singer is a bad one is not necessarily the extemes of “Can they hit and hold a note” or “Do I like their musical style”, but rather “if they were to cover a randomly picked song, how long would it be before I flipped the channel, or turned off or shot the radio?” Here, Mariah is in the same league as Dylan with me: I’d turn both of them off if they were singing the same average song. Whereas Schascle I would just sit entranced.
Well, that’s pretty much what I’ve ascertained. I’m a fairly decent musician myself, if I may say so, and I used to be very much about technique, and technique was mostly what mattered to me. However, at some point in time, I just had a, well, complete change in philosophy about music. There’s a lot more to music than just technique. And there is a lot more than passion, as well. But great technique with feeling–which is where I place Mariah and her ilk, even worse is Whitney Houston–is simply as bad as, if not worse than, shitty technique.
Someone like Tom Waits. He has “unconventional” technique. But, oh my God, he is so much a great musician. He understand the heart and soul of music. A lot of blues players fall into the same category. Not the greatest technique, but the expression of gods.
I mean, to each their own, but in the visual world, there are plenty of excellent draftsman–people who can recreate reality photorealistically with only a pencil and a sketchbook. But most of them are not Aritists with a capital “A.” This is my distinction between vocalist and singer. There certainly must be some technique, and the best singers combine technique and artistry, but I’m WAYYYY more forgiving of poor technique than poor artistry. Great vocalists are a dime a dozen. Great singers are rare indeed.
I agree. There seems to be rampant conflation of “vocalist”, and “artist” in this thread, such that a (reasonably) objective assessment of a talented singing voice cannot be separated from wildly subjective stylistic assessments. I do share the oppinion that it’s the combination of vocal talent and exceptional stylistic judgement or instinct that make the finest artists, but a good instrument is a good, instrument, regardless of how inspired the player.