Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Neil D
Date: 02 Dec 09 - 08:56 PM

Mick Jagger
John Fogerty

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Joe Nicholson
Date: 03 Dec 09 - 07:36 PM

They used to call Bing Crosby The Old Groaner he could groan for me anytime
Joe Nicholson

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 03 Dec 09 - 07:45 PM

A bit unkind this thread, or what?
So I won't name any names, tho' I can think of a few whose songs are spell-binding, great lyrics, even if they haven't got the greatest voices.
But I saw one last week, who writes great songs, sings in tune BUT has a horrible rasp in his voice that turns me right off: makes me want to clear his throat for him or tell him that as he's using a mike, he doesn't have to shout down it.
And just another (sexist?) observation: it's easier for men with not very good voices to get away with it than it is for women (being one myself)!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Peter T.
Date: 03 Dec 09 - 08:34 PM

Janis Joplin was one of the great singers of the last 50 years. She was like Garland or Pavarotti or Edith Piaf -- when she sang it was with her entire being, and after she was done there was nothing left.   If you don't understand that, there is really no help for you.

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Sheridan
Date: 03 Dec 09 - 10:32 PM

If you believe the entries in this thread, apparently nobody can sing.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 04 Dec 09 - 01:21 AM

Am I alone in having always found Joni Mitchell much overrated? — diction dodgy so that one longed for subtitles or a cribsheet of the words [interesting that the BigYellowTaxi version I have just played on YouTube, to check I wasn't being unfair posting this, has the words printed alongside]; sentiments not all that original or profound; tunes not particularly interesting or catchy. I have long felt she was one of those most fortunate in having made the impact which she did.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Dick The Box
Date: 04 Dec 09 - 03:11 AM

My sewing machine is a great singer but it can't sing.......

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST
Date: 04 Dec 09 - 05:56 AM

Here's a sweeping generalisation regarding male singers but I think there is some of truth in it. Folk singers tend to sing slightly flat (Leonard Cohen, Dubliners) and country singers slightly sharp (George Jones, Dwight Yoakam).

OK, I can think of one exception straight away. Johnny Cash. Maybe that's why he has more "street cred" among folkies (in the UK anyway).

Feel free to tear my hypothesis to shreds (as if you needed an invitation).

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Peter T.
Date: 04 Dec 09 - 03:40 PM

You know, there are few finer things in life than getting the opportunity to tell someone that if they don't get Janis Joplin, they need to rethink. One of those finer things is to tell someone who thinks that Joni Mitchell is overrated that they themselves are overrated as human beings, and should perhaps turn in their "Human Here" badge.

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 04 Dec 09 - 03:53 PM

LOL! I tend to agree, Peter.

However, you also said: "Janis Joplin was one of the great singers of the last 50 years. She was like Garland or Pavarotti or Edith Piaf -- when she sang it was with her entire being, and after she was done there was nothing left.   If you don't understand that, there is really no help for you."

Fine, Peter.

Fine.

I am going to go out right now into the backyard and blow my worthless brains out with this little peashooter I have here. ;-)

I hope you will be wracked with guilt over what you have done this day...

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 04 Dec 09 - 03:56 PM

I tend to sing sharp...if I sing unaccompanied by an instrument. I slowly go sharper and sharper. Boy, is it ever annoying. I think it's an after-effect of my years in school choruses. Almost everyone else tended to sing flat...so I kept singing sharp to try and pull them up. It became an unconscious reflex after that.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 04 Dec 09 - 05:49 PM

Reading all (or mostly all) of this, I go back to a basic truth. We sometimes accuse people of not being able to sing because the vocal quality doesn't agree; i.e., it's rough or sandpapery, reedy or nasal or like gargling marbles (Waits). But, what you find is that nearly all who have become famous, whether you like them or not, do have basic musicality and can carry a tune.

Go back as far as Louis Armstrong or Jack Teagarden; even Jimmy Durante. None were noted for clarity or beautiful tone, but all could carry a song with great feeling and style. People loved their singing. Rod Stewart and Dylan have both been excoriated for their vocalizing by some. Maybe it's an acquired taste, but SOMETHING made them hugely popular.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 04 Dec 09 - 09:30 PM

PeterT & LittleHawk: could you please tell me what you so admire about Joni Mitchell which will contradict what I wrote above? I am not meaning to be contentious here, just genuinely curious to know what I am missing. I mean, the 'tree museum - dollar & a half' bit amuses, sure; but the actual dystopic sentiments of BYT [which I think will be accepted as one of her 'signature' compositions] are surely quite banal & oft-expressed; & the tune is nothing-xtra, is it?

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 04 Dec 09 - 10:18 PM

I mean, I know comparisons are odious & all that: but J Mitchell seems to me to be up there in public regard with the likes of the really important singer-songwriters [Paxton, Bogle, et al]: & I really cannot see why. Their messages, re personal relationships & FX of war respectively, genuinely make a contribution to important public attitudes. What was Joni's contribution?

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,seth in Olympia
Date: 04 Dec 09 - 11:15 PM

Most of the non-singin' artists here mentioned are much loved by me, and have been for a long time. What grates on my ears are the singers with huge voices whose singing is terrible, particularly evident in any mall, drugstore, supermarket in the U.S. at this time of year. Frank, Bing, Johnny M. had the chops and the even the artistic sensibility to do anything they wanted, why they would whore themselves out to do awful Christmas songs is beyond me. I've found that not so many agree with me on this, I guess hearing Bing bleat out "Let it Snow" one more time is essential to the warp and weft of the Christmas season for a lot of folks. However, if once, while walking through the local Safeway, I heard "Christmas Card from a Hooker in Minneapolis", that would make my afternoon for sure.
seth

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Dec 09 - 12:06 AM

MtheGM - Well, I was never much impressed by that song Joni Mitchell did about the parking lot either...although it's got a catchy and enjoyable tune. It's a very lighthearted song, seems to me, nothing that ever pretended to be very deep. I think she was mainly just having fun with the vocals on that one.

However, if you look through the whole catalog of all the work she's done, aside from the odd radio hit she's had here and there, it's quite remarkable in both its musicality, its variety, its intelligence, and its lyrical content. She's one hell of a fine musician, and an extremely capable singer too, plus a great songwriter. I think most in the folk field would agree with me on that. She's also very unique. No one else sounds like Joni Mitchell, but I know more than a few female singers who have tried to.

I personally never liked her material as much as I did that of Buffy Sainte-Marie and Joan Baez, but that's just my personal taste. It's not my evaluation of Joni's talents and abilities. I have a thing for intense female singers with dark hair who sing about social causes...and Joan and Buffy were of that type. Joni Mitchell was a different type. She's more eclectic or something...very artsy...off on her own creative trip...sort of like a latter day jazz beatnik combination. She looks like she should be wearing a black beret and painting impressionist oils between gigs. (and she does paint) ;-) That style of hers didn't interest me as much as Baez and Buffy's did, but I sure respect her musical ability.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 05 Dec 09 - 12:15 AM

Fair enough, Little Hawk. Thank you for your thoughtful analysis. I still can't, however, rate her diction highly; which matters a great deal, particularly in singing songs of 'significant' content. Nor do I agree about the tune of BYT, which I find uninspired and uninspiring.

I think Baez who, tho she sang other 'contemp' writers' work, didn't, I believe, write much of her own material, and started out, unlike Mitchell & Ste-Marie, as traditional, is not in quite the same category - would you agree?

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Peter T.
Date: 05 Dec 09 - 08:02 AM

Little Hawk said a few good things. The two finest things about Mitchell were (1) that she expressed in a powerful way a whole range of female emotion that essentially captured (and helped shape) a whole generation -- from her first album to "Blue" -- "Blue" is a masterpiece of mood and experience (I would say that it is not just my opinion) and after ("Hejira" is where I get to in this line -- "Amelia" is an astonishing poetic work); and (2) she is one of the great experimenters -- her open tunings and playing and jazz -- not all of which I go for -- are so far beyond what other singer-songwriters do that she is in a category by herself. And she started out, really, when there was nothing like it in women in popular music. (Now Jonis are everywhere).

I don't really understand the diction issue. Vowels, consonants, all there in the right order. She sings clearly enough for me.

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Dec 09 - 10:34 AM

"I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Bryan Ferry and, of course Elvis Presley."

Holy cow! How can you possibly say Elvis couldn't sing? What planet are you on? What made him so great was that he combined an extraordinarily beautiful, flexible and powerful voice with an unmatched ability to read a song and move the listener.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Molly
Date: 05 Dec 09 - 11:03 AM

Johnny Cash certainly but my alltime un-favourite is Roy flaming Orbison! Talk about wobble!!!
But, as summed up beautifully in a previous comment technical ability is irrelevant if you can't "put a song across".

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Dec 09 - 12:17 PM

MtheGM - As Peter says, Joni Mitchell's early albums through to the album "Blue" were absolutely classic, and "Blue" is a masterpiece. She was also, as he says, a great innovator.

In Joan Baez's case, well, she was just untouchable when she first appeared on the scene...she was the Queen...the Madonna...she was it. And everything (in female folksingers) that followed after for quite some time would be compared to Joan Baez. But she didn't write songs at all when she started out. She did write some poetry, but was under the impression she could not write songs. Bob Dylan advised her one day (over a coffee) that anyone could write songs. By the late 60s she was writing some songs. At first I would say they were...interesting...but a bit stilted. She hit her stride, however, in the mid-70s and began writing some very good material. The standout is the song "Diamonds and Rust", which I think is a masterpiece.

Now, in Buffy's case...she did actually do some trad songs on her early albums, but for the most part she was writing her own songs about personal viewpoints and/or social issues, and they were very good. I think Buffy Sainte-Marie is one of the finest songwriters, composers, and performers that I have ever seen.

As for Janis Joplin, I agree with Peter's remarks that she gave herself entirely over to the performance...yes...but I can barely stand to listen to how she sings, and I DO know someone who ruined her own voice and permanently damaged it by trying to sound just like Janis Joplin (God knows why anyone would do that...). One Joplin song I do thoroughly enjoy, though, is "Take a Piece of my Heart", backed by Big Brother and the Holding Company. That one was darned good.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: frogprince
Date: 05 Dec 09 - 02:05 PM

For my two cents worth, I think "The Circle Game" has it all: melody, imagery, universality. Love it.
                     Dean

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Dec 09 - 11:30 PM

Me too.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 05 Dec 09 - 11:45 PM

Little Hawk(yo-ho):"...I tend to sing sharp...if I sing unaccompanied by an instrument. I slowly go sharper and sharper...."

Don't B flat, B sharp, but B natural!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,specs7
Date: 05 Dec 09 - 11:58 PM

I remember many years ago some critic saying about Johnny Cash that he sure made a lot of money for someone who sang like a bullfrog.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Dec 09 - 12:11 AM

Definitions matter of course — so let's get back to basics on this thread:—

Someone please define 'Top'
Ditto 'Great'
Ditto 'Singers'
Ditto 'Can't'
Dito 'Sing'

I think we might all just agree as to meaning of number, 'ten' [tho nobody seems to be considering selves in any way confined by that figure], & of relative pronoun 'who' — but even there I am not too sure!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Dec 09 - 03:17 AM

Heh!

top - a T-shirt or blouse, etc.
great - large
singers - sewing machines
who - sound made by an owl
can't - worthless propagandizing
sing - a Chinese name (should be capitalized)

Now, where were we?

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Dec 09 - 03:25 AM

"Singers" shd be capitalised too, if y're going 2B picky, Hawky.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Dec 09 - 03:46 AM

You are so right. ;-)

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Dec 09 - 06:10 AM

Gee,Thanks, daddy-o - ;~)§

[This merely shameless ploy to publicise my new emoticon with my new beard!!!]

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Seth from Olympia
Date: 06 Dec 09 - 01:33 PM

If I hear "river" by Joni at a certain time and when I'm in a particular frame of mind ( not too often) my eyes just water up >
One of the stories that I read about her was that her first manager was blown away by how many songs she had that were written and ready to go at such a young age. I don't think " Big Yellow Taxi" her finest work, but if she wrote it when she was seventeen.... Don't I ( and you) wish we had one like that in the bin at such a young age. a lot of stuff on her early albums is hard to listen to now because I got old....
A singer who could sing was Nat Cole, with whatever he touched, jazz, blues, pop, Christmas, even gospel.
seth

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Elmore
Date: 07 Dec 09 - 08:22 AM

Randy Newman

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Smedley
Date: 07 Dec 09 - 08:43 AM

If you want to hear Joni M singing clear as a bell, with melodies to die for and lyrics that are genuinely poetic, ignore Big Yellow T (juvenilia by her standards) and seek out 'Free Man In Paris', 'Edith and the Kingpin', 'Coyote' or 'In France They Kiss on Main Street'.

And while you're at it, listen to some Laura Nyro too - though she doesn't belong in this thread at ALL.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 07 Dec 09 - 08:48 AM

No mention of Neil Diamond? His stuff may not be to everyones taste but a mighty fine voice and some material that could well be described as folky. (But let's not get into that:-) )

Another belter - Judith Durham, and seeing as her surname reminded me of a song, what about Roger Whittaker?

DeG

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Genie
Date: 09 Dec 09 - 02:23 AM

Elmore, I'd say Randy Newman is the epitome of what this thread is about.

BRILLIANT musician, songwriter, humorist!   Wonderful entertainer!   But a "singer" he ain't.
(And I doubt you'd get any argument from him. He doesn't need to be.)