Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Joe Offer
Date: 26 Nov 09 - 05:35 PM

I have to say that I find I get annoyed listening to folk music, unless I can pay total attention to it. I like the singing of Dick Gaughan or Ewan MacColl because they really tell the story of the song well - but I can't stand them if I'm trying to pay attention to something else. Musicality is of secondary importance in folk music, where the primary emphasis is conveying the meaning of the lyrics. And it you don't have time to listen to the lyrics, perhaps another genre of music would suit you better.

Now, if I were to choose musicians for their musicianship, among my top choices would be Peggy Lee and Dinah Shore and Jo Stafford. I could listen to them all day without paying attention to them, and I'd really enjoy it. Oh, and I wouldn't mind listening to Susan Boyle without paying attention to her, too.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,bankley
Date: 26 Nov 09 - 06:42 PM

what about Tiny Tim ?

there's no accounting for taste...

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 26 Nov 09 - 06:47 PM

Tiny Tim was an incredible singer. The man's range was simply phenomenal. I think he was a very fine musician.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Jack Campin
Date: 26 Nov 09 - 06:49 PM

And from other nationalities and genres:

Vladimir Vyssotsky
Asik Veysel
Maria Callas
Cameron de la Isla

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Nick E
Date: 26 Nov 09 - 07:43 PM

Since When do you have to sing well to be a good singer?

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: olddude
Date: 26 Nov 09 - 08:08 PM

nope Joe, now Pasty Cline, oh yes

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Effsee
Date: 26 Nov 09 - 10:54 PM

As Ronnie Drew used to say..."I've got a terrible voice, but I'm a good singer"...or words to that effect!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,999
Date: 26 Nov 09 - 10:54 PM

Has anyone noted that there IS (imo) a difference between vocalizing and singing?

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Nov 09 - 07:08 AM

Tiny Tim gave me a headache once.... maybe it was the coat...

One thing for sure, none of the aforementioned, alive or dead, are sitting around talking about us

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 27 Nov 09 - 07:50 AM

has everyone forgotten Lee Marvin's 'wandering star', just too awful to be called singing I suppose. Clint eastwood on the 'b'side ( I talk to the trees, wasn't much better.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Stringsinger
Date: 27 Nov 09 - 02:04 PM

There are many components to singing. Phrasing and emphasis is one. Vocal production is another. Vowel sounds. Breathing spaces. Dramatic sense. Diction. Musicianship (ie: staying on the beat or relating to the accompaniment)

In the final sense, if it moves you, it's good singing (for you). If you don't like it, it's bound to be "bad" singing.

So much subjectivity is here.

Gershwin admonished Ethel Merman not to go to a vocal teacher.


A lot depends upon whether you think Merman could sing. One thing for sure,
she could be heard over the orchestra.

A Bulgarian singer differs from an Operatic "bel canto" singer.

One thing about vocal training. It can help you keep your voice. There is such a thing
as vocal health.

There is such a thing as musicianship. The voice is after all an instrument. It can be played many different ways. If you study musicianship then perhaps you will be less
enthusiastic about the ways some people use their voices.

Then again, if you study singing you might be irritated with the sound of some voices.
l
A great voice can be misused in improper styles. Eileen Farrell may not have the "Right To Sing The Blues". The lovely Renee Fleming landed a jazz album with a dull thud.

Subjectivity creeps in here too. Was Richard Dyer-Bennet's "John Henry" a joke?

The (who can't sing) part of this thread has to do with whether the singer has had
"legitimate" training such as bel canto.

The bottom line: You have to put on different ears to evaluate every singer you hear.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 27 Nov 09 - 02:35 PM

I agree, Joe.

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Steamin' Willie
Date: 27 Nov 09 - 02:42 PM

I suppose it is a folk forum so there are bound to be people who have never heard of some of the best musicians and singers this old world has produced.

I take issue with Nick Cave's inclusion. His rendition of "Into My Arms" was played as we signed the registry book at our wedding last year. Haunting song, wonderful crooning voice.

Ian Dury fronted possibly the tightest rock jazz bands I have ever heard. the Blockheads are still, after his sad demise, touring and I aim to get to see them.

Jarvis Cocker is a local lad done well, and he can hold a note better than I can as well as tell the tale as it were.

Richard Thompson can sing, full stop. I always enjoy the bass pedal notes he used to harmonise with when Linda was singing, (Down where the drunkards roll being an excellent example.)

Shane McGowan and Billy Bragg?

They are far more interesting. If singing means holding a note then they are somewhat challenged, but if singing is anything to do with expression, then they express the words better than most.

Being in tune without singing is something I leave to some classical singers. I suggest you listen to, (but don't hit the buy button), Andres Scholl's album of English Folk (or at least the Vaughan Williams end of it) to hear what I mean about being in tune is not necessarily singing. Ok, he is, I think, German so singing by rote rather than joy of the language. Pure classical interpretation may be singingin tune but lacks the passion.

And... passion is every bit as important as pitch - Bragg, McGowan et al...

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: The Sandman
Date: 27 Nov 09 - 06:16 PM

Paul Robeson, Tony Rose, Peter Bellamy, Sandy Denny, Walter Pardon, Harry Cox, Phil Tanner, Sara Carter, Jeannie Robertson, Roy Orbison.
RIP, all fine singers who are sadly missed

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Callie
Date: 27 Nov 09 - 07:02 PM

Norma Waterson
Van Morrison

brilliant brilliant singers who can't hold a note. who cares?! they move us, their love and respect for music shines through. can't live without 'em!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Genie
Date: 27 Nov 09 - 07:07 PM

Funny that people so often think of Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen when listing "singers who can't sing." I've heard people say that about Willie Nelson too. But I hear that Joan Baez once (not too long ago) remarked about Dylan that one thing about him was "he can really sing!"   And when it comes to carrying a tune, I'd say that's true of Bob (or at least was during his first 3 decades of performing and recording), and it's also true of Willie. Leonard Cohen wasn't that good a singer in his early days, even if he had more range, but I love the sound of his later voice (the last 2 or 3 decades) -- not just his "storytelling," but the deep, gravelly sound of his low baritone.   

Now, Kristofferson is a different story. I've heard him go way off key or lose the tune in live performance, and I'd say he definitely is a much better songwriter and storyteller than singer.

Speaking of great songwriter/storytellers who can't sing all that well, how come nobody's mentioned Steve Earle?

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 27 Nov 09 - 07:21 PM

Speaking of great songwriter/storytellers who can't sing all that well, how come nobody's mentioned Steve Earle?

Kaiser Chiefs.....I predict a riot.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,999
Date: 28 Nov 09 - 02:48 AM

Luciano Pavarotti.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Genie
Date: 28 Nov 09 - 06:33 AM

FWIW, I've heard that when Janis Joplin died, her autopsy revealed that she had no nodes on her vocal folds.   Perhaps had she lived long enough to subject her vocal apparatus to decades of the kind of belting she did, she would have ruined her voice before age 50, but it doesn't seem she had done so by her twenties.

And whether you like the style or not, Janis could do things with her "instrument" that not only suited her type of music perfectly (e.g., "Piece of My Heart") but that most "good singers" can't begin to do.


Oh, and I can't believe I'm seeing singers like Sinatra, Ella, and Pavarotti "nominated" as singers who can't sing!    Even when I don't immediately recognize who it is, every time I hear an Ella Fitzgerald recording on radio, I find myself marveling at the voice and stopping to pay full attention.

And I agree with Don (and others) that saying someone whose pitch is spot on "can't sing" just because you don't like the timbre of their voice or their style is a bit like saying that an accordion or banjo is "less musical" than a piano or a violin because you don't care for its sound.









Oh, wait ... maybe I should have used better examples than banjos and accordions. ; D

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: MikeofNorthumbria
Date: 28 Nov 09 - 06:54 AM

IMHO a really great singer needs four things. These are: Technique - Ideas - Taste - Charisma
        
Technique alone – however excellent – is not sufficient. Without a modicum of taste, an idea or two and a dash of charisma, technical perfection quickly becomes boring.

Technically sound performers who are blessed with good taste but bereft of original thoughts may still build long-lasting careers - provided they (or their management) have the wit to borrow good ideas from more creative artists. But without charisma they will never become superstars.

Whereas once-great artists who retain their charisma can still pull in big audiences, long after they have run out of ideas, technique and taste. It's not fair, but that's show business, folks.

Wassail!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 29 Nov 09 - 05:57 AM

Women:In a few studios in Hollywood, Stevie Nicks was dubbed 'Four Note Stevie'..not much range there, but she HAD a 'cutish' voice in her youth, that people liked. Now she sounds like an old bag lady..Same with Britney Spears.. except she never sounded good.Terrible voice! Cher..so overrated, sometimes she sounds like an old man with laryngitis. Carol King, I guess she wrote better songs than sang them, very little emotion, too generic.(I've played her piano)

Men: Eddie Vedder, (Pearl Jam). Tommy James..can't tell if its his voice, or just the stupid songs he sings! Elton John, sounds like he's singing with a mouthful of mashed potatoes. Frankie Valli, enough with the falsetto! James Taylor, so pansy-ass, he was unbelievable. Stevie Wonder, Better when he was younger, Heard him recently? Bruce Springsteen, shouting and grunting in short phrases, sounds like he's shitting a giant brick. Jim Morrison(who I knew), wasn't really known for his singing ability, but his timbre and expression got him through.. and well too!

Great singers: Lisa Kelly, Andrea Bocelli, Josh Groban,(if he doesn't over due his vibrato. Marlena Fontanay, most expressive, and totally believable! Linda Ronstadt, heard her live from about six feet away, she could fill a room with her voice. Giorgio Tozzi, world renown for his 'Faust'(they used to set his mic 22 feet away!!)

Sorry to those I may have left out...in either category!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Bernard
Date: 29 Nov 09 - 06:06 AM

How about Florence Foster Jenkins?!!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Genie
Date: 29 Nov 09 - 08:16 PM

[[IMHO a really great singer needs four things. These are: Technique - Ideas - Taste - Charisma]]

I'd say those 4 are needed to be a great performer but not necessarily to be a great singer (e.g., for recording).

Plus, there's a vast chasm between "not a great singer" and "can't sing."

In fact "great singer who can't sing" is an oxymoron.   

But there have been many great vocal/music entertainers who didn't have great voices and/or whose pitch left something to be desired.

Some of those mentioned here (Tom Waits, Louis Armstrong, Kris Kristofferson, etc.) and others (e.g., Jimmy Durante) could be counted in that category.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 29 Nov 09 - 09:55 PM

Wow Bernard, she IS TERRIBLE!

Just saw the new Celtic Woman concert,'Songs from The Heart'. Chloe Agnew,(the plump one), got a little heavier, but Jeez-Louise!, can she blow your socks off!!! She is great!~ Add her to my 'great' bunch, next to Lisa Kelly!!!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Helen Jocys
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 02:29 AM

Why has nobody mentioned that 'great' American hopeless coloratura Florence Foster Jenkins? She hired the Carnegie Hall to perform. Sold out to an audience who came to laugh. Check her out on Google and don't forget to turn the sound up. She honestly believed she could sing while (quote) murdering Mozart. My favourite is The Laughing Song from Die Fledermaus. Talk about a massacre! Poor thing.

HelenJ

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 02:37 AM

Bernard already did, Helen.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: rich-joy
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 02:42 AM

WOW! What an amazing collection of opinions!!!
A far more "subjective subject" than I thought it would be!

R-J
Down Under
(and, an Ella fan from way back :~)

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 02:48 AM

Joe Cocker and Ivan [ Van ] Morrison, two of the worlds worst, not a single redeeming defect.

Dave H

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 03:25 AM

Florence Foster Jenkins not really eligible for this thread as nobody, apart from herself, ever thought her a 'great singer' — as distinct from a great self-deluding object of ridicule. One thing not clear — did she issue her own gramophone records at own expense, or did some record company cash in on the 'ridicule factor' to sell records? Anyone know?

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Brakn
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 05:52 AM

Elvis used vibrato to disguise the fact that he couldn't hold a note. I can't listen to him at all.

Also that bloke from duran duran.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 07:01 AM

"Joe Cocker and Ivan [ Van ] Morrison, two of the worlds worst, not a single redeeming defect.

Dave H"

Other than a) being distinctive in a field of mediocrity and b) writing brilliant songs.

Oh, and neither are, as it were, flat as a fart. I leave that to the likes of myself if I don't concentrate. I can't sing, they both can.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Helen Jocys
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 09:52 AM

I'm pretty sure F.F. Jenkins financed her own records. She wasn't without the 'readies'.

HelenJ

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: quokka
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 10:33 AM

Is it just me - opinions here seem to be more about personal taste rather than people who can't sing. There are a lot of singers whose style doesn't appeal to me, but I wouldn't go as far as to say they can't sing - obviously they can or they wouldn't be "famous" singers. If you want technical brilliance go to the opera. If you want to feel an emotional connection with the singer, the song, the lyrics, the music, the personality, then most of the singers listed above qualify as "great". Just my opinion...

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Dobbins
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 11:03 AM

Tom Waits is certainly an acquired taste but just check out his lyrics like "his wife was a spent piece of used jet trash". Genius. And he's done instrumentals like Dave The Butcher.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 11:56 AM

Listening to Florence Foster Jenkins has been a whole new experience! I'm sorry I wasn't alive to go to her concerts back when she was doing them. ;-)

In the case of Springsteen...I can understand the criticism of his technique that was offered here...however, I'd say that it works well for him. And he puts on a terrific show.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: robomatic
Date: 30 Nov 09 - 09:49 PM

those girl singers of whom christina aguelera is a shining example, unable to hold a note so they 'average' over and call it a tremolo "hey it's not a bug, it's a feature!" with no interior talent they have to have an album cover to expose their exterior attributes, the aforesaid aguelera once posing in shaded leather lace-up pants that left nothing to the imagination.

I have one other pet hate, a folksy old fogey who tries to sound late nineteenth century, a crooner before amplification. I will frnakly say I hate him so much I am incapable of judging his quality. I hate him so much I can't remember his name, but the crackling twanginess of his delivery has my dorsals in tension just writing this. must.....control......keyboard...of...flame



oh, yeah. . . Leon Redbone

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,M.Ted
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 12:37 AM

Florence Foster Jenkins had an amazing sense about where to be "off". Bad singers don't usually understand the music that well.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 12:58 AM

L.H.(yo-ho): "...I can understand the criticism of his technique that was offered here...however, I'd say that it works well for him. And he puts on a terrific show."

Went to one in the eighties. Tremendous energy!
I was mostly speaking on his technical abilities. Yes, what he does, certainly works for him.......not that I'd go again...

A very well known vocal coach, who is also a basso baritone, and performs opera, and revered internationally for his work, had a great phrase to describe the music of the sixties, which also fits Bruce's voice....."...When Mediocrity was chic "
GfS

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,Ralphie
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 01:05 AM

Talking of "Off Key" singing. Alongside the redoubtable FF Jenkins, you could line up Mrs Miller (Who's eponymous 2nd LP "Will success spoil Mrs Miller?" rarely leaves my turntable.)
Travelling into Europe, who could ever forget MA Numminem, whose rock opera on the subject of the philosopher Wittgenstein, "The Tractatus Suite" is a joy and a wonder.

We could always add at this juncture, those 2 celebrated doyens of Mudcat threads over the years, William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy.
And Jo Staffords benighted alter ego. Darlene Edwards!
Linda McCartney anyone?

Seriously. I think the original post was basically correct. The likes of Dylan, Waits etc. all have something to say. A case of the message not the messenger. But it's a fun thread nonetheless.

And the thought of Ian Dury as a computer software expert in Milton Keynes cracks me up!!

Nowadays I just wish I was the MD of Antares corp. (For those who don't know..It's a digital pitch shifter!) He must be making a fortune!!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 02:10 AM

Hey, GfS...there is a well-known music teacher and band conductor in Orillia, Ted Duff, who also works with a 4-person jazz vocal group called "Jazzamatazz". It happened one year that Jazzmatazz had lost their tenor, and they were taking auditions. I wanted to see if I could try out something really different for a change, so I auditioned...and I passed! So I got to sing the tenor part in Jazzmatazz for about a year.

After I passed the audition, Ted said to me, "I thought that none of you folksingers could actually sing! I'm pleasantly surprised to find out that there is one who can."

That made me feel pretty good, but I have to say that I think Ted is unreasonably prejudiced against folk and rock music in a general sense... ;-) There are lots of folksingers who can really sing.

I did shows with Jazzmatazz for about a year, then I decided to move on, because although it was darned good music, I could never really get that interested in it. I respect it, mind you...it just isn't the kind of music I have much of a yen for normally, so after a year my curiosity about it was fully satisfied, and I quit the group (on good terms, I might add).

Ted Duff was great to work with. He is one hell of a fine musician, and he loves the music...if it's jazz or show tunes, that is. He has brought a lot of fine music to Orillia.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Helen Jocys
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 02:26 AM

Sorry Bernard. Missed your entry Must have been asleep!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Mavis Enderby
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 02:41 AM

If only Florence Foster Jenkins could have been accompanied by Les Dawson

Pete

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 01:37 PM

Joe Valachi - he sang like a canary, but couldn't carry a tune in a lunchpail.

Poor Tom Waits, trying still to sing after having his vocal cords surgically mutilated - and laughing all the way to the bank, I'm sure.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Dave Roberts
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 01:47 PM

I think Elvis Presley was great.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Bobert
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 04:29 PM

LH & GfS,

When I booked Steelmill back in '69 and '70 in Richmond, Springsteen was the lead singer... But he also did, ahhhh, some fine folk music which was acoustic and very pretty stuff... It's a voice that most folks who think they know what Springsteen sounds like would never imagine...

If you get out the "Welcome to Asbury Park" LP and listen to "Mary, Queen of Arkansas" you'll hear Springsteen as close to pure as anything that he has recorded... But lotta folks, myself included, got to hear several "coffeehouse style" pefrormances by Bruce back then and the boy can flat out carry a tune...

B~

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: RTim
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 04:41 PM

Someone says:

"Elvis used vibrato to disguise the fact that he couldn't hold a note."

That is WHY you use Vibrato!

Tim Radford

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Dave Roberts
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 05:53 PM

Tim,

Quite.

To put Elvis in a list of people who 'can't sing' is patently absurd.

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Bobert
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 06:13 PM

Correction: "Greetings from Asbury Park"...

As fir Elvis??? Hey, look... Tyhis ain't no opera website, is it??? He sang great!!!

B~

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: Dave Roberts
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 06:28 PM

Bobert,

Sure did!

Subject: RE: Ten Top Great Singers Who Can't Sing
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Dec 09 - 10:57 PM

Shiz - this is easy.

Ray Charles
Aretha Franklin
Frank Sinatra
Tony Bennett
Ed Trickett
Carmen McRae
Ella Fitzgerald
Richard Hidalgo
Roy Orbison
Tony Williams of the Platters
Lyle Lovett
Teddy Thompson
Bob Shane
Joan Baez
Waylon Jennings
Marty Robbins
Emmy Lou Harris
Patty Lovelace
Herb Pedersen
Gordon Lightfoot