bart,
the vocal tract has a flexibility to it that is unmatched by any
instrument. it can be soft or stiff and it can change it's shape. before
we ever catogorize voices as to whether they are tenor, bass, alto, etc., we
identify them as individuals and, we do this based on the timbre of a voice.
no one ever hears a clarinet and says "hey, there's joe!"
yes, there are a number of instruments that are capable of more than one
sound but, these variations are usually made in the vibrator, not the
resonator. sticking an extension tube into the bell of a brass or wind
instrument and comparing that to the flexibility of the tongue is like
comparing wheels chipped out of rock to our modern radials, in fact, it's
worse.
even with a roland vg80, an electric guitar is only capable of assuming
sounds that have been mass produced (for example: making a parker nightfly
sound like a strat played through a marshall stack).
we have even heard people imitating instruments but, the closest we have
ever heard to an istrument imitating a voice is jeff beck sounding like
charlie brown's teacher.
mike
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