Dear Lloyd and List:
I have enjoyed the many interesting postings about registers.
Lloyd's latest posting has prompted me to present my way of thinking
about things, not backed up by any evidence but it makes sense to me.
Lloyd described dividing the female voice into several registrations:
chest
lower middle (chest heavy mix)
upper middle (headier mix)
upper (head)
with about an octave in the middle voice.
Let's consider a tenor. Lloyd has also written that the middle male
voice is say about a fourth or fifth (say c4 to g4), and then another
fourth or so in head voice (g4 to c5). Yet we know many tenors
(and baritones) can sing higher than c5 in a different registration
that is not "falsetto."
So what makes sense to me is to re-label things a bit:
Thus the tenor would sing
chest (below c4)
lower middle (c4 to g4)
upper middle (g4 to c5)
upper (above c5)
While Lloyd has disputed my version, this registration scheme makes
sense to me and is supported by certain other writers. Thus I would
argue that operatic baritones and tenors generally do not use their
highest vocal register (let's not get into flageolet etc.), whereas
operatic mezzos and sopranos do. Operatic countertenors, I think,
use
all four registers but make their switches lower.
Well that's my attempt to make sense of this.
Cheers,
Michael
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