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Old 04-10-2006, 03:42 PM   #153 (permalink)
Hendrix
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Join Date: Apr 2006
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As a member of DDD and frequenter to the vocal list (and the guy who taught all these guys about the technicalities of voice), as Boo Boo knows...I don't like the list actually as is. The guy who originally made it basically knows nothing about vocals.

Importance and influence are highly subjective and shouldn't be weighed very heavily into this. Influence is only influence if the artist has said it personally, or has covered numerous songs of theirs, or sounds almost exactly like another artist (like how Kenny Wayne Shepherd's blues guitar sounds exactly like SRV's..maybe it has something to do with being from Texas though). Importance is highly subjective in that what I think is important, someone else may not think the same.

I may think Jussi Bjoerling was an important opera singer, while my voice teacher may not think so. If I didn't enjoy 50's R&B, I wouldn't think guys like Roy Hamilton would be important, unless I wasn't biased, but most people when it comes to music ARE biased (which is a big shame).

But when we're talking about vocalists, there isn't much room for this stuff. There's only so much you can do with your voice. You can take devices and sing into them and augment your voice, sure, but you can't actually do a lot to your voice. With guitar, you can alternate pick, sweep pick, right hand tap, play chords, etc. With the voice, you can sing one note at a time (although few people in the world can sing 2 distinct notes at once which aren't overtones), slide up to another note, use vibratto, use your throat to get gruffness (or, if you're good you can get gruffness from your diahragm), etc.

Should importance and influence be factored in? Of course, it's a "greatest of" list, but with vocals you also have to look at technicalities and there aren't THAT MANY vocal styles out there. Most styles come with diction, phrasing, and dynamics.
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