Stevie's Soft vs. Loud Voice

[HejiraNYC]

Originally Posted by GypsySorcerer

Perfect description.


I'm not a fan of the "shouting-singing" thing, either. I did think she sounded great on The Dance/Enchanted... but since Trouble in Shangri-La, she just hasn't been the same. Her recent singing has been a bit better.

I think the Dance/Enchanted tours were marked by some of her worst singing in recent memory- often off-pitch, shouty and ragged. I cringe often when I listen to her 1998 Woodstock show.

I think she is clearly able to sing softly when she wants to, as evidenced by her live harmonies on "Say Goodbye." But I think she shies away from using the soft voice on lead vocals simply because she has never had the ability to project her falsetto very well. Her voice is either reedy with a sharp edge, or feathery and wispy; there is just no in-between with her voice. Accordingly, she is probably not able to control the pitch and consistency of her falsetto very easily, especially when she is trying to compete with thudding drums and crunchy guitar riffs in her monitor. I do not blame her for belting things out- it's much more predictable and consistent, whereas it would suck mightily to sing falsetto and hit some bad notes. During her intro to "Leather and Lace" at the Bristow show, she told her usual story about using a vocal coach and taking voice lessons every day. But she added an interesting anecdote about listening to "cassettes" of Fleetwood Mac shows from the 1970s and remarking about all of the "bad singing" and having lots of bad nights on the road. Of course the audience audibly showed its disagreement with that statement. So, needless to say, in Stevie's world, singing a song differently every night is a bad thing, while projecting from the diaphragm and singing consistently every night is a good thing. I think there is merit to her views on this even though I do wish she would occasionally surprise us with a falsetto note here and there.