Resonatory Properties in Professional Tenors Singing Above the Passaggio

• Introduction: The question of formant tuning in male professional voices has been a matter of discussion for many years. Material and Methods: In this study four very successful Western classically trained tenors of different repertoire were analysed. They sang a scale on the vowel conditions /a,e,i,o,u/ from the pitch C4 (250 Hz) to A4 (440 Hz) in their stage voice avoiding a register shift to falsetto. Formant frequencies were calculated from inverse filtering of the audio signal and from two-dimensional MRI data. Results: Both estimations showed only for vowel conditions with low first formant (F1) a tuning F1 adjusted to the first harmonic. For other vowel conditions, however, no clear systematic formant tuning was observed. Conclusion: For most vowel conditions the data are not able to support the hypothesis of a systematic formant tuning for professional classically trained tenors.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Data- och informationsvetenskap -- Språkteknologi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Computer and Information Sciences -- Language Technology (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Vocal-Tract Configurations

Formant Tuning Strategies

Falsetto Registers

Singers

Resonance

Frequencies

Phonation

Acoustics

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)