As you find yourself standing on the edge, do you fall or fly? What's real is surreal, LA pop songstress May Devun sings in her latest track, "Say the Words," released last week. To answer that question: The earth-shattering vocal runs in "Say the Words" are enough to send me over the edge, barely touching the bottom, before getting catapulted into the highest dynamic range possible. Listening to a May Devun track is like getting whisked around by a glittering nebula high above the earth. Real, but surreal.
How does her voice reach these astronomical heights? With training. And loads of practice, that's what I presume. The technique she's using is called melisma, a single syllable stretched by a vocal run (or series of different notes). Melisma is a vocal tradition dating back 3,000 years ago, originating in the performances of religious opera (George Frideric Handel's Latin prayer, The Messiah) and classical music. A style of drama and ethos, it's no wonder R&B and pop singers of the early 80s and 90s have adopted it into their singing vocabulary - grammy award-winning artist Whitney Houston has famously owned the style, but before Houston, there were the enigmatic gospel runs of Whitney's godmother, Aretha Franklin, who burst onto the scene as a choir singer in the late 50s.
Melisma made it into the pop mainstream in large thanks to the choristers who started out small and hit it big with their first record deals, but the style often causes eye rolls because of its over-usage. Sometimes melisma is used as a person with blemishes uses concealer to make up for the natural, or in the singer's case, natural talent. When a novice singer ( or even a great one) uses melisma to over-intensify their vocals, it can amplify other less-than-flattering aspects as opposed to enhancing their natural tonality and range.
Another case that comes to mind is the fictional Youtube character popularized by actress and comedian Colleen Ballinger, Miranda Sings. Colleen made a killing on the Internet as the self-absorbed, wanna-be professional singer on a ruthless quest for fame and stardom. The problem is, she can't really sing. Well. At all. But little girls the world over love her theatrics and over-the-top personality, mostly, I think, because as much of a talentless hack that the character is, Colleen herself is actually a wonderfully-trained singer, and she gives little girls a sense of ownership over their talents. Below, Miranda Sings teaches a young Arianna Grande "the ropes" of singing and acting.
Now that you know a little more about the popular melismatic singing style, enjoy some May Devun!
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