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The Evolution of MJ's Singing Voice

Psychoniff

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Is MJ the most revolutionary singer the popular music history?

The gulps, grunts, gasps, cries, exclamations; frequently scats or twists and contorts words until they are barely discernible contrasting grit with high melotic notes. Mimicking nearly any and every musical instrument, stacking and backing vocal harmonies, trapping both fast and slow notes, the EVS (Emotive Vocal Singularity), vocal trickery, the beatboxing and singing the most pain-filled ballad on the same album as the dirtiest raw hard rock track. His idiosyncratic percussive-rhythmic-staccato like sound that still no other artist can compete with. He could go warm or cold when ever he saw fit.

Boasting a wide vocal range and an enigmatic vocal style.

Did MJ push the envelope on what it means to be a vocalist in postmodern music the way the Beatles push studio production?
 
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Psychoniff said:
Is MJ the most revolutionary singer the popular music history?

The gulps, grunts, gasps, cries, exclamations; frequently scats or twists and contorts words until they are barely discernible contrasting grit with high melotic notes. Micking nearly any and every musical instrument, stacking and backing vocal harmonies, trapping both fast and slow notes, the EVS (Emotive Vocal Singularity), vocal trickery, the beatboxing and singing the most pain-filled ballad on the same album as the dirtiest raw hard rock track. His idiosyncratic percussive-rhythmic-staccato like sound that still no other artist can compete with. He could go warm or cold when ever he saw fit.

Boasting a wide vocal range and an enigmatic vocal style.
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Yes he is.
When I saw who started it I thought that this was going to be a bait thread, but I'm pleasantly suprised LOL.

His falsetto and vocal style are legendary. :yes:
 
Silouette said:
From childhood to adulthood, his voice has left an indelible mark in the world.
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indeed. his voice alone, is a good enough reason to listen to him at ANY age
 
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I love the first comment in this thread. The details you point out about Michael’s singing voice are quite informative.

Sent from my SM-N910P using Tapatalk
 
His voice never fails to amaze me. It's just got everything, heavenly falsetto, stunning pitch and harsh emotional grit. Simply the greatest.
Great thread we need more like this
 
His voice is great and evolved seamlessly from childhood to adulthood to the almost deep growl of the Dangerous period onwards.

His child voice is pretty common up to the Skywriter/Music and Me era(1973 - 14/15). Starting with Get it together and the Dancing machine era it is maturing and turning into the baritone he used in his adult life. dancing Machine the song has the 15 year old Michael sound very mature (mooooovvveeee it baby). By the time the Jacksons were with epic he was doing the full adult voice, although it deepened further in the 80s. Even in the Jacksons material, Michael was singing rings around his brothers including Jermaine. Jackie had a fair voice too, but Marlon and Tito were best in harmonies rather than solos, although Marlon did a lot of singing in the early Epic years, but mostly as background or a second more adult voice to Michael's. When Jermaine came back in 1983, he pretty much took over as the second singer again, and after 1984 became the main vocalist in the Michaeless Jacksons, with Jackie deputizing.

Michael'svoice became more diverse on Thriller where uses falsetto, Baritone and tenor in good measures, preferring a light poppy voice most of the time. His speaking voice was the soft high pitched thing, but MJ has said himself it was an act mostly and his usual speaking voice was much deeper.

I think his vocals get more aggressive and throaty with Bad and Dangerous to Invincible he has a bigger range from falsetto through to the type of deep but sharp voice he has in songs like TDCAU. If anything his singing is amazing and it is what makes MJ the complete package, an awesome dancer, songwriter and personality, he has a heaven sent voice too. I would even say his voice is better than Prince's and that is a lot coming from me.

He only really started doing falsetto on the Off the Wall album, and in modern artists, only Prince could match him in falsetto, but MJ's baritone and tenor are much better and MJ's voice was more suited to Pop whereas Prince's falsetto Camille was a bad pastiche. MJ also had the first rate songs for his voice. After his dancing ability, his voice is his next most talented aspect of his raw musical skills.

So only Michael the dancer can top Michael the singer, combined the talent lead to the most powerful combination of music, art, skill, humility and brilliance in one person. No one can or ever will top him. Michael Jackson was one in a quintillion.
 
Psychoniff said:
Is MJ the most revolutionary singer the popular music history?

The gulps, grunts, gasps, cries, exclamations; frequently scats or twists and contorts words until they are barely discernible contrasting grit with high melotic notes. Mimicking nearly any and every musical instrument, stacking and backing vocal harmonies, trapping both fast and slow notes, the EVS (Emotive Vocal Singularity), vocal trickery, the beatboxing and singing the most pain-filled ballad on the same album as the dirtiest raw hard rock track. His idiosyncratic percussive-rhythmic-staccato like sound that still no other artist can compete with. He could go warm or cold when ever he saw fit.

Boasting a wide vocal range and an enigmatic vocal style.
Click to expand...

Beautiful description. People tend to forget how great of a vocalist MJ really was


mjprince1976 said:
He only really started doing falsetto on the Off the Wall album, and in modern artists, only Prince could match him in falsetto, but MJ's baritone and tenor are much better and MJ's voice was more suited to Pop whereas Prince's falsetto Camille was a bad pastiche. MJ also had the first rate songs for his voice. After his dancing ability, his voice is his next most talented aspect of his raw musical skills.
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Why do you always compare Michael to Prince? The question asked in this thread had nothing to do with prince whatsoever.. Also El Debarge is also a contender when it comes to falsetto.
 
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Themidwestcowboy said:
Beautiful description. People tend to forget how great of a vocalist MJ really was




Why do you always compare Michael to Prince? The question asked in this thread had nothing to do with prince whatsoever.. Also El Debarge is also a contender when it comes to falsetto.
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I love this description as well. I need to copy and save it.

I never think of Michael having a baritone voice. Jermaine, yes. Michael was a tenor with an enormous range to me.
As for falsettos, the best for me were Johnny Mathis and Smokey Robinson before Michael grew up.
 
Too me Curtis Mayfield had a great falsetto voice, but he used it exclusively.

And often MJ gets mistaken for being primarily a falsetto singer, he RARELY utilized his falsetto singing voice.
 
barbee0715 said:
I love this description as well. I need to copy and save it.

I never think of Michael having a baritone voice. Jermaine, yes. Michael was a tenor with an enormous range to me.
As for falsettos, the best for me were Johnny Mathis and Smokey Robinson before Michael grew up.
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I could have added more but, you guys get the point.
 
The midwest cowboy
Why do you always compare Michael to Prince? The question asked in this thread had nothing to do with prince whatsoever.. Also El Debarge is also a contender when it comes to falsetto.[/QUOTE]

Because I am a Prince fan first and also Prince and MJ had similar voices, singing similar material, along with MJ going Aow!, so did Prince and he even went further with his Aow - wows! Also both are Black pop artists who love to sing very well and incorporate dancing in their music. Prince's music was very similar to MJ's in the 1980s, and most polls in magazines had Prince in 2nd place behind MJ.

Also because there is not a law against it, the country I live in has something called Freedom of Speech except for orchestrated hate speech. Ever heard of that. I like Prince, you may not, but I do, so warm to it.

Even worse about your comments, was the fact my post was actually saying MJ was better voicewise and I spent more talking about MJ's voice and its evolution, mentioned Prince briefly and moved on to MJ's dancing ability. It mut have pleased someone as the OP gave me a like for it.
 
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Yep. You know something's great when people don't want you to have it, then everybody mimicks it.
 
mjprince1976 said:
Because I am a Prince fan first and also Prince and MJ had similar voices, singing similar material, along with MJ going Aow!, so did Prince and he even went further with his Aow - wows! Also both are Black pop artists who love to sing very well and incorporate dancing in their music. Prince's music was very similar to MJ's in the 1980s, and most polls in magazines had Prince in 2nd place behind MJ.
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All those things still has absolutely nothing to do with the evolution of Michael's singing voice.. Lol.

Listen man I get that you're a prince fan,everyone gets that you're a prince fan, I am a prince fan myself, but this is a Michael Jackson forum after all isin't it? almosts all your post has something to do with prince, it's like you can't mention MJ without mentioning prince. If I went to a prince forum and started mentioning MJ in almost every single post don't you think someone would have called me out on that?

and the "reason: defense against prince haters." is hilarious. Where did i spew hate towards prince? I myself am a very big prince fan, but I think you need a reminder that you are after all in a Michael Jackson Forum.
 
All of what we know as the Michael Jackson sounds was developed over time.. As many of us can literally hear the evolution vocally when listen to music In chronological order.. While his voice did slowly deepen over the years which allowed the gritty sound to be more and more effective it was all in stylizing his voice.. He was a master of creating stamps that represent him as a product...

From stylizing clothing with stamps (arm band/fedora/tape on fingers/ white socks etc.) to vocal stamps (hiccups/ harsh inhales / "aooows" even to the aggression) they all became stamps for the MICHAEL JACKSON sound.

Also to add it's theatre at its finest in a differen form. He was able to emote specific emotions (gasps of desperation / grunts of anger / dips in vocals of passion / anguish etc.)

He always understood living the vocal but over the years he used that gift to create a sound and use theatrical vocals (and instrumental sounds) to make the vocal a visual.
 
Two songs that always come to mind for me about MJ's stellar young J5 voice are his cover of Who's Lovin' You and Ray Charles's A Fool For You. My jaw drops every time I hear those...there are others as well...and was DSTYGE Michael's first falsetto song? I always think of Barry Gibb/the Bee Gees as the epitome of falsetto style.

His adult voice is just so pure and full and beautiful...he's also the greatest 'angry sounding' singer, imo.
 
mjprince1976 said:
His voice is great and evolved seamlessly from childhood to adulthood to the almost deep growl of the Dangerous period onwards.

His child voice is pretty common up to the Skywriter/Music and Me era(1973 - 14/15). Starting with Get it together and the Dancing machine era it is maturing and turning into the baritone he used in his adult life. dancing Machine the song has the 15 year old Michael sound very mature (mooooovvveeee it baby). By the time the Jacksons were with epic he was doing the full adult voice, although it deepened further in the 80s. Even in the Jacksons material, Michael was singing rings around his brothers including Jermaine. Jackie had a fair voice too, but Marlon and Tito were best in harmonies rather than solos, although Marlon did a lot of singing in the early Epic years, but mostly as background or a second more adult voice to Michael's. When Jermaine came back in 1983, he pretty much took over as the second singer again, and after 1984 became the main vocalist in the Michaeless Jacksons, with Jackie deputizing.

Michael'svoice became more diverse on Thriller where uses falsetto, Baritone and tenor in good measures, preferring a light poppy voice most of the time. His speaking voice was the soft high pitched thing, but MJ has said himself it was an act mostly and his usual speaking voice was much deeper.

I think his vocals get more aggressive and throaty with Bad and Dangerous to Invincible he has a bigger range from falsetto through to the type of deep but sharp voice he has in songs like TDCAU. If anything his singing is amazing and it is what makes MJ the complete package, an awesome dancer, songwriter and personality, he has a heaven sent voice too. I would even say his voice is better than Prince's and that is a lot coming from me.

He only really started doing falsetto on the Off the Wall album, and in modern artists, only Prince could match him in falsetto, but MJ's baritone and tenor are much better and MJ's voice was more suited to Pop whereas Prince's falsetto Camille was a bad pastiche. MJ also had the first rate songs for his voice. After his dancing ability, his voice is his next most talented aspect of his raw musical skills.

So only Michael the dancer can top Michael the singer, combined the talent lead to the most powerful combination of music, art, skill, humility and brilliance in one person. No one can or ever will top him. Michael Jackson was one in a quintillion.
Click to expand...

hi mjprince1976 :ciao: I just wanted to tell you that I don't like Prince
 
dewey said:
Two songs that always come to mind for me about MJ's stellar young J5 voice are his cover of Who's Lovin' You and Ray Charles's A Fool For You. My jaw drops every time I hear those...there are others as well...and was DSTYGE Michael's first falsetto song? I always think of Barry Gibb/the Bee Gees as the epitome of falsetto style.

His adult voice is just so pure and full and beautiful...he's also the greatest 'angry sounding' singer, imo.
Click to expand...

His first falsetto performance was on "Push Me Away" off the The Jackson's Destiny album.
 
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