The oldest musical instrument; the strangest, the most powerful, beautiful and versatile?
I have something of an obsession with musical instruments; to the extent that one of the first things I do when flicking through a CD booklet is turn to the credits page to see what fascinations await me. The more exotic, esoteric and arcane the better. And there are so many available now - to add brightness, decadence, drama and texture to the musical platter.
I adore authentic period instruments; I want harpsichord, violin, viola, cello, oboe; the dull echoing thunder of a timpani. Then there are more unexpected beasts - the marimba, glockenspiel, flugelhorn and clavinet. From North Africa and Greece we have the saz, the oud, the ney flute, the bouzouki and so many other instruments bowed and plucked and piped. The sitar whose ringing notes evoke both Indian classical and psychedelica. The exquisite hurdy-gurdy - an astonishingly beautiful instrument often carved with the heads of women and which summons a drone somewhere between a violin and a bagpipe. The keening, lamenting erhu, the rain-picked pipa.
Vintage organs and synthesizers - the Moog, the Rhodes piano, the Hammond and farfisa. The mellotron - an early synthesizer-styled organ that utilizes looped audio samples to (well, theoretically) replicate the sounds of an orchestra; it is an instrument much beloved of prog bands. Then, stranger things - the theremin and ondes martenot - both instruments played without physical touch - instead by manipulating electronic fields.
There will always be room in my CD collection for Tibetan singing bowls and ritual flutes fashioned from the thigh-bones of monks.
Now the rise in electronic instrumentation has birthed a new realm of sounds and possibilities. Laptops, samples and synthesizers have become so advanced that they can perfectly conjure the sound of a hundred-piece orchestra (with substantial brass and woodwind section) - and a choir to go along with it. But they can replicate stranger things too - the sound of brittle light winking off ice, of glaciers collapsing, tectonic plates shifting. Bjork's most recent album 'Biophilia' features newly-created instruments that seem to owe more to high-level theories of physics than musicology - the anti-gravity harp, the sharpsichord, the gameleste.
Even commonly maligned musical instruments can delight. A skillfully-played accordion can sound fiery and fierce, passionate and playful, anguished and ominous. A recorder at the lips and fingertips of a baroque classical musician can achieve delicate trills not unlike a flute, but far earthier and richer. I dig bagpipes, man. Though I generally think they should be heard only from a distance as they are a damn loud instrument.
But.
But.
But, for myself, the most extraordinary, bewildering and versatile of all musical instruments is to be found in the throat, the vocal chords, the chest and the lungs. It is reflected and reshaped across the meat of the soft palate, manipulated by the muscle of the tongue and echoed against the line of the teeth.
It has to be the oldest instrument. As old as language, certainly. I like to believe that it is older still; the line that divides us from so many of our genetic ancestors. Humankind: the ape that sings.
In every culture, in every country, there is song. There are a multitude of different techniques - developed over centuries, intended to aid projection or to reach notes that should be beyond possibility. And this, above all other things in music, is what fascinates me.
Oh sure, I can dig on a bit of fully instrumental music, but only in small doses and for me there is always a slight disconnect. I need the human voice - however mutilated or manipulated or altered, to link to the music. It draws me in. I'm not talking about words here, lyrics aren't that big of a deal to me. Wordless singing is often exceptional and compelling. Besides, a substantial portion of my collection is sung in languages that I cannot speak.
I have always been draw to artists whose voices startle, compel, bewilder and beguile. I love people who push their vocal ranges and abilities into stranger realms.
The river gravel bellow of Tom Waits. The bat-like shrieks and stygian contralto of Diamanda Galas. Nina Hagen with her rasping, theatrical thunder-roll of a voice. And of course, Mike Patton. Always Mike Patton; a man whose voice seems to shift effortlessly between lush, lounge-lizard baritone; rich, full-voiced tenor; and ghostly falsetto. Not to mention the menagerie of gibberings, screeches, snarls, slaverings and other inhuman utterances.
In the realm of metal there is seemingly no end of vocal experimentation and contrast. From the eerie, damned falsetto of King Diamond; to the stentorian bass-baritone of the late, lamented Peter Steele (Type O Negative). I swear the latter even plumbs the depths of basso profondo on occasion (such is the lowest octave reachable with human vocal chords, and then only by chanting Tibetan monks). There we also have the anguished, soul-scraping baritone of Aaron Stainthorpe (My Dying Bride - from whose song the title of this post is taken) and the vivid delivery and dynamic operatics of tenor Thomas Vikstrom (Therion, ex-Candlemass).
And in metal we have the extreme vocalists too. While all too commonly dismissed as 'Cookie Monster' growling, grunting and other such silliness; extreme death and black metal vocal performances actually utilize a full range of voicing and projection techniques closely linked to Classical, operatic method. From the bowel-deep basso roars of death metal to the harsh, sibilant tenor screeches of black metal - these are vocals that require a great deal of skill, practice and understanding of the way the human voice works. To attempt these sounds without such learning... well... you'll end up shredding the hell out of your throat. This, I figure, is why a great many proficient extreme metal vocalists later reveal themselves to have well-developed and startlingly melodic 'clean' voices.
Speaking of Opera. In the purely Classical field, I am drawn again to the more unusual and unexpected voices. I am endlessly fascinated by countertenors; the phenomenal control they have over their head voices; and the purity and downright oddness of their vocal range. I love Philippe Jaroussky's bright, fluting tones. He sounds startlingly like a true soprano. Thus, in his performance of Monteverdi's sublime 'Pur Ti Miro' he and soprano Nurial Ria sound almost identical - the song shifting seamlessly between male and female, as closely twined as is appropriate for such a tender duet. And then there are the darker, richer and more honeyed tones of Max Emanuel Cencic - who sounds every bit as startlingly like a true mezzo-soprano. His voice is endlessly dexterous and full of subtle shadings and exquisite nuances (something countertenors are often criticized for lacking).
Among the women I seem most smitten with mezzo-sopranos. The wild drama and astonishing breath control of Cecilia Bartoli; whose pyrotechnic bursts of coloratura are jaw-dropping but who also excels in sensitive moments and whose voice is lithe, supple and gilded despite being startlingly deep at times. Then there is the softer, subtler lushness of Magdalena Kozena; she possesses an achingly lovely trill and clever, quiet nuances of voice. Her performances are delicate, lightly-shaded and heartbreakingly beautiful.
But anyway...
Of the newer artists I love the grim opulence of electronic artist Zola Jesus; whose dark, pulsing industrial-Gothic arrangements underscore her booming, soul-ache of a voice (a voice that recalls both Siouxsie Sioux and Florence Welch). Which brings me to...um, Florence Welch: her glittering gospel and utterly committed delivery. Hers is a thrilling and powerful voice; a huge voice that sounds simultaneously youthful and far older than her years. Then there is Lana Del Rey's bruised and melancholy vocal. She seems to shift between breathlessly girlish and wounded, wine-soaked contralto, all over lavish backdrops of orchestral-pop-gone-hip-hop. And thus to the sultry Bond-theme-meets-gleaming-soul-and-grandiose-rhythm-and-blues of Janelle Monae. Her delivery shifts between brassy, swaggering, dramatic, vulnerable and pop-inflected.
Then there are those even stranger few. Like Bolton-to-Berlin maverick Janine Rostron (a.k.a PlanningToRock) whose multi-layered, pitch-shifted and digitally reconfigured vocalisations form a kaleidoscopic choir over her acoustic-meets-electronic instrumental tapestry. Shorn of digital manipulation Rostron's voice has an appealing huskiness reminiscent of Janis Joplin. Saxophones and strings melt into a sea of synth-pads. Glockenspiels dance with drum machines to hip-hop, pop, carnival, electro, dance, classical and rock rhythms. She wants to bite ya.
And lastly but a long way from leastly - I can't harp on about experimental vocal techniques without at least mentioning throat singing. Tanya Gillies (a.k.a. Tagaq) is a self-taught Inuit throat-singer. She has performed with Kronos Quartet, Bjork and Mike Patton (odd how certain names keep popping up - though I like to believe that whenever an album gets sufficiently vocally-experimental Mike Patton just spontaneously manifests). Her style of throat singing is all guttural panting, sighing, moaning and gasping, the vocal rhythms are percussive and playful. It is astonishingly visceral, even carnal (her delivery is quite often sexual, orgasmic). Hers is a song to the bones and flesh of us, music that you feel in your gut. Her second album - 'Auk [Blood]' - sees her performing with a couple of string musicians (accompanying her on violin, viola and cello); a beat-boxer; rapper Buck 65 (if he is the Canadian equivalent of Fiddy Cent, their exchange rate is worse than I thought) and...yup, Mike Patton. The latter contributes an astonishing performance to one track - in which he variously recalls a muppet version of Joplin and a traditional Middle Eastern singer in a wind tunnel. Apparently, even in a song featuring a freaking Inuit throat singer you will still find yourself asking "what the hell is Mike Patton doing?"
The rough-edged strings echo the vocal percussions of Tagaq beautifully, and occasionally adopt a wailing, Asiatic quality as well. It is a fascinating (and occasionally infuriating) disc which I feel would be best classified as modern classical.
Seemingly a world away is the rough, thrilling and utterly beautiful Mongolian folk-meets-indie-blues/jazz-rock of Hanggai. Their work matches the unusual trilling (occasionally birdlike, jewel-like and boiling-kettle-like) style of Mongolian throat singing to dense and propulsive rock rhythms. A sound fleshed out with the plaintive keening of horse-hair violin and - on their superb release 'He Who Travels Far' - a guest spot from avant-guitar virtuoso Marc Ribot.
So there you are. I have written enough. Hell, too much even. This it totally into 'TL;DR' territory. And yet I have only scraped the surface. Song is ancient, timeless and universal. It will always be of immense interest to me, and it will always surprise me.
