Recognizing Different Voice Timbres

Summary

In this lesson, students will learn to recognize different vocal timbres. Listening to different songs, they will expand the vocabularies they use to describe voices. They will study the basics of vocal techniques, characteristic of different musical styles. Students will learn to analyze the vocal part of a song, following the notation.

⏰ Time: 45 min

🎓 Grades: 5-12

🎯 Objective(s): As a result of this lesson students will be able to...

• Identify and describe different vocal timbres;
• Identify and understand vocal pitch and range;
• Learn the basic differences between musical styles and vocal techniques.

💡 Required Prior Knowledge and Skills:

• Basic notation.

💻 Materials:

• Solfeg.io app best used with Chrome browser
• Projector or computer and access to Wi-Fi

Song suggestions:

A cover of
Bleeding Love
LEONA LEWIS

A cover of
No Money
GALANTIS

A cover of
Feel It Still
PORTUGAL. THE MAN

A cover of
The Git Up
BLANCO BROWN

A cover of
Bad Liar
SELENA GOMEZ

A cover of
Sweet Child Of Mine
GUNS 'N' ROSES

A cover of
Radioactive
IMAGINE DRAGONS

Inspiration

🕐 10 min - Voice map

• Divide students in small groups (each containing around 5 students).
• Each group should have a sheet of paper (A3 or bigger) and a pen or pencil.
• In the form of mind map, create a 'Voice Map': write down words that can be used to describe vocal qualities. (Some keywords: soft, loud, high, low, thick, thin, breathy, grating, gravelly, gruff, hoarse, coarse, husky, monotonous, nasal, orotund, raucous, ringing, rough, shrill, small, big, smoky, strident, throaty, tight, wobbly, mellow...)
• Ask students to think about such questions:
• How would you describe your voice? What about the voices of your friends or your teacher?
• How would you describe the voice of your favourite singer?
• What kind of voices you don't like?
• Try using objective descriptive adjectives instead of subjective evaluations (for example, soft instead of beautiful) - focus on perception, not evaluation.
• What do different voices remind you of?
• How does singing feel to you?
• What other things can you do with your voice? (Talk, whisper, scream, roar, rap, breathe, beatbox…)
• Each group shortly presents their 'Voice Map'.
• Discuss the similarities and differences between the 'Voice Maps' of the class.

Warm-Up

🕐 5 min - Theory

• Shortly explain what timbre is. (A term describing the tonal quality of a sound. Timbre is a more complex attribute than pitch or loudness, which can each be represented by a one-dimensional scale (high–low for pitch, loud–soft for loudness); the perception of timbre is a synthesis of several factors. - Grove Music Online)
• You can mention that timbre is a unique set of characteristics that makes the voice distinctive. The timbre can be described, using adjectives from students' 'Voice Maps'.
• Talk about the pitch. Female voices are usually higher than male voices. Both can be high-pitched or low-pitched.
• Ask students to follow the notation of the song excerpts.
• Can they identify the highest note sung?
• What's the lowest note sung?
• Can they sing those notes? (Are they in their range?)
• High female voice: 'Bleeding Love' by Leona Lewis (Bridge)
• Low female voice: 'No Money' by Galantis (Verse)
• High male voice: 'Feel It Still' by Portugal. The Man (Chorus 1)
• Low male voice: 'The Git Up' by Blanco Brown (Chorus 1)
• Shortly explain what range is. (The extent of an instrument or voice, from the lowest to the highest note; the interval between those notes. - Grove Music Online) The vocal range can be wide/big or narrow/small.
• Ask students to follow the notation of the song excerpts.
• What's the highest note sung?
• What's the lowest note sung?
• Can they sing those notes? (Are they in their range?)
• An example of small range is 'One-Note-Melody', often used in pop music: 'Bad Liar' by Selena Gomez (Chorus 1)
• Big range: 'No Money' by Galantis (Verse 1 - low, Pre-Chorus 1 - high)
• Shortly talk about vocal characteristics of different musical styles or genres. For example, vocals in rock music can sound 'crunchy', 'forced' etc.
• Ask students to follow the notation of the song excerpt.
• How would you describe the pitch and the range of this voice?
• What other adjectives would you use to describe this voice?
• 'Sweet Child of Mine' by Guns 'N' Roses (Chorus 3)
• Besides singing, other vocal techniques and effects can be used in songs, for example, indeterminate pitch, rapping, speech, screams, grunts etc.
• Ask students to follow the notation of the song excerpt.
• Explain that the cross-shaped notes represent lyrics that must be spoken rather than sung, retaining the marked rhythm but having indeterminate pitch.
• 'The Git Up' by Blanco Brown (Intro)

Practice

🕐 10 min - Exercise 1 - Radio-analyze

• Play students 'Radioactive' by Imagine Dragons (Intro, Verse 1, Pre-Chorus 1 and Chorus 1).
• Ask students to listen, follow the notation and analyze the vocal part of the song.
• They can focus on these questions and write down their answers:
• Is it a man or a woman singing?
• Is there just one person singing or more?
• Is the voice high or low?
• What's the highest and the lowest note sung?
• How would you describe the range of the melody?
• Are there any other vocal effects used besides singing?
• What is the style of this song?
• What adjectives would you use to describe the vocal part?
• What did you like about singing in this song? What did you not like?
• Students practice for 30 seconds.

🕐 5 min - Exercise 2 - Radio-active!

• Play the song once again.
• Ask students to sing along.
• They should try to imitate the singing style of the song.

Reflection

🕐 5 min - Discussion

• What new things have students learned about voice?
• What sort of voices do they like to listen to?
• What other interesting vocal effects do they know?

Beyond the Lesson

• Challenge students to go beyond the lesson by...
• Exploring different song categories and trying to imitate different voice timbres.

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