Folk music
Folk music includes traditional folk music and the genre that evolved from it during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be called world music. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted orally, music with unknown composers, or music performed by custom over a long period of time, it has been contrasted with classical styles. The term originated in the 19th century. Starting in the mid-20th century, a new form of popular folk music evolved from traditional folk music; this process and period is reached a zenith in the 1960s. This form of music is sometimes called contemporary folk music or folk revival music to distinguish it from earlier folk forms. Smaller, similar revivals have occurred elsewhere in the world at other times, but the term folk music has not been applied to the new music created during those revivals; this type of folk music includes fusion genres such as folk rock, folk metal, others. While contemporary folk music is a genre distinct from traditional folk music, in U.
S. English it shares the same name, it shares the same performers and venues as traditional folk music; the terms folk music, folk song, folk dance are comparatively recent expressions. They are extensions of the term folklore, coined in 1846 by the English antiquarian William Thoms to describe "the traditions and superstitions of the uncultured classes"; the term further derives from the German expression volk, in the sense of "the people as a whole" as applied to popular and national music by Johann Gottfried Herder and the German Romantics over half a century earlier. Though it is understood that folk music is music of the people, observers find a more precise definition to be elusive; some do not agree that the term folk music should be used. Folk music may tend to have certain characteristics but it cannot be differentiated in purely musical terms. One meaning given is that of "old songs, with no known composers", another is that of music, submitted to an evolutionary "process of oral transmission....
The fashioning and re-fashioning of the music by the community that give it its folk character". Such definitions depend upon " processes rather than abstract musical types...", upon "continuity and oral transmission...seen as characterizing one side of a cultural dichotomy, the other side of, found not only in the lower layers of feudal and some oriental societies but in'primitive' societies and in parts of'popular cultures'". One used definition is "Folk music is what the people sing". For Scholes, as well as for Cecil Sharp and Béla Bartók, there was a sense of the music of the country as distinct from that of the town. Folk music was "...seen as the authentic expression of a way of life now past or about to disappear" in "a community uninfluenced by art music" and by commercial and printed song. Lloyd rejected this in favour of a simple distinction of economic class yet for him true folk music was, in Charles Seeger's words, "associated with a lower class" in culturally and stratified societies.
In these terms folk music may be seen as part of a "schema comprising four musical types:'primitive' or'tribal'. Music in this genre is often called traditional music. Although the term is only descriptive, in some cases people use it as the name of a genre. For example, the Grammy Award used the terms "traditional music" and "traditional folk" for folk music, not contemporary folk music. Folk music may include most indigenous music. From a historical perspective, traditional folk music had these characteristics: It was transmitted through an oral tradition. Before the 20th century, ordinary people were illiterate; this was not mediated by books or recorded or transmitted media. Singers may extend their repertoire using broadsheets or song books, but these secondary enhancements are of the same character as the primary songs experienced in the flesh; the music was related to national culture. It was culturally particular. In the context of an immigrant group, folk music acquires an extra dimension for social cohesion.
It is conspicuous in immigrant societies, where Greek Australians, Somali Americans, Punjabi Canadians, others strive to emphasize their differences from the mainstream. They learn songs and dances that originate in the countries their grandparents came from, they commemorate personal events. On certain days of the year, such as Easter, May Day, Christmas, particular songs celebrate the yearly cycle. Weddings and funerals may be noted with songs and special costumes. Religious festivals have a folk music component. Choral music at these events brings children and non-professional singers to participate in a public arena, giving an emotional bonding, unrelated to the aesthetic qualities of the music; the songs have been performed, by custom, over a long period of time several generations. As a side-effect, the following characteristics are sometimes present: There is no copyright on the songs. Hundreds of folk songs from the 19th century have known authors but have continued in oral tradition to the point where they are considered traditional for purposes of music publishing.
This has become much less frequent since the 1940s. Today every folk song, recorded is credited with an arranger. Fusion of cultures: Because cultures interact and change over time
Chicago Blues Festival
The Chicago Blues Festival is an annual event held in June, that features three days of performances by top-tier blues musicians, both old favorites and the up-and-coming. It is hosted by the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events, always occurs in early June; until 2017, the event always took place at and around Petrillo Music Shell in Grant Park, adjacent to the Lake Michigan waterfront east of the Loop in Chicago. In 2017, the festival was moved to the nearby Millennium Park. Chicago has a storied history with blues that goes back generations stemming from the Great Migration from the South and the Mississippi Delta region in pursuit of advancement and better career possibilities for musicians. Created by Commissioner of Cultural Affairs Lois Weisberg, the festival began in 1984, a year after the death of McKinley Morganfield, better known as Muddy Waters, considered "the father of Chicago blues"; each year the organizers choose a theme to honor a departed blues musician.
Chicago blues acts are common. In 2015, the festival celebrated the centenary of the births of Willie Dixon; the Centennial Tribute featured several musicians who had played with Muddy Waters as well as his sons Mud Morganfield and Big Bill Morganfield, with Alex Dixon playing bass. In keeping with the blues' influence on other musical genres, there are some soul, jazz blues and blues-rock acts. Since those early beginnings the festival has risen to a status that the City of Chicago has billed as the world's largest free concert of its kind, the largest of the city's music festivals. For many years through 2016, the festival's "Route 66 Roadhouse" side stage was located a few yards north of historic old U. S. Route 66, a block west of Route 66's former eastern terminus at US 41 Lake Shore Drive. Albert King, The Aces, B. B. King, Bill Doggett, Golden "Big" Wheeler, Billy Branch, Bo Diddley, Bobby "Blue" Bland, Bobby Rush, Buckwheat Zydeco, Buddy Guy, Calvin Jones, Carey Bell, Carl Perkins, Barrelhouse Chuck, Chuck Berry, Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, Dave Myers, Dion Payton, Dr. John, Eddie Boyd, Eddie C.
Campbell, Eddie Vinson, Eddy Clearwater, Etta James, Fenton Robinson, Floyd Jones, Fontella Bass, Hank Ballard, Henry Townsend, Homesick James, Hubert Sumlin, James Cotton, Jerry Portnoy, Jimmy Johnson, Jimmy Rogers, Jimmie Lee Robinson, Jody Williams, John Lee Hooker, Johnnie Taylor, John Brim, Johnny Shines, Johnny Winter, Junior Wells, Keith Richards, Koko Taylor, Little Milton, Little Willie Littlefield, Lonnie Brooks, Lowell Fulson, Louisiana Red, Luther Allison, Eddie Cusic, Lurrie Bell, Magic Slim, Matt Murphy, Memphis Slim, George "Mojo" Buford, Mick Taylor, The Neville Brothers, The Ice Cream Men, Otis Rush, Pee Wee Crayton, Pinetop Perkins, Ray Charles, Robert Cray Band, Robert Lockwood, Jr. Sam Lay, Otis "Big Smokey" Smothers, Snooky Pryor, Son Seals, Lacy Gibson, Staple Singers, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Sugar Blue, Sunnyland Slim, Grady Champion, Taj Mahal, Willie Dixon, Yank Rachell, Lil' Ed Williams and the Blues Imperials, Johnny B. Moore, Terry "Harmonica" Bean, Harmonica Hinds, Linsey Alexander, Liz Mandeville, Nora Jean Bruso, Holle Thee Maxwell, Eddie Taylor Jr.
List of blues festivals List of folk festivals Chicago Blues Festival Media related to Chicago Blues Festival at Wikimedia Commons
African Americans
African Americans are an ethnic group of Americans with total or partial ancestry from any of the black racial groups of Africa. The term refers to descendants of enslaved black people who are from the United States. Black and African Americans constitute the third largest racial and ethnic group in the United States. Most African Americans are descendants of enslaved peoples within the boundaries of the present United States. On average, African Americans are of West/Central African and European descent, some have Native American ancestry. According to U. S. Census Bureau data, African immigrants do not self-identify as African American; the overwhelming majority of African immigrants identify instead with their own respective ethnicities. Immigrants from some Caribbean, Central American and South American nations and their descendants may or may not self-identify with the term. African-American history starts in the 16th century, with peoples from West Africa forcibly taken as slaves to Spanish America, in the 17th century with West African slaves taken to English colonies in North America.
After the founding of the United States, black people continued to be enslaved, the last four million black slaves were only liberated after the Civil War in 1865. Due to notions of white supremacy, they were treated as second-class citizens; the Naturalization Act of 1790 limited U. S. citizenship to whites only, only white men of property could vote. These circumstances were changed by Reconstruction, development of the black community, participation in the great military conflicts of the United States, the elimination of racial segregation, the civil rights movement which sought political and social freedom. In 2008, Barack Obama became the first African American to be elected President of the United States; the first African slaves arrived via Santo Domingo to the San Miguel de Gualdape colony, founded by Spanish explorer Lucas Vázquez de Ayllón in 1526. The marriage between Luisa de Abrego, a free black domestic servant from Seville and Miguel Rodríguez, a white Segovian conquistador in 1565 in St. Augustine, is the first known and recorded Christian marriage anywhere in what is now the continental United States.
The ill-fated colony was immediately disrupted by a fight over leadership, during which the slaves revolted and fled the colony to seek refuge among local Native Americans. De Ayllón and many of the colonists died shortly afterwards of an epidemic and the colony was abandoned; the settlers and the slaves who had not escaped returned to Haiti, whence. The first recorded Africans in British North America were "20 and odd negroes" who came to Jamestown, Virginia via Cape Comfort in August 1619 as indentured servants; as English settlers died from harsh conditions and more Africans were brought to work as laborers. An indentured servant would work for several years without wages; the status of indentured servants in early Virginia and Maryland was similar to slavery. Servants could be bought, sold, or leased and they could be physically beaten for disobedience or running away. Unlike slaves, they were freed after their term of service expired or was bought out, their children did not inherit their status, on their release from contract they received "a year's provision of corn, double apparel, tools necessary", a small cash payment called "freedom dues".
Africans could raise crops and cattle to purchase their freedom. They raised families, married other Africans and sometimes intermarried with Native Americans or English settlers. By the 1640s and 1650s, several African families owned farms around Jamestown and some became wealthy by colonial standards and purchased indentured servants of their own. In 1640, the Virginia General Court recorded the earliest documentation of lifetime slavery when they sentenced John Punch, a Negro, to lifetime servitude under his master Hugh Gwyn for running away. In the Spanish Florida some Spanish married or had unions with Pensacola, Creek or African women, both slave and free, their descendants created a mixed-race population of mestizos and mulattos; the Spanish encouraged slaves from the southern British colonies to come to Florida as a refuge, promising freedom in exchange for conversion to Catholicism. King Charles II of Spain issued a royal proclamation freeing all slaves who fled to Spanish Florida and accepted conversion and baptism.
Most went to the area around St. Augustine, but escaped slaves reached Pensacola. St. Augustine had mustered an all-black militia unit defending Spain as early as 1683. One of the Dutch African arrivals, Anthony Johnson, would own one of the first black "slaves", John Casor, resulting from the court ruling of a civil case; the popular conception of a race-based slave system did not develop until the 18th century. The Dutch West India Company introduced slavery in 1625 with the importation of eleven black slaves into New Amsterdam. All the colony's slaves, were freed upon its surrender to the British. Massachusetts was the first British colony to recognize slavery in 1641. In 1662, Virginia passed a law that children of enslaved women took the status of the mother, rather than that of the father, as under English common law; this principle was called partus sequitur ventrum. By an act of 1699, the colony ordered all free blacks deported defining as slaves all people of African descent who remained in the c
Happy Traum
Happy Traum is an American folk musician who started playing music in the 1950s and became a stalwart of the Greenwich Village music scene of the 1960s and the Woodstock music scene of the 1970s and 1980s. For several years, he studied blues guitar with Brownie McGhee, a big influence on his guitar style. Happy is most famously known as one half of Happy and Artie Traum, a duo he began with his brother, they released several albums, including Happy and Artie Traum, Double Back, Hard Times In The Country. He has continued as founder of Homespun Music Instruction. Traum first appeared on record at a historic session in late 1962 when a group of young folk musicians, including Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs, Pete Seeger, Peter LaFarge and The Freedom Singers, gathered in the studio at Folkways Records to record an album called Broadside Ballads, Vol. 1. With his group, The New World Singers, Traum cut the first version of "Blowin' in the Wind" to be released. Traum sang a duet with Dylan, who performed under the pseudonym Blind Boy Grunt, on his anti-war song "Let Me Die in My Footsteps".
These tracks were re-released in August 2000 by Smithsonian Folkways as part of a boxed set, The Best of Broadside 1962 - 1988: Anthems from the American Underground. That year, The New World Singers, which featured Traum, Bob Cohen and Gil Turner, recorded an album for Atlantic Records, with liner notes by Dylan; the album featured the first recording of Dylan's "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right" In 1971 Happy once again joined Dylan in the studio, playing guitar, banjo and singing harmony on four songs, which appeared on Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits Vol. II and The Bootleg Series Vol. 10 – Another Self Portrait. Dylan invited Happy to participate in a famous session with poet Allen Ginsberg, which resulted in the box set Holy Soul Jelly Roll. 1970 Bright Morning Stars With John Sebastian, Roly Salley, Richard Manuel and Larry Campbell 1975, Relax Your Mind, Kicking Mule Records KM110 1977, American Stranger, Kicking Mule Records KM301 1987, Buckets of Songs, Shanachie 2005, I Walk The Road Again, Roaring Stream Records • 2015, "Just For the Love Of It," Lark's Nest Music 1970 Happy and Artie Traum - Capitol Records 1971 Double Back - Capitol Records 1975 Hard Times in the Country - Rounder Records 1994 The Test of Time - Roaring Stream Records 2006 Happy and Artie Traum Live Recordings 1970's and 1980's - Slice of Life Records 1963 Broadside, Vol. 1 - Folkways Records.
The New World Singers 1964 The New World Singers - Atlantic Records 1966 The Children of Paradise - Columbia Records Happy and Artie Traum, Eric Kaz and Marc Silber. 1972 Mud Acres: Music Among Friends - Rounder Records Happy and Artie produced and performed, along with Eric Kaz, Maria Muldaur, Jim Rooney, Bill Keith, John Herald, Lee Berg and Tony Brown. 1976 Woodstock Mountains: More Music from Mud Acres - Rounder with Happy and Artie, Pat Alger, Eric Andersen, Lee Berg, Rory Block, Paul Butterfield, John Herald, Bill Keith, Jim Rooney, Roly Salley, John Sebastian, Paul Siebel and others. 1978 Woodstock Mountains Revue: Pretty Lucky - Rounder 1981 Woodstock Mountains Revue: Back to Mud Acres - Rounder 1987 Woodstock Mountains: Music from Mud Acres - Rounder 1990 Bring It On Home, Vol. 1 and 2 - Sony Legacy The "Best of..." Happy and Artie's WAMC Public Radio show. 2000 The Best of Broadside – Smithsonian/Folkways Boxed Set 1971 Bob Dylan's "Greatest Hits, Vol. 2" - Columbia 1971 Allen Ginsberg "Holy Soul Jelly Roll" with Bob Dylan, David Amram, Ed Sanders, et al. 2014 Bob Dylan "Another Self Portrait" Happy can be heard on albums with, John Sebastian, Chris Smither, Jerry Jeff Walker, Tom Pacheco, Priscilla Herdman, Pete Seeger, Ronnie Gilbert, Eric Andersen, Rory Block, Maria Muldaur, Peter Tosh, Rick Danko, Levon Helm and many others.
American folk music revival Artie Traum Brownie McGhee Bob Dylan Guitarists Banjo Gray, Michael. The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia. Continuum International. ISBN 0-8264-6933-7. Http://www.happytraum.com/ Official Website http://www.myspace.com/happytraummusic Happy Traum on MySpace http://www.homespun.com/ Homespun Tapes https://shop.platformpurple.com/?shop=7 Homespun Instant Access downloads http://www.bobdylan.com/#/node/6308 Album Info from "Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits, Volume II" on Bob Dylan's website Happy Traum Interview NAMM Oral History Library
Piano
The piano is an acoustic, stringed musical instrument invented in Italy by Bartolomeo Cristofori around the year 1700, in which the strings are struck by hammers. It is played using a keyboard, a row of keys that the performer presses down or strikes with the fingers and thumbs of both hands to cause the hammers to strike the strings; the word piano is a shortened form of pianoforte, the Italian term for the early 1700s versions of the instrument, which in turn derives from gravicembalo col piano e forte and fortepiano. The Italian musical terms piano and forte indicate "soft" and "loud" in this context referring to the variations in volume produced in response to a pianist's touch or pressure on the keys: the greater the velocity of a key press, the greater the force of the hammer hitting the strings, the louder the sound of the note produced and the stronger the attack; the name was created as a contrast to harpsichord, a musical instrument that doesn't allow variation in volume. The first fortepianos in the 1700s had smaller dynamic range.
An acoustic piano has a protective wooden case surrounding the soundboard and metal strings, which are strung under great tension on a heavy metal frame. Pressing one or more keys on the piano's keyboard causes a padded hammer to strike the strings; the hammer rebounds from the strings, the strings continue to vibrate at their resonant frequency. These vibrations are transmitted through a bridge to a soundboard that amplifies by more efficiently coupling the acoustic energy to the air; when the key is released, a damper stops the strings' vibration, ending the sound. Notes can be sustained when the keys are released by the fingers and thumbs, by the use of pedals at the base of the instrument; the sustain pedal enables pianists to play musical passages that would otherwise be impossible, such as sounding a 10-note chord in the lower register and while this chord is being continued with the sustain pedal, shifting both hands to the treble range to play a melody and arpeggios over the top of this sustained chord.
Unlike the pipe organ and harpsichord, two major keyboard instruments used before the piano, the piano allows gradations of volume and tone according to how forcefully a performer presses or strikes the keys. Most modern pianos have a row of 88 black and white keys, 52 white keys for the notes of the C major scale and 36 shorter black keys, which are raised above the white keys, set further back on the keyboard; this means that the piano can play 88 different pitches, going from the deepest bass range to the highest treble. The black keys are for the "accidentals". More some pianos have additional keys. Most notes have three strings, except for the bass; the strings are sounded when keys are pressed or struck, silenced by dampers when the hands are lifted from the keyboard. Although an acoustic piano has strings, it is classified as a percussion instrument rather than as a stringed instrument, because the strings are struck rather than plucked. There are two main types of piano: the upright piano.
The grand piano is used for Classical solos, chamber music, art song, it is used in jazz and pop concerts. The upright piano, more compact, is the most popular type, as it is a better size for use in private homes for domestic music-making and practice. During the 1800s, influenced by the musical trends of the Romantic music era, innovations such as the cast iron frame and aliquot stringing gave grand pianos a more powerful sound, with a longer sustain and richer tone. In the nineteenth century, a family's piano played the same role that a radio or phonograph played in the twentieth century. During the nineteenth century, music publishers produced many musical works in arrangements for piano, so that music lovers could play and hear the popular pieces of the day in their home; the piano is employed in classical, jazz and popular music for solo and ensemble performances and for composing and rehearsals. Although the piano is heavy and thus not portable and is expensive, its musical versatility, the large number of musicians and amateurs trained in playing it, its wide availability in performance venues and rehearsal spaces have made it one of the Western world's most familiar musical instruments.
With technological advances, amplified electric pianos, electronic pianos, digital pianos have been developed. The electric piano became a popular instrument in the 1960s and 1970s genres of jazz fusion, funk music and rock music; the piano was founded on earlier technological innovations in keyboard instruments. Pipe organs have been used since Antiquity, as such, the development of pipe organs enabled instrument builders to learn about creating keyboard mechanisms for sounding pitches; the first string instruments with struck strings were the hammered dul
Dexter Gordon
Dexter Gordon was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. He was one of the first players of the instrument in the bebop idiom of musicians such as Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Bud Powell. Gordon's height was 6 feet 6 inches, so he was known as "Long Tall Dexter" and "Sophisticated Giant", his studio and performance career spanned over 40 years. Gordon's sound was characterized as being "large" and spacious and he had a tendency to play behind the beat, he was known for humorously inserting musical quotes into his solos, with sources as diverse as popular tunes, "Happy Birthday", the operas of Wagner. This is not unusual in common-practice jazz improvisation, but Gordon did it enough to make it a hallmark of his style. One of his major influences was Lester Young. Gordon, in turn, was an early influence on Sonny Rollins. Rollins and Coltrane influenced Gordon's playing as he explored hard bop and modal playing during the 1960s. Gordon was known for his humorous stage presence, he was an advocate of playing to communicate with the audience.
A photograph by Herman Leonard of Gordon taking a smoke break at the Royal Roost in 1948 is one of the iconic images in jazz photography. Cigarettes were a recurring theme on covers of Gordon's albums. One of his idiosyncratic rituals was to recite lyrics from each ballad before playing it. Gordon was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for his performance in the Bertrand Tavernier film Round Midnight, he won a Grammy for Best Jazz Instrumental Performance, for the soundtrack album The Other Side of Round Midnight, he had a cameo role in the 1990 movie Awakenings. In 2019, Gordon's album Go was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry for being "culturally or aesthetically significant". Dexter Keith Gordon was born on February 1923 in Los Angeles, California, his father, Dr. Frank Gordon, was one of the first African American doctors in Los Angeles who arrived in 1918 after graduating from Howard Medical School in Washington, D.
C. Among his patients were Duke Ellington and Lionel Hampton. Dexter's mother, Gwendolyn Baker, was the daughter of Captain Edward Baker, one of the five African American Medal of Honor recipients in the Spanish–American War. Gordon played clarinet from the age of 13, before switching to saxophone at 15. While still at school, he played in bands with such contemporaries as Chico Hamilton and Buddy Collette. Between December 1940 and 1943, Gordon was a member of Lionel Hampton's band, playing in a saxophone section alongside Illinois Jacquet and Marshal Royal. During 1944 he was featured in the Fletcher Henderson band, followed by the Louis Armstrong band, before joining Billy Eckstine; the 1942–44 musicians' strike curtailed the recording of the Hampton and Armstrong bands. In 1943 he was featured, alongside Harry "Sweets" Edison, in recordings under Nat Cole for a small label not affected by the strike. By late 1944, Gordon was resident in New York and a featured soloist in the Billy Eckstine big band, during early 1945 he was featured on recordings by Dizzy Gillespie and Sir Charles Thompson.
By late 1945 he was recording under his own name for the Savoy label. His Savoy recordings during 1945-46 included Blow Mr. Dexter, Dexter's Deck, Dexter's Minor Mad, Long Tall Dexter, Dexter Rides Again, I Can't Escape From You, Dexter Digs In, he returned in Los Angeles in late 1946 and in 1947 was leading sessions for Ross Russell's Dial label. After his return to Los Angeles, he became known for his saxophone duels with fellow tenorman Wardell Gray, which were a popular concert attraction documented in recordings made between 1947 and 1952; the Hunt gained literary fame from its mention in Jack Kerouac's On The Road, which contains descriptions of wild tenormen jamming in Los Angeles. Cherokee, Byas a Drink, Disorder at the Border are other live recordings of the Gray/Gordon duo from the same concert as The Hunt. In December 1947, Gordon recorded again with the Savoy label. Through the mid-to-late 1940s he continued to work as a sideman on sessions led by Russell Jacquet, Benny Carter, Ben Webster, Ralph Burns, Jimmy Rushing, Helen Humes, Gerry Mulligan, Wynonie Harris, Leo Parker, Tadd Dameron.
During the 1950s, Gordon's recorded output and live appearances declined as heroin addiction and legal troubles took their toll. Gordon made a concert appearance with Wardell Gray in February 1952 and appeared as a sideman in a session led by Gray in June 1952. After an incarceration at Chino Prison during 1953-55, he recorded the albums Daddy Plays the Horn and Dexter Blows Hot and Cool in 1955 and played as a sideman on the Stan Levey album, This Time the Drum's on Me; the latter part of the decade saw him in and out of prison until his final release from Folsom Prison in 195
Singing
Singing is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice and augments regular speech by the use of sustained tonality, a variety of vocal techniques. A person who sings is called a vocalist. Singers perform music that can be sung without accompaniment by musical instruments. Singing is done in an ensemble of musicians, such as a choir of singers or a band of instrumentalists. Singers may perform as soloists or accompanied by anything from a single instrument up to a symphony orchestra or big band. Different singing styles include art music such as opera and Chinese opera, Indian music and religious music styles such as gospel, traditional music styles, world music, blues and popular music styles such as pop, electronic dance music and filmi. Singing arranged or improvised, it may be done as a form of religious devotion, as a hobby, as a source of pleasure, comfort or ritual, as part of music education or as a profession. Excellence in singing requires time, dedication and regular practice.
If practice is done on a regular basis the sounds can become more clear and strong. Professional singers build their careers around one specific musical genre, such as classical or rock, although there are singers with crossover success, they take voice training provided by voice teachers or vocal coaches throughout their careers. In its physical aspect, singing has a well-defined technique that depends on the use of the lungs, which act as an air supply or bellows. Though these four mechanisms function independently, they are coordinated in the establishment of a vocal technique and are made to interact upon one another. During passive breathing, air is inhaled with the diaphragm while exhalation occurs without any effort. Exhalation may be aided by lower pelvis/pelvic muscles. Inhalation is aided by use of external intercostals and sternocleidomastoid muscles; the pitch is altered with the vocal cords. With the lips closed, this is called humming; the sound of each individual's singing voice is unique not only because of the actual shape and size of an individual's vocal cords but due to the size and shape of the rest of that person's body.
Humans have vocal folds which can loosen, tighten, or change their thickness, over which breath can be transferred at varying pressures. The shape of the chest and neck, the position of the tongue, the tightness of otherwise unrelated muscles can be altered. Any one of these actions results in a change in pitch, timbre, or tone of the sound produced. Sound resonates within different parts of the body and an individual's size and bone structure can affect the sound produced by an individual. Singers can learn to project sound in certain ways so that it resonates better within their vocal tract; this is known as vocal resonation. Another major influence on vocal sound and production is the function of the larynx which people can manipulate in different ways to produce different sounds; these different kinds of laryngeal function are described as different kinds of vocal registers. The primary method for singers to accomplish this is through the use of the Singer's Formant, it has been shown that a more powerful voice may be achieved with a fatter and fluid-like vocal fold mucosa.
The more pliable the mucosa, the more efficient the transfer of energy from the airflow to the vocal folds. Vocal registration refers to the system of vocal registers within the voice. A register in the voice is a particular series of tones, produced in the same vibratory pattern of the vocal folds, possessing the same quality. Registers originate in laryngeal function, they occur. Each of these vibratory patterns appears within a particular range of pitches and produces certain characteristic sounds; the occurrence of registers has been attributed to effects of the acoustic interaction between the vocal fold oscillation and the vocal tract. The term "register" can be somewhat confusing; the term register can be used to refer to any of the following: A particular part of the vocal range such as the upper, middle, or lower registers. A resonance area such as chest voice or head voice. A phonatory process A certain vocal timbre or vocal "color" A region of the voice, defined or delimited by vocal breaks.
In linguistics, a register language is a language which combines tone and vowel phonation into a single phonological system. Within speech pathology, the term vocal register has three constituent elements: a certain vibratory pattern of the vocal folds, a certain series of pitches, a certain type of sound. Speech pathologists identify four vocal registers based on the physiology of laryngeal function: the vocal fry register, the modal register, the falsetto register, the whistle register; this view is adopted by many vocal pedagogues. Vocal resonation is the process by which the basic product of phonation is en
