Talk:Vibrato

message: The two biggest causes of misunderstanding are generated by people, including respectable scholars, who write that "vibrato" was "once an ornament."  It wasn't. Tremolo (Bebung, etc.) was once an ornament, and, yes, it was used only on long notes, but it was not vibrato. Furthermore, an "ornament" is something that stands out against the texture of the music - a fleeting, expressive enhancement, a trill, a mordent, a turn, (a ring upon the finger, a diamond stud in the tongue, a jewel nestled into the bellybutton) - but not an ongoing, abstract aspect of sound itself. Singers, as we know, probably always had used continuous vibrato in their natural sound, and not a single historical source presents evidence to the contrary. It makes no sense that the violinists who imitated them simply did not notice this fact, recreating only their gruesome goat trills and ornamental shakes! According to Geminiani's own treatises, he (and others) used vibrato on every note possible. Writing from Austria, even that dour and cautious pedagogue Leopold Mozart was forced to admit, reluctantly, that many players to his knowledge did likewise. The adoption of an expressive, "continuous" vibrato was apparently a progressive trend. Equally, we can reject the speculation of Sir Roger Norrington, who tells us that the continuous vibrato was first established in modern times, not even the result of a slow evolution, but a mere fad. Norrington writes, "What was new in the 20th century was the idea of a continuous vibrato, used on every note, however short." Upon reading further, we are most astonished (and heartily amused) to learn that "the great Austrian violinist Fritz Kreisler seems to have started the fashion, drawing on the style of cafe musicians and Hungarian and Gypsy fiddlers."(!)
As it turns out, Norrington's statement about Kreisler is lifted (without acknowledgement) straight from Carl Flesch's The Art of Violin Playing, but the part about the Gypsies is just pure baloney. None of it makes any sense. To begin with, it is not possible to achieve vibrato on "every note, no matter how short" (one is truly surprised to learn that a major conductor would be unaware of this simple technical fact.) But that Fritz Kreisler transmitted his "continuous" vibrato to us from Hungarian and Gypsy fiddlers is the very height of unwashed speculation. Kreisler studied with Hellmesberger at the Vienna Conservatory and with Massart at the Paris Conservatory. His technique was clearly formed when he made his début at the age of nine, possibly before he ever entered a Hungarian café and decidedly before his mama would have allowed him to spend much time with the Gypsies. And apart from an inappropriate ethnic fantasy, how could Norrington "know" that Gypsies and Hungarians of the late 19th century used "continuous vibrato" in violin playing? After a hard day polishing their earrings and telling each other's fortunes, did they then also drink too much wine and dance the night away behind their wagons? (See David Montgomery: The Vibrato Thing *)—Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.130.135.193 (talk) 12:00, 4 February 2007
COMMENT regarding the above:  "Singers, as we know, probably always had used continuous vibrato in their natural sound, and not a single historical source presents evidence to the contrary."  This statement is misleading.  An absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.  We do not know at all what "singers" did, as we have no recordings of "singers".  We have some manuscripts that we know instructed some particular singers to sing with vibrato.  We know nothing about how other singers sang manuscripts that lacked any such instruction.  We could not possibly know whether a majority, much less most or all singers used vibrato, especially when we start talking about all persons who sang.  I strongly suspect that the majority did not, based on what we hear today in the wider world, where there is no one correct way to sing.  Point being, we don't know and cannot know, so long as only the past is our guide.  So, perhaps more unwashed speculation.
There seems to be a settled opinion among some "experts" that vibrato is always present in the natural voice, that it is safe and natural, and that singing in pure tone (vibrato free) is wrong and harmful.  Alas, the planet is full of people who sing beautifully without vibrato, and this is no recent fad.  There are no scientific studies that show that singing "straight" is harmful (nor the opposite, that vibrato is harmful).  My opinion is that forcing vibrato onto a voice that naturally sings straight/pure tone may be harmful over long time spans, and that forcing a person who has a natural vibrato to sing without it would have the same harmful effect.  The main point here is that there is no evidence whatsoever that all (or most) singers in the past sang with natural vibrato, and what we see around the world today (outside the classical music tribe) suggests the contrary.  
If someone were to do a survey of, lets say 10,000 adults randomly selected around the world, I think you would find the following:
If asked to sing, most people would not be able to sing in tune (and most might not give a rip).  Of these non-singers, the majority would "sing" out of tune in straight tone, and the minority would "sing" out of tune with a natural vibrato.
Taking the minority of humans who could sing, I think you would find that most of those, (these are the folks who can sing in tune within their own range) the majority would sing "straight" (no vibrato) and the rest would have a natural vibrato.
In support of this thesis, I would point out that when people talk, they talk in straight tone, and only very rarely with a natural vibrato (excepting some aged persons).  
If this is true (and of course I think it is) it says nothing about the value of vibrato either way, but it does suggest that, if "imitating what singers do" (yes I paraphrase) is our reason for violins and flutes to maintain a continuous vibrato, maybe we should think again.
The above expected survey results are still another example of "unwashed speculation", this time on my part, with the caveat that this is something that could at least be verified in principle.
My experience is outside the classical/opera universe, (I am of the folk/traditional music tribe) and what I hear out in the world, across many cultures is the following: singers mostly sing in straight tone, with vibrato used to ornament as an expression of emotion (or not at all).  The use of constant vocal vibrato, as is exemplified in opera singing, makes impossible the "blending" of voices.  Blending in this case means the partial alignments of wave peaks and troughs where there is a mathematical relationship between two or more pitches.  For example, with two singers singing an octave apart, every wave crest sung by the lower singer is perfectly aligned in time with every second wave crest sung by the higher voice (if in tune and vibrato free).  Fourths and fifths have similar simple fraction relationships and are especially sweet sounding when sung straight without any vibrato.  In my opinion, the continuous vibrato so beloved by opera singers and classically trained instrumentalists needs to be re-examined, not just treated as a best practices "must do".  
The points made above about Sir Norrington are good ones, and it may be the case that his historical arguments are incorrect.  But, on purely esthetic grounds, he is onto something.  When vibrato is removed from the orchestral toolbox for a particular piece, other things can come out or are made possible.  Harmonic clarity is enhanced, subtle bowing speed and pressure changes can be heard, and vibrato is then available as an emotional signifier, if used sparingly.  This does not mean that we should get rid of vibrato, I know lots of people love it. I regard myself as an extreme advocate for letting the anti-vibrato musicians do their thing within the classical music universe, as they are free to do out in the wide world.  Vibrato is not going away, but toning it down a bit, getting it off that "required technique" pedestal would be nice.  
I think of a musical note as being like a cake, and things that can be done to the note along the way (vibrato included) as frosting on the cake.  In some parts of the classical music universe, there seems to be standardized training that says, cover the cake with tons and tons of only one kind of frosting, and don't worry if no one can find the cake.  
I submit for your review this opinion:  Continuous vibrato cannot be expressive for the same reason that running any emotional signal on autopilot is not expressive.   If you hear a person say "I love you" that can be read as expressing something.  If the same person says "I love you" over and over again for three hours straight you will conclude that they have a mental problem. 
Vibrato as a subject has to involve opinions and disagreement.  This page is doomed to be a mess, and I think that is OK.  There is no other way to advance our collective musical civilization.... 66.118.92.4 (talk) 08:52, 12 July 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: A basicly flawed article

message: This paragraph is pretty full of imprecise language.  "Spinning the sound around the room" would be ok as a description of an effect, but it's stated as fact.  I don't know enough about what the original author was talking about to clean this up, but I think it needs re-writing with more of an eye to actual facts, instead of the fuzzy descriptions of appearance that people often resort to.
:The effect is intended to add warmth to a note, and in the case of bowed strings, adds a shimmer to the sound, as the sound pattern emitted by a well-made instrument virtually "points" in different directions with slight variations in pitch. This effect interacts with the room acoustics to add interest to the sound, in much the same way as an acoustic guitarist may swing the box around on a final sustain, or the rotating baffle of a Leslie speaker will spin the sound around the room.
--24.3.195.202 01:13, 22 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Follow the link to the Leslie speaker, which literally "spins the sound around the room" like a kid swinging a flashlight beam in circles.  This text is meant as a description of that fact, as well as the documented fact that "the sound pattern emitted by a well-made instrument virtually "points" in different directions with slight variations in pitch." Any sonar designer knows how an acoustic projector array can point sound in a focused beam. There's that flashlight analogy coming in handy again. Any one who has spent some time listening to actual string instruments may be able to hear this for themselves. Recorded sound through speakers or earphones does not show this; you need to hear it live. See here and here. __Just plain Bill 22:31, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Imprecise Mumbo-Jumbo

message: Why is there nothing regarding voice vibrato and its techniques? What a disappointment...
165.123.140.215 08:31, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If you ever come back and see this, kindly consider jumping in and adding verifiable pieces about what you do know. It's a tasty soup simmering here, started with nothing but some water and a stone. __ Just plain Bill 14:24, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Voice Vibrato 

message: I came to this article looking for technical information on vocal vibrato.  While it is mentioned, instrumental vibrato is by far the main focus here.  This was also highlighted by the seeming non-sequitur sentence at the end of the article which states "Whitney Houston is one of the best contemporary employers of vibrato."  The paragraph it is tacked onto had been talking about instrumental vibrato and unless Whitney plays an instrument I am not aware of it doesn't really seem to fit.  (At the very least, that closing sentence is an opinion and not a fact and should be moved or removed).  So, I'd like to propose either a separate article on vocal vibrato, or a separate section within this article to focus on singers that employ the technique as part of their style, dangers of overuse, etc.
---ThaughtPolice 17:05, 1 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Distinction between vocal and instrumental vibrato 

message: I think this article was initially written by someone who dislikes vibrato and wants it excluded from all music. I know there are such sans vibrato fans. Whatever. But now with all other edits it's a mess. Someone should rewrite this whole thing from a natural point of view. —Preceding unsigned comment added by ??? (talk • contribs) 
:It is a bit heavy on two points: 1) that vibrato is sometimes used to mask poor intonation, and 2) that there was much contention over the use of vibrato before the 19th century. Regarding this second point, that argument is pretty much over, except where "period" performances are concerned, so I agree that some toning down of the overly-pendantic and equivocal tone would be good. ==ILike2BeAnonymous 17:46, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  POV 

message: I've reorganised the article under a number of headings.  It probably doesn't flow as well as it used to, but now it's hopefully easier to locate the information you're after.  Feel free to rewrite it, preferably around the new major headings that I introduced.  I'm hoping that sections of the Finger vibrato article can be incorporated here under the Techniques section.  
-- TimNelson (talk) 03:33, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reorg, merge, and that sort of thing 

message: If the article was at one time anti-vib, it had certainly swung to the other extreme, with all Norrington statements being "allegedly" and pro-vib opinions presented as fact. Have tidied these up, and made the controversy explicit by adding the "Vibrato wars" heading. Norrington's claims certainly benefit from challenge, but the challenges themselves are still badly sourced. --Straw Cat (talk) 14:27, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Vibrato wars

message: Nothing substantial about vocal vibrato, which in "Classical" music is the real problem.
Opera fans are stupid freaks on it, and to me, it disfigures most opera into once in a while unlistenability.
Also, about instrumental vibrato, I have heard all my life that Joachim's Quartet was the first ensemble to play with constant vibrato.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Beenhere (talk • contribs) 18:54, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lousy, not up to standard. 

message: The illustration at the begining of the article which alleges to show the difference between "tremolo" and "vibrato" does no such thing.  What is does seem to show is the difference between a discontinuous DC source and a continuous AC source -- interesting, but nothing to do with this article.  Tremolo (one definition, anyway) is a periodic variation in /amplitude/; vibrato is a periodic variation in frequency.  The diagram shows neither of these.  Assuming frequencies in the range of hearing the top wave would be heard as a series of clicks, and the bottom wave would be heard as a continuous tone, without any variation of pitch.
208.100.240.10 (talk)  —Preceding undated comment added 22:09, 5 June 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree it may not be the clearest of illustrations, but look again. The way I read that display, the horizontal axis is time, vertical axis is frequency, and the Z-axis (brightness) is amplitude. The upper interrupted line shows an amplitude-varying signal at a steady frequency, and the lower trace shows a frequency-varying signal at steady amplitude, more or less. __ Just plain Bill (talk) 22:34, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

text: The illustration is perfectly accurate since it's not trying to show a waveform, but is rather a spectrographic representation of sound over time. User:kyleleitch  —Preceding undated comment added 20:31, 16 January 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Illustration doesn't illustrate 

message: In the article, it is claimed: "Defenders of vibrato object that the sonic limitations of older recordings, particularly with respect to overtones  and high frequency information, make an uncontroversial assessment of earlier playing techniques very difficult."
Unfortunately, it is not made clear that this claim is unfounded, if not misleading. The phenomena of vibrato and tremolo both have NOTHING to do with "overtones and high frequency information", but with rhythmic volume and/or frequency changes of the tone as such, so they logically cannot become imperceptible just because part of the upper frequency range is lacking. A band-pass filter (cutting out both very low and very high frequencies, as usually happens on early cylinder or 78rpm recordings) is simply not capable of turning a tone played/sung with vibrato into a straight tone! On the contrary, most early (pre-1930) recordings were done, for technical reasons, in very small studio rooms with little reverberation and thus give a "close-miked" effect to voices and solo instruments; this technique over-emphasizes rather than diminishes any vibrato employed by the performer - one reason why certain singers like Caruso or Melba who sang with very little vibrato recorded more successfully than others at the time. The only thing that might happen with a poor recording is that an artificial vibrato-like sound is introduced by mechanical wow and flutter (periodic variations of disc or tape speed during recording), but if you hear steady tones with no or very little vibrato you can always be confident they were played/sung that way, no matter how distorted or constricted the recording may be.
The nonsense about "primitive early recordings reproducing notes sung/played with vibrato as straight vibrato-less tones" has already spread to various critics and reviewers(usually to ridicule those modern "classical" singers who eschew the commonplace wide vibrato unheard-of before the 1950s, following the style heard on early 20th-century recordings), so I feel a rebuttal is necessary in the main Wikipedia article on the subject.
ChrisZ78 (talk) 18:26, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unfounded claim about early/primitive recordings 

message: Pardon?! Has the author ever listened to just a single line sung at full voice by Joan Baez or Ewan McColl? (I'm not providing links to these names, for anyone who needs to look them up should not make statements about "folk music" at all except to express their ignorance of the subject).  —Preceding unsigned comment added by ChrisZ78 (talk • contribs) 18:03, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, there are exceptions and JB is a famous one; there is footage of her doing her operatic style and laughing about it with Dylan in, I think, Don't Look Back. The majority of folk singers seem to prefer using grace notes or, in Carthy's case, a kind of slur towards the tone.Straw Cat (talk) 11:32, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Folk Music Singers Never Use Vibrato??? 

message: This article exhibits many subjective and harsh comments that do not inform, but merely instruct.  When reading parts of this article, it seems that the writer(s) are pushing their own agendas and could care less about citing sources, but are far more fixated on interpreting them in the guise of some sort of belligerent naysayer toward historically-informed performance and anything else thereunto appertaining.  Historically-informed performance, scholarship, and so forth do not exist for the purpose of finding out how musicians from the past performed to the tee; however, some who have contributed to this article seem to enjoy knocking over this proverbial “straw man” by making such ridiculous comments that are not factual, but merely opinion—something that extends beyond the boundaries of acceptability in an encyclopedia-like forum such as Wikipedia.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Orgelspielerkmd (talk • contribs) 05:31, 29 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Too Judgemental  

message: I'm pretty sure that the leslie speaker works on a principle of directivity modulation, rather than through amplitude modulation. The change in SPL caused by the horn rotating is likely to be in the order of fractions of a dB for any listener more than 15 feet away from the speaker, except for the fact that much of the High Frequency generated is reflected by the horn, and sent in a different direction to the listener. When the horn faces the listener the HF will be much stronger, as HF is absorbed when it reflects more than LF is. This would indeed result in a level difference as the reflected sound would be lower in level than the direct path sound, but this is not due primarily to distance from the source. The spectral difference would be very noticeable, kind of like a wahwah pedal. I would be surprised if the LF (<100Hz) was affected very much at all by either effect.  Therefore the leslie speaker probably results in primarily neither a pitch vibrato, nor an intensity vibrato, but a spectral vibrato which is not really mentioned by the article.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.233.100.171 (talk) 11:54, 17 March 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I too find the Leslie discussion weird. It's true that the Doppler effect, combined with oscillation in distance, would create vibrato, but the Doppler variation is going to be extremely small since the Leslie speaker only moves by a few tens of centimetres relative to the mic or the listener. Definitely needs citations to justify that section, otherwise it is unfounded speculation and should be removed entirely.--mcld (talk) 19:52, 8 April 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Leslie Speaker Discussion Wierdness 

message: Yes, Norrington conducted Elgar non-vibrato at the 2008 Proms, but not the Enigma Variations.   It was the First Symphony, in Prom 7.   Greeted with some warmth, as it happens.   An important experiment.   Pity the article couldn't be bothered to get it right.Delahays (talk) 19:35, 26 August 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Norrington Prom 2008

message: The historical parts of this article are rather heavily partisan against period performance practice. Evidence against the use of constant vibrato in the standard modern practice are continually presented and then dismissed with weasel words. Section "Vibrato's use in various musical genres" could probably use a POV tag. --♦♦♦Vlmastra♦♦♦ (talk) 17:03, 30 September 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  POV 

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