Mr. Joe Gracey Sir sez:
> An interesting note about George Jones, from my standpoint as a watcher
> of singers- he sings through the whole front of his skull. Whereas most
> vocalists open their mouths and project a sound from the hole, George
> basically sings through clenched teeth and projects the sound from every
> orifice in his skull, including vibrating the bones of his face. I think
> this is one of the things that adds such weird tension to his vocals.
> Try it- sing real loud through closed teeth. See?
Yeah, when I wrote yesterday I was talking about his phrasing in
particular, but the particular timbre of his voice is unique as
well. Iv'e never thought about it in exactly the terms you use
above, except to observe the clenched-teeth thing and that he does
seem to really sing through his *head* chest rather the chest or
diaphragm.
Once, um, I sat around for the better part of an afternoon singing
"Why Baby Why" over and over trying to understand how he gets that
sound <g>. All I could ever get to was a real nasal-sounding tone
that, alas, never even approached George-ness. I tried to constrict
my throat and hold my mouth in odd, closed ways like he does, but
never got the results.... Ah well. At least this practice came in
handy on the "Why Baby Why" singalong in CK's room last Tfest <g>.
There's a little of that timbre in Buck as well, no? (as opposed
to Johnny Paycheck, who seems to get the phrasing but not the
timbre....). They both have that head-centered, closed-mouth sound,
as opposed to the more "correct" resonating voice a la Faron and
such.
Interesting topic. I'm always fascinated by the particular "grain"
of different singers' voices. Willie's a strange one that way; he
sometimes strikes me as having several different phrasing-styles
(with more and less of that around-the-beat thing he does) and
timbres that he brings out for different purposes.
--junior
