Betsy Wolfe departs CAROUSEL — Page 14

https://twitter.com/BetsyWolfe/status/912812274481541125

I saw "Ghost" more than once for complicated reasons. Whatever one thinks of this actor, her voice is quite an instrument, and she uses it successfully and carefully, like Menzel. As soon as I saw the animated film and knew that Menzel would be too old (and perhaps indifferent anyway), I thought Levy would get the part. I'm not prescient, or even good at casting. It was easy to deduce she'd be a front runner.

Auggie27 said: "Whatever one thinks of this actor, her voice is quitean instrument, and she uses it successfully and carefully, like Menzel."

BHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!! Menzel? Careful? Good singing technique? IM ROLLING ON THE GROUND. That woman has screeched her way through every single score since Rent.

Sally Durant Plummer said: "She screetched her way to 3 Tony nominations; 1 win; the face of the biggest song of the decade; and an army of fans who will defend her to the death. I wish I were so lucky."

Me too. Regardless, she has the most unhealthy singing voice that I have ever heard.

GeorgeandDot said: "SchuylWERKsister said: "If Betsy Wolfe is a high belter than what are we calling people like Eden Espinosa, Adrienne Warren, Stephanie J. Block, Alice Ripley, Cynthia Erivo, Betty Buckley?"

Ummmm, I would also call them high belters......."

Stop. If you think Betsy Wolfe's voice can do what these women's voices do at the capacity that they do it then this isn't even worth discussing. Conversely Betsy can do things with her voice that the women I listed cannot. As far as belting goes, to categorize what Betsy does with her voice with what those women do is a disservice, even to her.

Again, I'm not saying that one relationship to the voice is better than another, but there is absolutely a difference. There's this taboo around not being a belter that people need to stop feeding into. Betsy Wolfe is good. She is NOT a true power belter. Period. She has had an excellent career in spite of this and the (unforgiving) demand for belting on the American musical stage. She has even garnered roles that sing in that range, but this does not change where her voice sits. If anything gaining these roles and not being a true power belter is more of a testament to her talent, but not an means to misclassify.

Updated On: 9/27/17 at 01:58 PM

SchuylWERKsister said: "ladypresent said: "i love that you all have this much time to debate this subject.
and they say millenials don't have drive and ambition."

I never understand the point of posts like this. What is your end game? And if you don't have one aren't you just as wasteful of your time as your implying we are, if not more?We joined a theatre chat board to talk abouttheatre. You joined for the same reason.

Passive aggressive censorship and shaming is whack. Go elsewhere withyour time thatyou use so much better than the rest of us."

I love people who complain about censorship by others while in less than 24 hours on a board, have declared themselves the definitive authority on Betsy's voice and anyone who disagrees needs to just "stop".

Schuylwerk, welcome. I can tell you've been a lurker, so congrats on taking the plunge! There really are lively discussions on here, and many of them are legitimately educational. In situations like this, I prefer to take the safe way out and just comment on them using funny GIFs...

Okay y'all. I'd like to re state that Caissie has a great voice. And I'm a singer who's been studying voice for almost a decade. Menzel (who I love) has had pretty bad technique her whole career. I haven't listened to her as of late so I can't speak of her recent stuff. She always pushes her chest voice up the scale without mixing and she's had some vocal damage along the way as well. Caissie does have a better technique then Menzel but speaking of where the voice "sits" Caissie's sits higher then Idina so she has way more ease with the score then Menzel did. Idina was never a high belter and people put her in that box to her disadvantage. A "high belter" uses a healthy mix. Betsy falls into this category. Almost every good and smart belter uses a mix at some point so they avoid cramming the chest voice all the way up. Also having seen Frozen with Caissie I must say she did sing pretty well. Except for every high note she stuck her tongue actually out of her mouth. It was insane. Girl has a got some tongue tension. Ideally the tongue should rest behind the lower teeth. And the group of "high belters" are not all high belters. Nearly everyone's voices you listed on that list have completely different (and amazing) voices. Betty Buckley and SJB are definitely more regular belters. And when I say that I'm thinking of belting from a C to an Eb (C5-Eb5) maybe an E. Stephanie has sang F/F# in wicked and she wasn't that comfortable. If she's sung more of those and I'm wrong feel free to show me. I don't know everything. When I think of a high belter who mixes I think of people who can sing from an E to a G or higher (E5-G5). Betsy, and Cynthia Ervio fall into this category. At least for me. Im sorry if this comes off wrong I'm just trying to give my two cents.

"Passive aggressive censorship and shaming is whack. Go elsewhere with your time that you use so much better than the rest of us."

Spoken like a true millennial. :)

BroadwayConcierge said: "I adoredCaissie inHair and I think she sounds fantastic in the "Let It Go" bootleg that's been floating around. But to GeorgeandDot's credit, she was a pretty terrible Fantine and a so-so Elphaba. It's false to say she has "zero" singing technique, but GeorgeandDot isn't wrong in saying that her style isn't flawless.

Betsy is pretty flawless though, IMO."

She sounded great in Hair but that's not really on the level of difficulty of those other parts. (Side note: As much as I love sopranos and high belters, it would be nice if more composers took it easy on the female singers in their shows. Variety is nice.) I didn't see her as Fantine or Elphaba but she also sounded great in First Daughter Suite. Of course, I thought that score forced most of the actresses into a place where they sounded shrill so I wasn't really focused on vocal technique.

I do think Betsy managed to sound less shrill than Sherie Renee Scott in her recording of The Last 5 Years for whatever that's worth.

The idea that Betsy doesn't look like Elsa or that she's not "dark" or "edgy" enough to play a Disney princess is ridiculous.

Unless she goes full Tim Lincecum, yes, I would imagine you'll find out eventually.

http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/09/21/where-have-you-gone-tim-lincecum-in-search-of-beloved-giants-ace/

broadwayboy223 said: "So it's looking like she's probably not returning to Frozen and not Eliza and most likely not pregnant will we find out why she's not in Carousel?"

Betsy already stated that there is a conflict with the fall. She said that upfront in a statement on the day the Carousel change was announced. Is Betsy's word not good enough? You need or feel entitled to know more?

(Even though I am responding to your comments, I am obviously responding to many)

Updated On: 10/3/17 at 10:53 AM