The Adam Guettel Argument

[RentBoy86]

Posted: 11/6/06 at 11:43pm

I'm singing "How Glory Goes" in my voice class, and my voice teacher brought up an interesting argument. He doesn't care for Guettel's music because he said that Guttel doesn't write well for the voice. Which I'm finding is the case. And a lot of his music tends to sound the same. I think "How Glory Goes" sounds similar to a lot of his other works. He writes beautiful music, don't get me wrong, but my voice teacher said he just doesn't write for the voice and the people who pulled off his music in "Piazza" - the show he saw - should all have gotten rasies or Tonys. What do you all think?

[CurtainPullDowner]

Posted: 11/6/06 at 11:57pm

I think your teacher is an ass.
Listen to Vicki Clark, Kelli O'Hara etc.
The voice is a part of the process.
he may be difficult but the results are worth it.

[NickHyper]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 12:28am

Yeah, the voice is an instrument just like a piano, or cello, or anything else. There are easy exercises for beginners, and as you get better, you move on to more challenging things. Adam Guettel doesn't write chopsticks or I,vi,IV,V progressions. It's not called "not writing well for the voice," it's called challenging the singer.

And I would definitely say Piazza and Floyd Collins are quite different, except for maybe a couple things.

Updated On: 11/7/06 at 12:28 AM

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 1:03am

I kind of agree that your voice teacher's an ass...

[broadwaybelter]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 1:06am

I'm confused...how does that statement his voice teacher made distinguish that he is an ass?

[kyle.]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 1:55am

I think that Saturn Returns, Collins, and Piazza all sound very different from one another.

Those works, compared to other songs he has penned that appear on recordings such as McDonald's first two albums, are also very different. All of his shows so far each have a very distinct sound that match with the location of the piece, which not every composer does.

I heard somewhere that before writing any lyrics he writes the emotion of the scene/character. Anyone know if this is true? It makes sense to me. If you listen to the music alone in Statues and Stories, it sounds exactly like dawn breaking in a busy square in Italy. The Joy You Feel feels very suspicious, tense, vicious. Dividing Day is very reflective and in the past. In my opinion not every composer has the ability to create a very distinctive setting with the music alone.

[actormcfamous]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 2:04am

I agree that Guettel's three major works - Piazza, Floyd Collins, Saturn Returns/Myths and Hymns all sound very different. True, I think that Guettel has a distinct sound, but then again so does every composer worth his or her snuff.

I also think that Guettel composes very well for the voice. I too have sang "How Glory Goes" and found that though it whipped my chords into a shape, I feel more natural singing his music than any other musical theater composer. His music is supremely difficult, and yet he is similar to Sondheim in that interpretation and acting make or break the song.

[Jazzysuite82]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 2:25am

yeah I'd say that you voice teacher should develop an ear, which may be a problem when teaching you about your voice. Adam has a style and a sound, but so does Mozart and Beethoven and any other composer for that matter.

Now I'm a singer and I find Guettel's music VERY singable. First of all what does your teacher mean specifically? What makes his music so unsingable? I'm actually looking at How Glory Goes now. It's a song I've sung before and while there are tricky things in it, it's totally singable and it's not rediculously hard. A lot of the composition is linear. The biggest interval I see is an octave jump. The range is 1 note beyond an octave and a half (which is hardly unreasonable when you're talking about a lyric baritone or bari-tenor). All the vowels are pretty open, especially on the highest and longest notes.


Yeah, um I have no clue what the heck your teacher is talking about. I think it'd be weird for him to write instrumentally since he's always been a singer, even before an instrumentalist. HE knows the voice. I could see someone saying that his stuff is so high because he has a rediculously high voice.

Now WEBBER that's someone who can't write for a voice. EVITA?! Really. Yeah sure lets have a belter belt a High E and then go down the entire scale to a low E in a span of 5 sec. Now do it 8 times a week. THAT'S healthy.


end of rant

[LuPonatic]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 2:53am

I don't think there is anything wrong with Adam Guettel's writing for the voice. I do however see how he can sometimes be writing voice parts with string instruments in mind. some things are easier on a violin than in the voice. This doesn't mean bad...just challenging.

There are many very VERY famous composers who have been "classified" as not knowing the human voice. A good example is Beethoven...His vocal stuff is done less often than others, because he didn't write as well for the voice as others. We still, however, sing Beethoven vocal pieces and label them "a challenge." I think my point is we shouldn't be too hard on this voice teacher.

Right now I have "Say It Somehow" from Piazza in mind, which is a piece I am performing with a friend of mine. It has some very tough things that aren't for your "average voice." Maybe that's all this teacher meant...not for the average voice.

[Jazzysuite82]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 3:09am

doesn't write well for the voice is different than challenging. I find it hard to believe that Adam thinks in terms of stringed insturments. He knows it will be sung, he actually hums the tune. Why think in terms of an instruments?

[DG]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 3:32am

"A good example is Beethoven...His vocal stuff is done less often than others, because he didn't write as well for the voice as others."

Which explains the 9th Symphony, the Missa Solemnis and, of course, FIDELIO.

Who ARE you people, and where do you come from?

[EugLoven]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 4:19am

I also don't think your voice teacher knows what he's talking about. Well, I mean to say, he doesn't seem to have a well-informed opinion.

I've been singing Guettel night after night for the past 2 months... We're staging "Floyd Collins" at SFSU.

Guettel's music is transcendent.
It is difficult as hell.
He doesn't "help" you, like Sondheim does.
If you're looking for your note, it's usually the one that sounds "wrong" in the chord.
But that doesn't mean he doesn't write for the voice.
It means that he's creating a magnificent challenge.

To have your voice reach the talent and level of Guettel, to fit it into his complex melodies, is a triumph. Up to this point in my life, Guettel has been the most difficult music I've ever had to learn. And I'm loving it. To write "for the voice" means very little to me. What matters to me is truly letting your voice be another instrument in the score.

[nobodyhome]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 7:21am

The idea that Beethoven's vocal writing is sometimes quite awkward is a common one that has been expressed by critics and musical commentators and I would guess by performers as well.

Of course, it hasn't kept the 9th (especially), the Missa Solemnis and Fidelio from being performed frequently.

[WickedGeek28]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 7:41am

I disagree with your voice teacher because very few other composers are able to express emotion like Adam. It's definately and obviously harder to sing and learn, but once you do, it's so worth it.

[Ourtime992]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 10:37am

I would second Jazzysuite's comments that part of the problem may be that Adam writes for, at least in, his own voice, which is very high and very lyrical. If you get a chance sometime, find the audio files of him humming Light in the Piazza and notice how easy it is for him in his own range.

[RentBoy86]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 11:14am

I agree that some of his stuff is too high. And I would agree that "How Glory Goes" is not a tough song note wise or vocally, but there are a few things that are just unatural in the way the notes progress. You would think a note would end here, but then it goes to something that doesn't sound like it fits. Which I guess is his style.

As for not being singable, I think he just meant that - like Sondheim - a lot of Guettel's music doesn't really have a melody, its more stream-of-consciousness kind of singing, which can be tough to figure out how it fits into the accompianment. I wouldn't say it makes the vocal chords stronger because I've sung songs that are a lot tougher on the voice than this, but you have to be on your game about counting because there isn't any sort of way to just listen to way the piano is playing and fit your part into it.

Also - not that this really means much - but my voice teacher got his degree at Juliard and sings a couple opears a year, so I would think he knows what he's talking about. He also doesn't like how Guettel makes the characters sing on "Ah" a lot during Piazza. He thought it was a cop-out. But again, just his opinion. I for one love Piazza.

And I really do think a lot his stuff sounds the same. I'm sorry, but "How Glory Goes" sounds like something in "Saturn Returns" - if you listen to the music. I would say Piazza sounds distinct, but Floyd has bits and pieces that sound directly out of Saturn Returns.

[Enjolras77]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 11:46am

I agree that a lot of Guettel's work sounds similar -- but that is just his style. Most composers works sound similar in style to their other works. There are certain chord progressions, cadences, intervals, melody patterns, rhythms etc. that each composer is fond of and they use them in their works. That is what makes them unique. Just by listening to the scores without prior knowledge I could identify that Myths and Hymns, Floyd Collins, and Piazza were all by the same composer. By that same token I could pick out a show by Sondheim, Webber, Yazbeck, LaChiusa, or Jason Robert Brown without prior knowledge too. They all do things in their music that is distinctive of their style of composition. It's just like listening to a classical music radio station and knowing immediately if a piece is by Beethoven -- his style is very recognizable.

Of course there are always exceptions here and there. If you listened to some of Beethoven's later works, it might be hard to pinpoint it as Beethoven because by then his style had moved from Classical into what would later be deemed Romantic. If all you had to listen to by Guettel was "The Ballad of Floyd Collins" and "Aiutami" then it might be hard to guess they were by the same person -- but if you listened to the entire scores of both shows it would be obvious. When I play the song "Lonely Room" for people who are only familar with the movie of Oklahoma! they never guess it was composed by Richard Rodgers. However, obviously the rest of the show is in the classic Rodgers style.

Finally, I see where your voice teacher is coming from. Some of Guettel's work is very challenging and doesn't fit the vocal line well, but it is not unsingable. It is just very, very difficult. However, songs like "Migratory V", "Hero and Leander", "The Light in the Piazza", and "Passeggiata" all fit very smoothly into the voice. Sometimes I wish my college voice professor were more like yours -- he knew that I was comfortable singing musical theatre and melody driven pieces so he always wanted to challenge me by having me sing twentieth century art songs. Which I guess in the long run probably was better. My last year though, which was 1999, I was able to sing a selection by Jason Robert Brown and one by Guettel on my senior recital. The voice faculty was very impressed by the musical vocabulary used by these two composers. Up until then the only musical theatre composer whose works they thought were challenging enough to merit us occasionally singing them at recitals was Sondheim.

[RentBoy86]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 11:56am

Thanks for providing nice feedback/argument instead of just stating "your teacher is an ass" which is such a childish thing to say.

And I'm in the same boat. I'm a musical theater student taking voice classes through the music department. Most of them sing songs from operas or art songs, so it's hard for them to take me seriously as a vocalist. But they still let me sing whatever I want usually.

And I think the best example of Guettel's music being difficult is "Hero and Leander" because the vocal line sounds so improvised that it's hard to fit it into my voice or someone else's voice because it was so made to fit his own voice. It sounds like he was just at the piano and plucking away and then put it down on sheet music. It's just that all the lyrics he wants to put sometimes don't fit too nicely with the music. Most composers put down a melody which the actor can sort of change and alter to fit the text in, but with Guettel you can't really.

[TenThousandThings]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 12:11pm

Just as each person's fingerprints are unique, each person's voice has its own strengths and weaknesses. This is why classical voice created "fachs" -- categories that demystify the most common groupings of those strengths and weaknesses. Unfortunately, there are songs for all of us that we love dearly that just won't fit our voices no matter how hard we try.

It's really not so much an issue of how certain composers write for the voice (although Beethoven notoriously treated voices like instruments and makes his singers scream to compete with huge, bombastic orchestral backup that is the equivalent, for most people, of scraping their larynx against a piece of concrete)as it is finding the songs that fit your voice.

The one thing I will say about my own experience singing Adam Guettel's music is that it makes me work like crazy to support. But so does anything with soaring lyrical lines (no matter who wrote it). That's my particular challenge with his stuff. Someone else's might be hearing the melody amongst all of the dense and complex chord progressions. Someone else might find that the range or tessitura doesn't fit their voice -- well, if you're a bass-baritone trying to sing high tenor material, it may not work so well (duh).

I find that Adam Guettel writes for *performers.* The pieces are so effortless to act, and I've rarely heard music that captures and embodies a character's emotion as well as his. And especially in a piece like "Piazza" where the language barrier is part of the story, there are times when words fail the characters and all they can muster is a melisma on an [a] vowel. His music, to me, sounds like someone just opening their soul.

[Jazzysuite82]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 12:11pm

I'm sorry as a vocalist it's your job NOT to change and alter text to fit in lyrics. That's a composers job. I'm VERY confused by that statement. I think 'singable' is not the word you want to use here. I think just because a note doesn't go where you want it to doesn't make it not singable. Guettel DOES write melodically. I think people who say that aren't really listening. How can you listen to How Glory Goes or Say It Somehow and say that's not melodic writing?

I think it's important to note that because a song doesn't fit in your voice doesn't make it unsingable. The question is why? I know for me personally Hero and Leander sit in my passaggio. It wasn't an easy fit for my voice (which is why my teacher gave it to me). By the way a comment like Guettel writes too high doesn't make sense. He's a composer, he writes what he hears. Now if there are no singers who can do it then it's too high, but there are plenty of people singing his stuff well.

[Enjolras77]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 12:14pm

I see what you mean. A lot of the melismatic or "Ah" sections in Guettel's music do sound very improvisatory -- and due to the complicated nature of the music it is very hard to do any "altering" to the vocal line. I had a hard time singing works by Satie or Debussey for the same reason.

Do you have any music writing or MIDI programs that could play back music you entered? Back when I was in college Finale and Sibelius were still in their infant stages so I had a MIDI program that I used. When I had a song that was particularly difficult, I would take the several hours neccessary to enter the accompaniment into the program note by note. Then I would enter in my vocal line. Although the playback was of poor sound quality I could hear how my part fit in with the acccompaniment. I would turn the level of my part up loud so that it stood out and would then practice. Once I felt comfortable enough I would mute the vocal line and then sing it with only the accompaniment. It helped a lot, especially when there were difficult rhythms, syncopations, or when the melody and accompaniment were in dissonance. The program always kept strict time.

Obviously fitting the text in is a whole challenge unto itself, but once you can master the intervals, rhythms, and other tricky aspects of the melody then it might make things easier.

[RentBoy86]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 12:24pm

Composers put down lyric lines, but then when actually put into a performance might be hard for a singer to actually sing. Like they might not provide breaks for breathing, etc. so therefore the actor must fit a bunch of words into a certain line in order to breath, etc. I'm not saying its done all the time, but it's done. I mean get a piece of sheet music and then listen a cast recording and you'll see that the notes don't line up exactly as they do on the page.

[GClef2]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 12:31pm

Most of Sondheims music is just as, if not MORE challenging than Guettels...

[EponineAmneris]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 12:34pm

I have been working on DIVINDING DAY and I must say it is challenging. Adam's music is not easy stuff to perform. He has Sondheim-esque qualities that may just need more time to develop fully... But your teachers is wrong to say he does not write for the voice. The voice is one of the most important things Broadway composers write for.

[RentBoy86]

Posted: 11/7/06 at 12:35pm

I've never tried to sing Sondheim, but it doesn't seem as difficult to learn/sing as Guettell. But I don't know. I'm too young to sing Sondheim - that seems to be the consensus around here anyways.