Pop , Musical Theatre and Opera

I was 24. I had been working in the industry as a singing actor for a while and a guy called Mark Meylan was giving a talk on musical theatre singing. Mark resides in London and is a West End guru. Mark said something so simple and so incisive that it really floored me. I have repeated this notion to other experienced singers and i often get the same “ ha!  Of course” 

Ok so here goes: 

Opera is about the music.

Musical theatre is about the words.

And Pop ……. (dramatic pause) … is about feel

I’ll say that again pop is about feel

As soon as he said that everything fell into place. How can someone who is classically trained hear Jimmy Barnes on the radio and have any opinion about what his singing is? With singers, you have to compare apples with apples. 

As a teacher, you have a responsibility to the vocal health of a student and if when they sing they are smacking their vocal chords together in a way that is going to prevent them from singing long term that's another thing.  But the point of this post is: Pop classical and music theatre are three different realms and they must be treated differently.

I just love the fact that People like Jo Estil waded into this with science.  Because of these people we have a pedagogy.  Singing is singing. Pushing air through vocal cords to make a sound. But stylistically they are different and physically they are different.