Soapbox

Unchained Melody

OK, here’s my thing: people should have to sing a song more or less the way its written. It ought to be a law!
While I wouldn’t go so far as to call myself a “songwriter” I do fool around in that medium, so perhaps I’m more sensitive on the subject than others. Whatever the reason, I have a real peeve with people who change the melody of famous songs when they sing them, in order to show off their “vocal stylings”.

It’s very popular these days to take a simple melody and do little trills and riffs all over that aren’t written in: “diva crap” I like to call it. While changing a note or two here and there to make a song better fit your voice is fine, when you go beyond that it seems like the singer is saying they are more important than the songwriter. Some songs work well with improvisation, but in others it’s just plain wrong! You start with a beautiful, simple melody and it gets cluttered up and you lose the quality of the music. It can also be annoying, when adenoidal, breathy boy-band singers flutter up and down and around a note like a whineing mosquito.

Up until now, the most egregious case of this “look at me! Aren’t I special?” syndrome I’ve heard was on the finals of the latest “American Idol” when Reuben sang “Imagine” by John Lennon. Well, those are the words he sang, anyway. Mr Studdard seemed to think he knew better than a member of one of the top song-writing duoes in history what would make a good tune!

I kept urging, “Aw, c’mon, man! He wrote a beautiful song here- why don’t you just sing it!” I imagined John Lennon at the piano at 3 AM, laboring in love to create exactly the blend of words and music to express his vision…and Reuben looking over his shoulder and saying, “Ummmm…no” It was a crying shame.

So I was thinking that there should be a code, that says that at least the first time through a melody, for the first verse, a singer should be expected to sing it as it’s written, in homage to the writer, if nothing else. Then in subsequent verses, if you want to do a “theme and variations” on the melody; well, you can have at it. Just make sure you do it well.

But I realize now that there are times when even that rule just won’t cut it.

A few weeks ago a singing duo performed at my church. They were very nice young men who batted their eyelashes and spoke sincerely about singing for Jesus and all that, but they did have good voices and did some close, tricky harmonies that were quite nice. So after the service I went over and bought one of their CD’s. I chose a Christmas one and then just stuck it on a shelf, since it was October, after all.
Yesterday I got it out and listened to it. Eeek! It is like N’Sync does Christmas to the stylings of the Muzak Orchestra! Well, too bad. It’s just not my taste in music, I thought.
But then I heard “Ave Maria”.

They did the Schubert version, which, although the lesser of the two in my mind is still hauntingly beautiful. But from the very first “A-a-ave Mari-i-a…” it was full of breathy, adenoidal “diva crap”!! This guy was hopping all around the melody line like he was on a pogo stick. He has the voice to sustain those long notes- he just didn’t. He thought his skinny little 24 year old self knew better than Franz Schubert what Franz Schubert’s classic song should sound like! I mean, Ave Maria, for God’s sake!

Enough already! That’s it! There needs to be something stronger than a code- we need a law! People who mess up perfectly good songs should be condemned to listen to their stupid selves over and over and over for a day or two until they realize what they’ve done. And people who disrespect the masters: Bach, Handel, Schubert, Lennon~ should be smacked upside the head!
There’s only so much a person can be expected to take!