scriptgirl said:

Why do black males have lower speaking voices?

?

Do they?

I don't think so.

I have a bass voice. Barry deep.

But it gets too much attention to be common.

My voice is lower than most brothers I speak to.

I sure think a lot of black males have deeper (sexier) voices than most

BlaqueKnight said:

Anyone notice how over the past 25 years or so, the natural lower register of black male voices have been pushed out of R&B music?

Its common knowledge that many black American males have lower speaking voices. At one point (60s-70s) this was a staple of the music being made and there was a balance of range. For every Little Richard, there was a Sam Cooke. Teddy Pendergrass and Luther Vandross were just as common and loved as Michale Jackson (before Thriller) and Prince (before Purple Rain). Male vocal groups had voices in different ranges, not voices that all covered the same octave.

Over the course of the past 20-25 years or so, the distinctive lower register of the black male voice has been filtered out of R&B, as has the commonality of the black male voice in the black community (via more black males in prison, but I digress)

In the 70s & 80s, you had Jeffery Osborne, Luther Ingram, James Ingram, the unmistakeable Barry White, Freddy Jackson, Rick James, etc., etc., etc. In the 80s, higher registers were more popular but they weren't non-existent by any means. You had voices that were distinctly black male. Even in the 90s, while Babyface was all the rage, there was still Jodeci and Jagged Edge, Donnell Jones, Brian McKnight and the like. There were fewer but they were still there.

That all changed in the 00s. Now, you have Jaheim, Anthony Hamilton, and a small handful of others but most of the voices in R&B are more along the register of Chris Brown; voices that sound like boys rather than men. The black male voice, which has traditionally been a staple of the R&B sound, has been all but removed from R&B as we know it. I DID NOT say that it doesn't exist (as have already cited examples), but it has certainly been reduced to an imbalance in favor of more immature, non-threatening sounding voices. Anyone disagree?

Also, the maturity of songwriting that went along with those voices has also declined substantially. A commanding, powerful voice is often more likely to be heeded that a lighter, softer one. See where I'm going with this? R&B heads, discuss.

(just trying to incite some more interesting conversation on here rather than the same old Beyoncé/MJ/Janet/Kanye/Timberlake talk)

[Edited 5/25/13 8:40am]

I agree!! I believe it has everything to do with "crossover" appeal. I think someone had mentioned to make them less intimidating and that may very well be the case. As far as Jodeci was concern, they were over-shadowed by Boyz II Men. They were over-shadowed because they were more aggressive with their sound and appearance. I don't know, I just feel that R&B (true R&B, the one that we grew up on) is a dying genre. Instead we have weak-voiced singer trying to to turn somebody on. I'm sorry, but Lloyd, The Dream, and wanna be grown sounding Trey Songz only make me wanna say "little boy...go somewhere and sit down!" when they try to sing about intimacy.

And to take this conversation a step further, let's talk about the females of R&B. Jill/Angie Stone/Ledisi well never be as appreciated as those two females that you put in parentheses. And nothing pisses me off more than when someone wants to refer to B-girl as a R&B singer!!!!!

Sweetie and I have had this conversation many, many times. Back in the day, black male singers had voices. And not just voices, but really distinctive sounds. You could listen to the radio and know immediately whether you were listening to Sam Cooke or Jackie Wilson or Little Willie John or Levi Stubbs or Lenny Williams or Eddie Levert or Teddy Pendergrass.

Now, they all sound alike - universally mediocre.

I get the concept that "music isn't as good as it used to be" but I think the conspiracy behind that is a lot more milquetoast and mundane than some people are suggesting.

I just see a conspiracy to make money by appealing to the lowest common denominator. All the singers mentioned as models here stopped having hits 20 years ago.

They have computer programs to tell you how likely a song is to be a hit nowadays. Low voices don't get high scores in the program, because no one that has one has had a hit in 20 years. So, no low voices will be heard.

That's just marketing. I do believe in marketing conspiracies.

Anyway now that all singers are autotuned, if low voices come back in style, just drop it an octave in the computer and you're good to go.

mimi02 said:

BlaqueKnight said:

Anyone notice how over the past 25 years or so, the natural lower register of black male voices have been pushed out of R&B music?

Its common knowledge that many black American males have lower speaking voices. At one point (60s-70s) this was a staple of the music being made and there was a balance of range. For every Little Richard, there was a Sam Cooke. Teddy Pendergrass and Luther Vandross were just as common and loved as Michale Jackson (before Thriller) and Prince (before Purple Rain). Male vocal groups had voices in different ranges, not voices that all covered the same octave.

Over the course of the past 20-25 years or so, the distinctive lower register of the black male voice has been filtered out of R&B, as has the commonality of the black male voice in the black community (via more black males in prison, but I digress)

In the 70s & 80s, you had Jeffery Osborne, Luther Ingram, James Ingram, the unmistakeable Barry White, Freddy Jackson, Rick James, etc., etc., etc. In the 80s, higher registers were more popular but they weren't non-existent by any means. You had voices that were distinctly black male. Even in the 90s, while Babyface was all the rage, there was still Jodeci and Jagged Edge, Donnell Jones, Brian McKnight and the like. There were fewer but they were still there.

That all changed in the 00s. Now, you have Jaheim, Anthony Hamilton, and a small handful of others but most of the voices in R&B are more along the register of Chris Brown; voices that sound like boys rather than men. The black male voice, which has traditionally been a staple of the R&B sound, has been all but removed from R&B as we know it. I DID NOT say that it doesn't exist (as have already cited examples), but it has certainly been reduced to an imbalance in favor of more immature, non-threatening sounding voices. Anyone disagree?

Also, the maturity of songwriting that went along with those voices has also declined substantially. A commanding, powerful voice is often more likely to be heeded that a lighter, softer one. See where I'm going with this? R&B heads, discuss.

(just trying to incite some more interesting conversation on here rather than the same old Beyoncé/MJ/Janet/Kanye/Timberlake talk)

[Edited 5/25/13 8:40am]

I agree!! I believe it has everything to do with "crossover" appeal. I think someone had mentioned to make them less intimidating and that may very well be the case. As far as Jodeci was concern, they were over-shadowed by Boyz II Men. They were over-shadowed because they were more aggressive with their sound and appearance. I don't know, I just feel that R&B (true R&B, the one that we grew up on) is a dying genre. Instead we have weak-voiced singer trying to to turn somebody on. I'm sorry, but Lloyd, The Dream, and wanna be grown sounding Trey Songz only make me wanna say "little boy...go somewhere and sit down!" when they try to sing about intimacy.

And to take this conversation a step further, let's talk about the females of R&B. Jill/Angie Stone/Ledisi well never be as appreciated as those two females that you put in parentheses. And nothing pisses me off more than when someone wants to refer to B-girl as a R&B singer!!!!!

That is what I was pointing out! Before I was rudely interrupted. A lot of the pop market are turned off by heavy bass voices in black muziq rnb. So to make it less intimidating they prefer high nasal voices like billy goat sounding Trey Songz or a high tenor vocalist like Chris Brown. Only rappers are more accepted with bass voices. But even that is being watered down lately..

Its sad but true. Because they can copy the voices better when they try to duplicate the sound. Like Nsync & Backstreet Boys copied New Edition or Justin Timberlake copying Ginuwine & Usher..