Queen - A-Z Challenge - The Letter Q

 

Freddie is my all time favorite singer of the Rock Era and it's nice to know there is scientific reasons for my love of his vocals. I must have known even back then that his like would never be seen again when he was gone.

 

Anyone who’s ever heard a Queen song recognizes the power of Freddie Mercury’s voice. Those majestic, bombastic, rough-hewn vocals have had an indelible impact on pop and glam genres. Now, a group of Austrian, Czech, and Swedish researchers have used science to prove Mercury was just as good a singer as listeners thought.

Well, not quite as good. Legend had it that Mercury’s voice was capable of spanning four octaves. The researchers weren’t able to confirm this from their data (they used a mix of archival Mercury performances and interviews for data) but still found evidence that Mercury was extremely skilled at modulating his voice. One interesting element of Mercury’s singing was how he could sound finessed at times and more rough at others. The researchers noted this may have been due to his vibrato frequency, a few notches above the standard for classically trained vocalists.

 

The researches also found evidence that Mercury used subharmonics in his singing by vibrating his ventricular fold, a technique typically used only by Tuvan throat singers. As the researches write, the use of subharmonic 'aids in creating the impression of a sound production system driven to it's limits, even while used with great finesse. These traits, in combination with the fast and irregular vibrato, might have helped create Freddie Mercury's eccentric and flamboyant stage persona." So there you have it: the scientific reasoning behind Mercury's vocal greatness.

http://www.ew.com/article/2016/04/19/queen-freddie-mercury-voice-science

I want this figure soooooo much.

18 inches of Freddy!