Who Does My Voice Sound Like? - How to Understand Your Vocal Quality
Picture this: You are casting the next production of The Little Mermaid, and Ariana Grande, Beyoncé, Billie Eilish, Lana Del Rey and Taylor Swift ALL walk into your casting room. They all want to play either Ariel or Ursula and they all want to be together in the same cast - how are you possibly going to assign their roles?
Each of these artists are incredibly talented, powerful performers, and each of them has a very unique sound. This is often how we feel about our students when they walk into a casting room. In order to cast everyone successfully, we consider vocal quality. In this blog, we’ll identify what vocal quality means, how you can identify your vocal quality, and how you can use this information to better understand the casting process.
WHAT IS VOCAL QUALITY?
We often hear many different types of voices in our audition room. We refer to the way we describe a performer’s sound as their vocal quality. Vocal quality is made up of, but not limited to, the following characteristics:
TONE - BRIGHT | DARK | FORWARD | PINGY
STRENGTH - THIN | STRONG | FULL
PLACEMENT - HEAD VOICE | CHEST VOICE | MIX | BELT
How these characteristics are combined to create your sound is what gives you your unique vocal quality. Some of the most common vocal qualities that we see are:
PINGY, FORWARD, MIX
This is similar to Taylor Swift’s sound - we also see this in roles like:
Matilda - Matilda
Anna - Frozen
Little Red - Into the Woods
DARK, THIN, MIX/BELT
This is similar to Billie Eilish’s sound - we also see this in roles like:
Ursula - Little Mermaid
Velma Kelly - Chicago
Persephone - Hadestown
BRIGHT/VIBRANT, STRONG, MIX/BELT
This is similar to Beyoncé’s sound - we also see this in roles like:
Elphaba - Wicked
Fantine - Les Miserables
Elsa - Wicked
BRIGHT, STRONG, HEAD VOICE / MIX
This is similar to Ariana Grande’s sound - we also see this in roles like:
Glinda - Wicked
Ariel - Little Mermaid
Christine - Phantom of the Opera
SOFT, THIN, HEAD VOICE
This quality is similar to Lana Del Rey’s sound - we also see this in roles like:
Joanna - Sweeney Todd
Eurydice - Hadestown
Cosette - Les Miserables
HOW DOES VOCAL QUALITY IMPACT YOUR CASTING?
Let’s talk about YOUR voice!
If you have a stronger/fuller chest/belt sound, you might find that you tend to be cast in leading roles in musical theatre
If you sing more in your head voice, you might find yourself in more romantic/ingenue roles
If you find that you have a stronger/fuller chest/belt sound, and your tone is darker, you might end up cast in more villain/antagonist roles
If you have a mix belt/forward sound, you may often be cast playing younger, childish roles
Now that you understand a little more about your voice - you have some choices!
Perfect your strengths and challenge yourself:
If your voice lends itself to the roles you want - you can keep gunning for your ideal roles, or try challenging yourself with roles that might require some bold vocal choices, or some completely contrasting vocal choices..
If, for example, you have a strong chest voice, maybe you want to spend some time challenging yourself to perform more head/mix voice styles and expanding your vocal quality to be more versatile.
Set goals for yourself:
If your vocal quality doesn’t align with your desired roles, you can aim to work on strengthening your vocal technique so that you can work towards your desired vocal quality.
Accept your quality and make it work:
When students explore and get excited about roles that suit their voice, instead of the handful of specific leading roles, they have the opportunity to make interesting and unique choices! Try not to be frustrated by what you don’t have - do something amazing with what you do have!
Musical theatre is a specific vocal style that explores and features many different vocal qualities! We are here to cheer you on as you learn to own your voice and discover how to best use the unique qualities you bring to the table!
