How can talking aloud help you learn and remember better? I'm around a lot of studying. When I walk through the lobby of the Psychology building at Texas.VOCALIZING; Female Tenor Tells All. IT'S ''Messiah'' season again, and soon I will be dressing for the concert. My tuxedo is pressed, and my bow tie is at hand. Now I must think about accessories. Do I wear high heels or low? For female tenors, the dress code is flexible. There are more of us than you would think, and you will find us in many community choruses around Westchester County and Manhattan. We women sing tenor because the range suits us better than alto, which is the lowest female choral part. My voice, for example, quits at the A above Middle C, where altos are perfectly comfortable. There are at least 1. I belong to, and most sing as well as the men. I know that no matter how thoroughly I learn the music, no matter how precise my pitch, there is one thing I will never have: the sublime, soaring sound of a male tenor voice. Soprano mystique aside (how do they go so high?), low female singing has its fans. Our voices are called dusky, velvety, provocatively sexy. Professional singers like the contralto Marilyn Horne or the pop singer Carly Simon - - whose vocal range is extraordinary - - can cause shivers with their rich, full- bodied bottom notes. I, however, as a relatively untrained singer who simply wants to make music with others, serve chiefly as ballast, someone who adds vocal weight to the section. Ballast is why some conductors - - although by no means all - - admit women into their tenor sections. It helps when the men don't show up. Choruses tend to be chronically short on men, so they appreciate our interest. The conductor I sing with asks, after we pass his audition, only that we study the music and attend rehearsals. He never makes us feel like second- class citizens, even when he glares at our section and growls, ''Tenors, you're flat!'' The women take it on the chin like the rest of the guys. Singing Handel or Mozart is a pure joy, but later composers can be a challenge. Sometimes the music dips too low or the part is pure macho - - as in Orff's ''Carmina Burana,'' when the men sing lustily of spring and women - - and then some acting ability helps. There is a long tradition behind this. Trouser roles in opera, where the women wear the pants and woo the girls, have helped launch many a soprano's career. Learn how to identify Tundra Swan, its life history, cool facts, sounds and calls, and watch videos. On wintry days, flocks of North America’s most numerous swans. When our chorus traveled to China last summer, we met men who disdained female tenors. Lacking a common language, we could not learn what bothered them. We performed Verdi's ''Requiem'' along with a Chinese orchestra, Chinese and American soloists and a professional Chinese chorus, and the Chinese tenors kept their distance during rehearsals as well as the performance. Needless to say, no Chinese women were in the tenor ranks. Our American counterparts, on the other hand, are always collegial. When the chorus travels we become show people, even changing together in communal dressing rooms (backs turned discreetly). If female tenors are anomalies, no one says so. Some men could sing in the soprano section if they wanted to. They are countertenors, but may be too embarrassed to let loose with a High C. Countertenors talk like other men and look like other men, but sing in the stratosphere. And they do it with gusto. It can be eerie. Something comparable would be a woman blasting out the bass part. Short of that, what is so special about being a female tenor? Well, three nights a year we feel special. That is when we dress in tuxedos like the other tenors and sing at Carnegie Hall. We do our hair, put on makeup and feel like Marlene Dietrich in ''The Blue Angel.''Backstage, we compare notes. The answer: ''In the boys' department.'' We try for tasteful earrings, nothing that sparkles. We leave off the perfume, but so do the altos and sopranos. When our ties become crooked, the altos and sopranos straighten them. Then we all walk on stage together, the women in black skirts, white shirts and pearls, the men as dashing as Fred Astaire. We open our music books, wait for the downbeat, and watch the conductor. Then all that matters is the music. Continue reading the main story.
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January 2017
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