laura_drama_queen
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hardest song/character in musical theatrewhat role and what song in your opinion is the most challenging in musical theatre and why?
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Robinflamingo
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I'm not sure about MOST challenging, but Aldonza in Man of La Mancha is very challenging. It was written, as are most Broadway scores for a specific singer, in this case I believe it was Joan Diener - she is a dramatic, middle aged soprano, and because of the age of the character, and the type of character, if sopranos are cast, it's difficult to get the depth of the growl and the dirtyness of the life that she leads before she meets Don Quixote. If an alto is cast, it's difficult to sing certain songs in the type of voice that would usually cause an alto to get cast, because they are too high.
When I played Aldonza (I'm DEFINITELY an alto) I was too young to play her. But I had the growl and the attitude and a great onstage guitarist that actually accompanied two of my songs (written down a third) very effectively. It's a tough role: an onstage beating/rape, a total transformation of belief, and like everyone else in the play, two roles to play: a prisoner, and a character in the Quijana story.
Next?
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Salome
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as far as female roles.
The Baker's Wife in ITW is the most complex and challanging role in musical theatre. closely followed by Phyliss from Follies and Mama Rose in Gypsy.
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MaryMag
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| Robinflamingo wrote: | I'm not sure about MOST challenging, but Aldonza in Man of La Mancha is very challenging. It was written, as are most Broadway scores for a specific singer, in this case I believe it was Joan Diener - she is a dramatic, middle aged soprano, and because of the age of the character, and the type of character, if sopranos are cast, it's difficult to get the depth of the growl and the dirtyness of the life that she leads before she meets Don Quixote. If an alto is cast, it's difficult to sing certain songs in the type of voice that would usually cause an alto to get cast, because they are too high.
When I played Aldonza (I'm DEFINITELY an alto) I was too young to play her. But I had the growl and the attitude and a great onstage guitarist that actually accompanied two of my songs (written down a third) very effectively. It's a tough role: an onstage beating/rape, a total transformation of belief, and like everyone else in the play, two roles to play: a prisoner, and a character in the Quijana story.
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I sincerely agree. I believe Aldonza is the most difficult role vocally since she has such extremes in what she has to sing. The role is perfect for a dramatic soprano, but my feeling is unless a singer is classically trained, she'll never know she's a dramatic soprano. It seems that usually dramatic sop's think they're altos until someone shows them how to use their headvoice and then the soprano is like, 'ahhhhh that's better.'
In addition, (though this may be dramatic sop's perpetuating this myth to make themselves feel better about not being lyric sop's,) dramatic sopranos are supposed to be a fairly rare voice type.
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opheliarose
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| MaryMag wrote: | [
In addition, (though this may be dramatic sop's perpetuating this myth to make themselves feel better about not being lyric sop's,) dramatic sopranos are supposed to be a fairly rare voice type. |
Yes. Believe it or not, rarest of all women's voices is the true alto. Most "altos" are poorly trained sopranos. Lyric soprano is by far the most common. My head starts to hurt once you start getting into the picky differences between a full dramatic, a dramatic spinto, etc etc...
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MaryMag
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I agree about the 'most altos being undertrained sopranos' thing. If I had a nickel for every girl who called herself an alto just cuz she couldn't access her head voice yet, I'd be a rich girl. I've heard it estimated that only 20-30% of women are true altos. But I still believe less than 20-30% of women are spintos or dramatic sop's. So I still think that's rarer than altos.
And yeah I used to think the lines between spinto and dramatic and such were arbitrary and kinda elitist/pretentious, but when you really take a look at the roles spintos should be singing versus what dramatics should be singing, you really do see that the roles fit the weight and agility of the different voices. Like I would love to do Tosca, but I don't think my cords would be as happy singing that as say, some Turandot.
(Not that I'm singing Turandot at 24... my voice teacher nearly shot me when she saw that in my book and found out I was secretly learning it on my own...)
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Sweeney Hyde
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For males i think of Sweeney Todd initially because he has so many different emotions to display both in body and song. Same tihng applies to John Adams in 1776, perhaps the best book of a show ever written.
For females i think of Mama Rose in Gypsy, Daisy Gamble/Melinda Wells in On a Clear Day You Can See Forever because she has to play two completely different people pratically at the same time, and Dot in Sunday in the Park With George.
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Bianca.
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| MaryMag wrote: |
And yeah I used to think the lines between spinto and dramatic and such were arbitrary and kinda elitist/pretentious,
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I used to have a really great website that outlined the differences between everything.. but I lost it.. Does anyone have one?
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what_the_heck013
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Eva Peron in Evita has quite a vocal range (like Aldonza/Dulcinea). I also agree with whoever said Sweeney Todd. I think Marius is also quite a difficult male role.
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Luc
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I hate to use this, beacause it sounds really fangirly and stuff... and I hate sounding like a fangirl, because I'm a guy. haha
But, I think one of the hardest songs to sing on Broadway is Defying Gravity. It takes a lot to belt out those notes night after night.
And, here comes Salome saying that it's not belting, it's screaming, not a true musical, blah blah blah...
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