Remember my obsession with Pop Divas? Here's another secret, I also had an obsession with lip syncing as a child. In the 80's there was a whole phenomenon around the topic. There were games shows based on doing just this! I wanted to be on that game show!
When I was little, I would not only memorize every swoop, ornament, and note that the pop diva was singing, I also would get to the point that, I would look like her singing was coming out of MY MOUTH! When I was in 6th grade, and the first Mariah Carey album came out, my church had a lip syncing contest. My friend Jenn and I did "Someday" by Mariah Carey. We won the best Lip Syncing Award!
So, here's the question: should we all be freaked out when we learn an artist is lip syncing?
The answer is NO. Pop artists have the worst issues with their voices. They are expected to perform night and day with no vocal health problems. They are also expected to give interviews, act, and dance, all the while being able to sing perfectly for everyone in the process.
This has gone on with pop artists for years! We all know the "Milli Vanilli" era. This is when the technology started getting so good, more artists could get away with Lip Syncing! I'm not condoning Milli Vanilli. That whole situation was a lie. I'm talking more about the artists that really do sing for themselves and are expected to do all of these other feats and sound perfectly!
I've seen numerous artists live. I can definitely tell when they are really singing. I remember watching the Janet Jackson Concert in 2002 and knowing what she was doing. When she actually sat down and sang a slow song, sitting on a stool. She sounded COMPLETELY DIFFERENT. It wasn't bad. It was live singing!
Now, here's the thing about the Beyonce situation from the Inauguration. For all we know, they told her she had to pre-record it, or maybe she had a cold and was worried that she would loose her voice. Have you every sang out side in 30 degree or lower weather? It's pretty awful on the vocal cords in general. I remember, one year for the tree lighting at Rockfeller in New York, Britney Spears sang "Silent Night." She sang it with a coat the barely covered her arms an no scarf or any other coverage on her neck! Enrigque Iglesias sang after her. He had a gigantic scarf on covering his neck and keeping his vocal cords warm! I remember thinking how stupid Britney was being in that weather, and that time, she actually sang live! (Slightly scary!) And then, there's the Youtube video of "Britney Singing Live" that's absolutely terrible! She could actually sing as a child, but a child's stamina is completely different from an adult performer's.
Now, there are artists out there that do sing live all the time. Carrie Underwood gave a concert a couple weeks ago where her voice was giving out. She felt so bad, she publicly apologized to the crowd. Then, she announced on stage, she wasn't keeping a penny she was going to make from that concert, and that she would give it back to the community.
Whitney Houston tried to sing live at most of her shows. Towards the end of her career, that started getting her in trouble. She didn't have the chops to sing through an entire concert any more. There were a lot of upset concert goers at this time in her career.
Here's a little side note about the Beyonce situation. Did you know, that at Military funerals, the trumpeter that plays "TAPS" is prerecorded now? They aren't allowed to have a live trumpeter in most instances. This is a government issue and not the musician's.
If am going to hear a Broadway Singer or Opera Singer, I expect their singing to be live! If I'm going to see an artist, I don't always expect them to do it all live. Good or bad, that's just what I've come to expect these days.
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