Journal of Singing Featured Article:

Cosmetic Surgery for the Voice: All's Fair in Love and Pitch

by Paul Presto, Jr., with Robert Edwin

[Associate Editor's note: When I asked my colleague and friend, Paul Presto Jr., to write another column for me about what he does as a recording engineer, the request came on the heels of my revisiting the video of the legendary Woodstock concert of July 1969. What wonderful, human, flawed, unaltered, and magic performances there were—Janice Joplin's captivating singing that featured notes that didn't come out of her throat as well as incredible notes that did; the Crosby, Stills, and Nash struggle with out-of-tune voices and guitars; Joe Cocker's stunning cover of the Beatle's song, "With A Little Help From My Friends," complete with sincere albeit pitch-challenged backup singers; and, one of the top musical events I have ever heard, Jimi Hendrick's guitar rendition of the "Star Spangled Banner."

Paul's first column, "Confessions of a Recording Engineer" (JOS January 2003), opened a lot of eyes as to what can happen in the studio. Eight years later, many of you are about to learn that "Doctor Frankenstein," as I affectionately call Paul, can do even more to change the natural order of things. I'll have a few comments at the end of the piece including a link to what Paul and my alter ego, "Les Pitchy," did in Paul's Skylite Recording studio to demonstrate how this relatively new technology works.]

IF YOU'RE ANYTHING LIKE ME, you know a great singer when you see one. If you think I'm misquoting a cliché, just hold that thought. Hold your career choice as well because what I'm about to tell you may make you open a pretzel stand instead of teaching people how to sing. You see, for over twenty years I've been recording, singing, and performing live music. My father, a musician/entertainer for over fifty years, started me in this crazy business when he put my finger on middle C on the keyboard at the age of eight. I played in bars when I was fourteen (Don't tell anyone!), worked cruise ships, weddings, parties, etc., all while honing my craft of precise playing and singing on key (even when no one cared). For me, it was always about my personal best. I felt that I owed it to myself to be the best player/singer I could be. I'm a perfectionist—a curse and a blessing sometimes, yet I've been fortunate to play with other musicians who feel the same as I.

My recording career started with a cassette multitrack machine in 1982. I progressed to reel to reel, then to modular digital multitracks (a system based on S-VHS video tapes), and finally arrived in the computer based D.A.W. (Digital Audio Workstation) age with Pro Tools, the software recording program of choice for many studios. Since Pro Tools entered my world in 2001, I've been able to alter a performer's pitch, timing, phrasing . . . it's ridiculous. I often tease my clients when they ask, "Is there any way to . . ." I cut them off and say yes before they ever finish their sentence. "The answer is always yes with Pro Tools," I say.

To put this whole thing into context, it may be helpful to trace the recording process from its origins in the late nineteenth century. Thanks to Wikipedia, here's a brief overview:

The first practical sound recording and reproduction device was the mechanical phonograph cylinder, invented by Thomas Edison in 1877 and patented in 1878. The next major technical development was the invention of the gramophone disc, generally credited to Emile Berliner and commercially introduced in the United States in 1889. Discs were easier to manufacture, transport and store, and they had the additional benefit of being louder (marginally) than cylinders, which by necessity, were single-sided. The Vinyl microgroove was invented by a Hungarian engineer Peter Carl Goldmark. The vinyl microgroove record was introduced in the late 1940s, and the two main vinyl formats—the 7-inch single turning at 45 rpm and the 12-inch LP (long-playing) record turning at 33 1/3 rpm—had totally replaced the 78 rpm shellac (sometimes vinyl) disc by the end of the 1950s.

Magnetic tape brought about sweeping changes in both radio and the recording industry. Sound could be recorded, erased and re-recorded on the same tape many times, sounds could be duplicated from tape to tape with only minor loss of quality, and recordings could now be very precisely edited by physically cutting the tape and rejoining it. You could also alter the pitch by turning a dial. If you slowed the tape down, the key (and tempo) would drop so a singer could reach the "high" notes. When playback was resumed at the recorded speed, behold; the singer was "magically" able to hit the note previously out of his or her range.

1990 brought the first version of Pro Tools. A software editor and recorder that changed the shape of the recording world. Micro editing of pitch and timing were now available. Manually being able to raise or lower a bad note mathematically, producers and artists everywhere were rejoicing. No more singing till you get it right!

Recently, a fellow studio musician turned me on to a program called Melodyne. This program is pitch correction on steroids. I load in the vocal performance from the session I just recorded and each note comes up on the display in what appears to be a "blob" with a line that travels through the middle of it. The line shows the pitch during the sustained note. For example, if my client sang the note flat at the onset and glided up to pitch, the line would look like it's going uphill. If she sang on key but had vibrato in the note, the line looks like a child's drawing of water (depending on the child, of course). I can then straighten out the line, cut the "blob" into pieces and fix sections of the line to make the note stay "on key." A double click on the line will make it perfectly straight making the singer sound robotic (a sometimes desired effect in club/house music). Figures 1–3 show what Melodyne looks like.

There's also a formant bar that will add a nasal quality or bass-like sound depending on where I drag my cursor. The only thing that seems to be missing from the program is a "Diva/Divo control" to lessen some attitudes. The scary part is it's all very invisible sounding. Just about every single vocal you hear on the radio has been "touched and tuned" by someone. There's no way to know if what you're hearing actually happened in the recording process or the editing process. So should the "Best Vocal Performance" Grammy go to the engineer or the singer? There's always been a "Best Engineered" or "Best Produced" Grammy, but how about a "Best Fixed Vocal" Grammy with examples of before and after? It would be a tough sell. The one thing that Melodyne or Pro Tools can not do is voice modeling, that is, change a singer's voice to sound like his or her favorite singer. A singer can't come into my studio and sing like a goat and leave with a finished product sounding like Josh Grobin or Taylor Swift. I can't manufacture or manipulate a vocal to change gender. At least not yet . . .

But what about live performance you say? Ha! Perhaps you get to keep your day job after all! Well, hold on . . . did I mention there's a hardware version of pitch correction that plugs into a PA system? Yes. Insert between mic and mixer, punch in the key and sing away. One can even add live harmony. No more off key background singers in the band!

All this makes me sad. I've worked a long time on my voice to improve my pitch and styling. I still do retake after retake to get the song "right." However, I recently submitted a demo to someone looking to hire a singer for country music demos, something I've done hundreds of times before for many happy customers. This person responded that I'm too pitchy to be a demo singer. Hmmm. So I "Melodyned" my vocal and resubmitted to the client. He liked me better on these songs. When I A/B the two choices, the fixed one is absolutely perfect. Maybe a little too perfect?

I object to a singer not being allowed to be "human." A little glide or dredge here and there adds character to a singer's sound. Some of my clients demand the fixing; others won't even let me click on the program. A producer friend of mine who is no longer with us once told me, "You're not doing these people any favors by fixing pitch for them. Now they think they're good!" So, at what point do we say enough is enough? Now that reality TV and the Internet have made everyone a star, I think we'll never say "Uncle."

I'm still amazed at how many people are unaware that vocals are fixed in the studio. For them the singer is either good or she's not. Maybe they're basing their opinion on some other aspect of the act itself such as attractive looks, great lyrics, good beats, etc. Should we wreck the illusion of greatness or let sleeping dogs lie? That's a question you'll have to answer for yourself. The question I have for you is, "So now do you know a great singer when you see one?"

[Associate Editor's postscript: Awhile back, I remember the great golfer, Jack Nicklaus, initially refusing to switch from his wood driver, 3-wood, etc., to the metal "woods" almost everyone else was embracing. Finally, he capitulated because he just couldn't compete against the new technology. Naturally gifted golfers as well as minimally talented weekend hackers were improving their games with these incredibly innovative clubs that increased both distance and accuracy, although it's safe to say that no untalented weekend hacker ever ended up on the PGA tour.

That is not the case, however, with the vocal equivalent of the under-talented golfer. Since recording is no longer a real time process, the final product may in no way resemble the initial effort. To demonstrate this, I created the persona, "Les Pitchy," and sang the "Star Spangled Banner" as badly as I could. Paul then went to work with Melodyne and Pro Tools to turn Les into a much more competent singer. You can hear the results of our efforts on both of our websites—mine is www.robertedwinstudio.com under "Articles and Music," and Paul's is www.skyliterecording.com . Realize as you listen to the song that the only real time, organic singing done was Les Pitchy's first effort. Everything after that is the result of a machine and a very good recording engineer. Paul also added one of his original tunes, "Love You Anyway," pre- and post-Melodyne/Pro Tools to show how transparent this technology can be.

A question to my colleagues at colleges and universities: Will you ever again trust an audio submission from a potential student? Say what you will about American Idol, but the fact is the singers are initially unaccompanied and, most importantly, undoctored. What you hear is what they did—the good, the bad, and the ugly. We need to keep our audition processes, be they opera, music theater, jazz, or any other genre of CCM, as untainted by machines as possible if we want to hold on to at least some sense of humanity's quest for art at the highest possible natural and organic level.

Cosmetic surgery for the voice will continue to be a twenty-first century fact of life; athletes will continue to use anabolic steroids; beauty pageant contestants will continue to ask surgeons to improve upon nature; and Photo Shop will continue to cut and paste reality into more desirable results. However, as long as there are forums where both artists and audiences agree that live performances with all their inherent risks of success and failure (and without pitch fix machines) need to take place, then teachers of singing will indeed be able to keep their "day jobs."]

Paul Presto, Jr. has recorded everything from operatic arias to grunge metal music. He credits his father, long-time jazz organist, Paul Presto Sr., with teaching him his keyboard skills, skills he translated into a career in rock bands and jazz trios. Since 1991, he has been the band leader and music director for the prominent Philadelphia-area society band, The Black Tie Orchestra. His recording studio, Skylite Recording, founded in 1985 with the help of Philadelphia studio guru, Russell Faith, is based on the Pro Tools TDM architecture and includes 64 tracks of digital recording, state-of-the-art processors, keyboards, and microphones. He specializes in vocal recording, original music composition, arranging, and production. Recently he has had success as a country singer under the alias, Paul Street, with songs getting airplay in many overseas markets. www.paulstreetmusic.com, www.myspace.com/paulstreetmusic, Skylite Recording, 7 Bond Place, Lumberton, NJ 08048 phone: 609-760-8118 email: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Robert Edwin has served NATS in many capacities—among them: New Jersey Chapter President (1985–92); author of "The Bach to Rock Connection"—the first regular feature in the Journal of Singing dedicated to CCM (nonclassical) voice pedagogy (1985–2002); National Secretary/Treasurer (2002–06); first Master Teacher in the NATS Intern Program to represent the private studio sector (2005); first "wired" master class clinician at a NATS national conference (Nashville 2008);and JOS Associate Editor (2002-present).

Mr. Edwin is a frequent faculty member of the Voice Foundation's Annual Symposium: Care of the Professional Voice, and is an active member of the distinguished American Academy of Teachers of Singing. His DVD on child voice training, The Kid & the Singing Teacher, with CCC-SLP Barbara Arboleda, is available at www.voiceinsideview.com. He is a chapter author for the 2011 Oxford University Press, Handbook of Music Education, and his chapter on teaching children appears in the book, Pediatric Voice Disorders (Plural Publishing). www.robertedwinstudio.com

Reproduced with permission.
Journal of Singing, January/February 2011
Volume 67, No. 3, pp. 327–330
Copyright © 2011 National Association of Teachers of Singing

Journal of Singing is the official journal of National Association of Teachers of Singing, providing current information regarding the teaching of singing as well as results of recent research in the field. A refereed journal, it serves as an historical record and is a venue for teachers of singing and other scholars to share the results of their work in areas such as history, diction, voice science, medicine, and especially voice pedagogy. Journal of Singing is published five times annually (Sept/Oct, Nov/Dec, Jan/Feb, March/April, May/June). Richard Dale Sjoerdsma, Editor-in-Chief

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