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Since most people have medium voices, they are often assigned a part that is either too high or too low for them; the mezzo-soprano must sing soprano or alto and the baritone must sing tenor or bass. Either option can present problems for the singer, but for most singers there are fewer dangers in singing too low, than in singing too high. [4]
These basic types are soprano, mezzo-soprano, and contralto for women, and tenor, baritone, and bass for men. [6] Within choral music the system is collapsed into only four categories for adult singers: soprano and alto for women, and tenor and bass for men. [7]
For example, a female singer may have a vocal range that encompasses the low notes of a mezzo-soprano and the high notes of a soprano. A voice teacher would therefore look to see whether the singer was more comfortable singing higher, or lower. If she were more comfortable singing higher, then the teacher would probably classify her as a soprano.
Baritone and bass voices also use bass clef, and the tenor voice is notated in bass clef if the tenor and bass are written on the same staff. Bass clef is the bottom clef in the grand staff for harp and keyboard instruments. Double bass, bass guitar, and contrabassoon sound an octave lower than the written pitch; some scores show an "8" beneath ...
When the terms soprano, mezzo-soprano, contralto, tenor, baritone, and bass are used as descriptors of non-classical voices, they are applied more loosely than they would be to those of classical singers and generally refer only to the singer's perceived vocal range.
The mezzo-soprano voice (unlike the soprano voice) is strong in the middle register and weaker in the head register, resulting in a deeper tone than the soprano voice. [2] The term mezzo-soprano was developed in relation to classical and operatic voices, where the classification is based not merely on the singer's vocal range but also on the ...
Alto, like the other three standard modern choral voice classifications (soprano, tenor and bass) was originally intended to describe a part within a homophonic or polyphonic texture, rather than an individual voice type; [3] neither are the terms alto and contralto interchangeable or synonymous, though they are often treated as such. [citation ...
When the soprano and alto are notated in one staff, all stems for the soprano go up, and all for the alto go down. Similarly, when the tenor and bass are notated in one staff, the upper voice is marked by stems up, and both voices are written in bass clef, while the tenor is usually written in treble clef marked an octave down if it has its own staff.