Melisma: Classic or DUD?

"Other artists may have used it before Houston"

lmao

Hearing "I Will Always Love You" about 1000 times in the last few days it's actually surprising to me how utterly flat/non-melismatic she makes the first half of her drawn-out "I" - pretty much any singer would automatically put a little vibrato in there but it's like she's saving it all up for the end of the note

it was her rendition of Dolly Parton's love song that pushed the technique into the mainstream in the 90s.

this is a super-dubious claim

I mean I personally am pretty cranky on the subject of overuse/poor use of melisma in pop music but it's a tool in the box, saying "the problem is melisma" is like saying "the problem is people like F# too much, down with F#"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRVZ_HbtuVU

it's especially lame to paint melisma solely as some kind of grim vehicle of gratuitous technique since it's provided so many of the most infectiously joyous vocal performances in pop history.

Well F# can gtfo to be honest. It's a shitty key for bass players.

I don't mind melisma in religious contexts, especially middle eastern adhan or cantillation. But when singers go into masturbatory paroxysms exorting me to dance or get into their pants I rapidly lose interest. Probably WH's greatest crime.

yeah I think that's most people's complaint really - that melisma in pop sort of seems naturally (whether through tradition or some inherent quality of the technique in the context) to express excitement, some need to reach beyond the cue sheet to something more joyful. Or that, anyway, is I think the way people receive it, and certainly the way a lot of performers express it: "Here is the part in the song where I bust out the melisma as the music crescendos," etc. Which works better or worse depending on 1) the source material 2) whether the singer is a convincing performer 3) how much the listener already likes the performer

imo

too many people think "melisma" means "oversinging."
too many singers overuse melisma

just listened to what may be the worst song in the world, some boyband version of The First Noel (a dreadful song in its own right) completely trashed by oversinging, the kind of melisma that makes you angry at life

Leona Lewis' version of Run is excruciatingly ribald with this. Melismatic to the point of absurdity.

Why do I adore melisma in Indian, African, Middle Eastern and Eastern European music but loathe it in 95% of contemporary r&b? Can someone with theory chops help me understand this? It’s been bugging me for a while now. I don’t have the vocabulary for it but my general hunch is that contemporary r&b veers more readily towards the major key – is there any truth to this? I generally enjoy the stuff when it’s more melancholy and/or reserved.

(Inspired by that new SZA single, whose form and production are compelling to me, but I can’t cope with the melodic lines and it makes me feel like a total weirdo).

I’m not crazy about baroque operatic melismas either fwiw.