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Contemporary A CAPPELLA
A Cappella is an Italian term which means ‘in the style of the church’ or ‘at church’. The
term was originally used to differentiate musical works composed in the older polyphonic
style of the Renaissance from those written in the newer concertato style of the early
culture, however, audiences usually expect performance with contemporary music (i.e.
pop, R&B, jazz, and so on) in the arrangement of vocal band sound. This means there are
bass lines, back up vocal lines and even percussion line for a group consists of solely
human voice.
Barbershop music was the earliest form of contemporary A Cappella, and it is greatly
influenced by the African Americans. Many early vocal groups began by singing
barbershop music. However, with the rise of Vocal Percussion (VP) technique, AKA
Beatboxing, from the hip-hop community (as well as microphones and mixing technique),
A Cappella music gained the ability to access more kinds of music, such as pop, jazz,
R&B, or even heavy metal. Although human voices are the only instrument, the
1
William C. Holmes. "A cappella." Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. Oxford University Press,
accessed December 13, 2016, http://0-
www.oxfordmusiconline.com.lib.hkapa.edu/subscriber/article/grove/music/00091.
Musical Style Comparison
Three groups are selected for this section; they are the The King’s Singers, The Real
Group and Pentatonix. This section is to illustrate the musical characteristic of each
group. Most of the contemporary a cappella songs are generally cover songs, and most of
the selected excerpts in this section are covers, only one song is original. All songs are
from each group’s recent album. The comparison section is divided into two parts. The
first part is to analyze one song from each group, which can strongly represent their
musical style of each group. In order to do a more detailed comparison on the difference
among various groups and style, the second part is to analyze a particular song that all
Different Songs Comparison (Please right click and copy hyperlink, and paste the URL
into the browser)
original music is a lead singer, a guitar, foot tapping and birdsong overdub. The reason of
choosing this song is because; this is the pop song with highest views in King’s Singers
YouTube channel. The King’s Singers are a group of 6 male singers. All members are
classically trained, and their style is generally a clean, proper and classic vocal ensemble.
In The King’s Singers’ version, a light hi-hat by the vocal percussion (VP) is used to
replace the foot tap sound of the original version. The music starts with hi-hits, and back-
up vocal lines come in, singing ‘ding, ding, ding, ding-ah-ding-ah-ding’ throughout the
song and imitate the accompany pattern of the guitar in the original version. (0:01-0:06)
Lead singer comes in right after, but instead of singing like Paul McCartney (folk style),
he sings in a softer and more-or-less classical manner. This is also why the group is
generally performing in a chamber-choir-like style. All six members are male, so even
the highest part is sung by man with falsetto. A true male blackbird voice was recorded
and overdub in the original music. The King’s Singers adds a whistled melody (1:23-1:41)
and a flutter tongue technique (2:05) to emulate songbird and birds flying noise. The
mixing and effects (e.g. reverb and echo) of this piece give us an impression of singing in
a chapel, and was recorded from few meters away from the group. This is the general
style of The King’s Singers. They arranged many classical pieces into a cappella style.
section. The reason of choosing this song is clear; they write this song for themselves. It
suits and represents the group’s jazzy style. The whole song is consists of complicated
jazz chords (i.e. with lots of non-chord tones, 7th 9th, accidentals). The bass singer is
singing like a jazz rhythmic section by singing ‘dm tm dm tm’ syllable. The dm is to
imitate double bass, and tm is to imitate hi-hats, as well as to emphasize back beats (2nd
& 4th beats) like what jazz rhythm does. Instead of having one lead singer (as in the
previous example), the lead melody alternate from different parts. Back up lines contains
a massive amount of nonsensical syllables, which are used to either imitate instruments,
or to imitate scat singing effect. Back up lines shift from singing nonsensical syllables to
singing same lyrics with the melody (1:02-1:20), and then started to sing in mostly homo-
rhythmic and homophonic texture, until the sudden tempo change (2:53). The music ends
with a typical jazz band sound, imitating brass sections, with 9th and sharp 11th of the
ending tonic chord. We can know that singers recorded the song with close-miking
technique from the overall sound of this work, since every line is close and clear, and it
relies on mixing to create different panning effect (i.e. bass on the left, tenor on the left).
As they are singing jazz music, portamento (i.e. sliding from one note to another) is
largely used. Comparing with The King’s Singers, The Real Group singing technique is
more pop-like, which is singing with less space at the soft palate, and placing their voice
more forward.
Unlike the two examples above, Pentatonix is a young American a cappella group. They
rely heavily on Vocal Percussion and special mixing effects, such as the chorus effect
(bass doubling in the excerpt), compressor, reverb, EQ for frequency enhancement and so
on. The music starts with a compressed and reverbed tenor sound. Bass and VP come in
at 0:15, with very strong bass frequency enhancement and chorus effect (bass octave
doubling). The bass singer actually hummed his note most of the time, instead of singing
any open vowel. This is to create an even stronger muffled bass sound. However, he sings
‘orah’ vowel (0:22) in every two beat, and change to ‘dm’ and sing it in every beat (0:25).
This is to imitate the bassline rhythm of electronic music. Vocal percussion line is very
intense, and very much stronger than the other two groups. Back up lines sings ‘du, ah,
oh’, and alternate from nonsensible syllables to lyrics. Patterns of back up lines are more
sequential, and usually repeat a pattern for few times before moving on to another. (e.g.
1:39-1:52 and 2:08-2:19) Back up lines are basically easier than that of The Real Group,
in terms of harmony.
Cole, the American jazz singer. His version is arranged in jazz big band instrumentation.
In this section, we will compare three different a cappella versions of this song that sung
style. The music alternates between two texture; 1) when all singers sing exactly the same
lyrics and rhythm, and the melody is carried by upper part (e.g. 0:00-0:17, 0:43-1:00),
and 2) when singers are divided into backing parts and lead singer, which is when the
melody is bring out by the baritone, while the others sing long notes to hold chords. (e.g.
already a jazz music, but the group didn’t emphasize the swing rhythm in this
arrangement, which cause it sound more classical, less jazzy. This recording is not bass
enhanced, and the acoustic is natural and is like listening concert in a chapel.
original version. This version can be divided into three sections, 1) the slow section that
without vocal percussion (0:00-2:31), 2) the faster section with vocal percussion playing
jazz drum set in jazz swing rhythm, and 3) the third section when the lead singer sings
again. In the slow section, back-up singers mostly sing long notes, and it is more or less
like the first version. However, the bassline of this version is stronger than the first
version. The entry of the jazz drum set brings the music to its fast section, and modulates
to another key. The bass line change into a double bass pattern. The fast section starts
with an improvisation section, which is alike with many jazz bands’ arrangements, and
no verbal lyric is sung in this part. (2:31-3:39) The last section variates in tempo, and the
drum fades out at 4:04 to bring the music back to a slow tempo.
Pentatonix
It is interesting that Pentatonix decided not to add beatboxing in this arrangement. Instead
drum sounds, they use finger snaps to create the groove, as well as the percussive
bassline. The bass sings in a double bass style. Pentatonix keeps their easy but effective
style in their backing line. The rhythmic pattern of the backing line is basically, sing in
every down beat. They follow this pattern and alternate from singing nonsensible
syllables and fragments from the lyrics of main melody. A human voice emulated
trumpet solo is performed in the middle and the ending of the song (1:55-2:20, 3:24-3:40).
Conclusion
The three versions are all in jazz harmonies. The harmony is similar, but what make them
different are the singing technique, groove, musical arrangement and recording technique.
The song was originally distinctive and popular, but these three groups managed to
Reference
Grove Music Online - http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/public/