Why Singing Ballads Is Deceptively Hard

A common theme has been cropping up with clients over the last few weeks – the topic of singing ballads.

For the purpose of this article, I mean slower songs. Typically romantic, sad, tragic, etc.

Upbeat songs are more popular

Most people want to sing upbeat, fast or overtly intense songs. Hard rock, fast pop, energetic musical theatre, dance tracks. The answer for this is obvious – they are overtly fun and upbeat. We love listening to those exciting songs, so it stands to reason we want to sing them.

And singing fast songs, performing with energy is definitely demanding, I’m not saying otherwise.

But the truth is, high-octane songs typically rely far more on energy output from the singer, rather than vocal excellence. Having both makes for a fabulous performance, but there’s a reason many singers of high-octane songs lose their facility as they get older. It’s because they were relying on energy and intensity to deliver their tracks.

Ballads are the opposite

Ballads often don’t attract singers at first. They’re slow, the singer often sounds so relaxed they might slip into a coma, it’s not overtly intense… so such songs CAN come across as boring.

However, where high-octane songs are OVERT in their musical flare, ballads are often COVERT in how much they demand of a singer.

Upbeat songs take often simple to sing melodies and make them sound hard. They’re just hammering the notes out at speed.

Ballads and slower songs often take incredibly complex and hard to sing melodies, and make them sound effortless. It’s only when YOU try to sing the song you realise “blimey… this is bloody difficult!”.

And it’s often not just difficult to hit the notes, but because you find that if you rely on force even one iota, you ruin the aesthetic of the whole song.

A few examples

They Won’t Go When I Go – George Michael

This took me months to figure out and deliver with quality. Whereas other songs that go much higher and with more intensity speed, can be just a few days to get inside.

I Can’t Make You Love Me – Bonnie Raitt

This is one for female singers. Many of you will be able to hit the notes, but to make it sound as smooth as controlled as Bonnie Raitt… that will not be one day worth of work.

Why is this?

The short answer is quality vs quantity. Many singers obsess over how many notes they can sing, how high they can go, etc. But ballads don’t care about that. They care about how much quality and control you have over the notes you DO have.

To sing a given note you just need the vocal folds to be the right length. That says nothing as to the quality of the note. It doesn’t speak to how easy you found it, or how long you can hold that note.

To hold a given note, and make it sound like you’re doing nothing at all… you’ve got to have sung that note many thousands of times over, with incrementally greater ease and fluidity until it becomes second nature. THEN you need to learn how to move between all those notes with the same fluidity. THEN you need to be able to maintain that smooth sound on a given song. And every song is different.

That’s before we even talk about vibrato, tone, delivery, length of phrase, legato. It’s a much more multi-dimensional discussion than people realise. I spend hours poring over how to sing certain phrases. I have to learn to sing the phrase first, then I have to play with different note length, where to breath, and then record and listen back to hear the subtle aesthetic differences between each take. This takes a LOT of time.

While upbeat songs do have such considerations, generally it is minimal when compared to ballads. With faster intense songs you’re just trying to hit every note as it comes, and you’re never on any given note long enough to give it the same kind of consideration. The set of questions posed by fast vs slow songs are very, very different.

Conclusion

I’m not claiming slow songs are better or worse than fast songs. Rather, I’m simply pointing out just how deceptively challenging slower ballads are to sing. There is so much to explore in slower songs that faster songs simply don’t uncover in your voice.

If this has grabbed your attention, why not try singing along with some of the examples above and see how you find them. If you’d like any help with that, you can book in via the button below.