Click the framegrab at right to view (and hear) the resulting video (.avi format)
Erik Bresch and Shrikanth Narayanan
from the University of Southern California asked the singers to perform
a two octave musical scale (hitting the notes as best they could
considering the constraints of having their head inside a very noisy MRI machine)
The
digitised recordings showed that the sopranos were producing their
notes in ways which were “well in accordance with the expectations”
(backing up previous soprano voice research results obtained by other
experimental methods).
Rather than leading to a full comprehension of
soprano voice production techniques, however, the new study instead called into question whether sopranos might all be singing in exactly the same way – perhaps hinting at opportunities for further research?
“… based on our study, we cannot conclude that all sopranos employ generalizable strategies for resonance tuning the way it has been described in prior literature.”
The paper can be read in full here : Real-time magnetic resonance imaging investigation of resonance tuning in soprano singing.
However, I am glad it turned out to be about the voice. Looking at the paper, I read
It would be interesting if there were systematic differences with native speakers of other languages, especially the operatic ones such as Italian, and with soprano singers in other genres, perhaps those that get to the later stages of American Idol or X Factor USA.