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RE: Elise Testone
I agree with so much of what each of you wrote.
The bottom line for me isn't what she's doing with her voice, or how she sings each note and works the chords in a way that says exactly what she wants to say with music.
To me Elises voice, while certainly a tone of her own and on pitch and strong when she wants it to be strong isn't that next step of crazy good that would have you turning your head to listen.. like say Crystal Bowersox could probably do for me no matter what song she sings. Haley is somewhere in-between... Haley could sing a Cole porter song in the most straightforward manner possible and still have me whipping my head around without any interpretation at all(and Haley's head voice is unparrelled in my mind) but most of Haley's voice stops at super, not extraordinary and haley takes it up to super extraordinary with her interpretation. (I'd say, Elise has the same strong and controlled voice as Haley, without any incredible(like legendary?) part like Haley's head voice is, but neither could do an exact copy of Whitney Houston and not come up short unless they stylized it.)
The issue for me... and why Haley is an artist I see head and shoulders above the rest.. is that Haley has something to say.
All people probably have a song in their heart of who they are and what they see. The problem is.. we' don't always want to hear what all people "have to say" when it comes to philosophy on things (errm like me ? lol) .
Did any of you read and remember the book "Little Big Man" that talked about a similar subject in Native American sense of things?
I read a reflection from a great musician (I forget who) in the 12 or 18 hour history of Jazz documentary Quentin Marseilles made 10 years ago. The topic was Larry Parker and the rise of bop... and how when you broke all the rules and let the musicians free of the limitations of the chord progression... they let the improvisational Jazz artists loose to say what they had to say. The problem was , he went on, has that other than Charlie, Dizzy, Miles and a small handful of others… they just didn’t have anything special to say .
So, its not that Elise isn’t a good person , or that she isn’t a smart person, or that she isn’t a reflective person, or a forward looking person …… she’s just another cocktail of all of those and does so in a different way…. Elises sort of restrained hope isn’t Haley’s romantic certainty that there is more things good that we see at hand… .. Ok.. I’ll stop with my philosophizing there.. Because if I could put it in words accurately I’d be a famous poet or psychologist or both.
Its just as you have all said in the short and relevant take away department.. for whatever reason you’re not fascinated with her.
The reason I think, is that the personality of the musician has to be fascinating to you… even if you don’t agree with them up and down the scale, they’re echoing somethings you've thought of and giving you a flavor that sometimes affirms you and sometimes affirms and leads you to where you've got a view of more to add on what you feel on your own. Ok.. that’s the poetry again .. HARD STOP .
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