Martine Pagé

Fax machine vocals

In San Francisco, right after film school, I worked for a few long and unhappy months in the archives section of a huge law firm. Right next to the bathrooms, there was the fax machine room, where a full-time employee spent his days sending and receiving faxes. The noise coming out of that room was amazing. Every time I had to go to the bathroom, I would hear this high pitch melody made by the fax machines: « iiiiiiiiiiii eeeee iiiiiiiii eeeee iiiiiiiiii », and every time I heard it, it reminded me of that damn song by Whitney Houston: « I eee I eee I, will always love you uuuuu uuuuu ». And for the rest of the day, I would have that song stuck in my head. I hated the fax room.

The years went by and more and more singers got that vocal mannerism, from Mariah Carey to Celine Dion, and now of course, most of the contestants from American Idol and Star AcadÃ¯Â¿Â½mie (well, the few of them who could actually sing). I didn’t know this « technique » had a name. It’s called melisma, and there’s an interesting article about its origin and popularity in the New York Times. (Thanks Bob for the link, and all the other interesting stuff you generally link to.)

Why do people who have a good voice need to prove it in every single song? Why do we have to endure the constant olympics of singing? Some of the contestants on American Idol were amazingly talented. If only they could have dropped the damn melisma thing…

Now that I know about melisma, I will go to bed less stupid tonight (and a little bummed out that Clay didn’t win). And of course, I’ll probably wake up with that damn Whitney Houston song stuck in my head. Somebody shoot me.

200325266

200325003

200319303