Showstoppers Gregory Porter's Popular Voices

# Boy, you hear me calling your name

# The bridge is your time Your engine rolls hot

# If the bridges fall down

# Don't lose your head of steam. #

The voice, it's the one instrument we're all born with,

we all love to sing.

# Whoa, young man... #

Singing is my life. It's what I do, and who I am.

# Boy, I didn't make it too far

# But baby you are the family star... #

I'm going to take you on a 100-year celebration of the mystery, joy

and pain that lies behind the soul's instrument.

# Boy, you hear me calling your name The bridge is your time... #

I'm Gregory Porter and these are my popular voices.

# Young man

# I'm counting on you

# And whoa, young man... #

The magnificent show-stoppers who defy vocal gravity.

# Whoa-oh-oh-oh... #

Voices that set the bar.

# Somebody to... #

You watch him live and it's just like...

-HE SINGS:

-OHHHH!

I think that he's the greatest rock and roll vocalist of all time.

With sublime technique...

When she got into her booth, nobody messed with her.

The musicians jumped behind her and pushed her to the moon.

# Lord, walk with me... #

..and the power to move us to tears.

Their heart-stopping vocal gymnastics take our breath away.

SCREAMING

Do you know anybody who can scream like that?

These are voices on the brink.

# Oooh-oooh-oooh-ohhh... #

Voices that go one note higher...

SHE SINGS IN A HIGH OCTAVE

..then turn it up to 11.

# And I... #

And make the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end.

So what is it that elevates them from technical wizard to the level

of undeniable genius?

What transforms a singer into a show-stopper?

New York at the turn of the 20th century.

And this was popular entertainment for the masses.

Vaudeville Theatre.

A dozen acts for 25 cents a ticket.

Performances all day, every day.

Singers were just all part of the show.

One Italian tenor changed everything.

I guess you could call him the first international pop superstar,

the Elvis Presley of his day.

The greatest singer of the early 20th century.

His name was Enrico Caruso.

# La donna e mobile

# Qual piuma al vento

# Muta d'accento

# E di pensier. #

On this quiet street in Brooklyn,

87-year-old Aldo Mancusi has the greatest collection of Caruso

memorabilia in the world.

# La donna e mobile

# Qual piuma al vento... #

Aldo, tell me why you love Caruso.

His early recordings are really what made Caruso so great.

Because prior to his recordings, there were very few people

that would even go and have their voice recorded.

OPERATIC ITALIAN SINGING

Caruso had wowed audiences in Italian opera houses, but in 1902

it was a London gramophone company that catapulted him to

international stardom.

They went to Milano to record an opera singer.

They flipped over Caruso, so they asked him, "Would you record?"

He said, "Sure. I'll record." Ten cylinders, in those days,

in a hotel room for 500.

The gramophone typewriter company refused and said,

"Do not record Caruso, fee ridiculous."

They were afraid they'd never make the 500 back.

However, they sold thousands and thousands.

Everybody wanted Caruso's record.

Caruso's extrovert emotion and powerful tone cut across the crackle

of these shellac 78s.

CARUSO SINGS

Tenor Stephen Costello explained why.

He just has this rich baritone sound, but he's a tenor.

And usually, for me, when I'm hearing a sound like that,

you don't think they're going to be able to go up and have that top

extension. Which he does.

CARUSO SINGS

The voice is gorgeous, the sound pours out, the style is great.

The charisma of the man still comes through...

-It's true.

-..at the recording, so...

And it doesn't sound like it's about him

when he's singing, it's about him interpreting the music

and him enjoying singing.

-Yeah.

-And even on these old recordings, you get that feeling.

The gramophone's surge in popularity brought Caruso's voice out of the

opera house and into living rooms.

The first singer to sell 1 million records,

Caruso was so adored that, in 1921, he was given a royal funeral.

CARUSO SINGS

Caruso's barnstorming voice set the bar.

And there's nothing like the moment

a great tenor unleashes their full power.

HE SINGS

The big note, the high C.

It's nerve-racking, because as a tenor, everyone's waiting for it.

But it's one of those, you're nervous, you get it,

you can feel it, you get it and when it comes out, you're holding,

it's like, "Oh, yeah, there it is. I've got it."

HE SINGS

When you sing it, and you're holding it, it feels good.

It almost feels like you're flying.

And then, in response to that, the audience applauds.

So you know you did something right.

There's just something about it that just feels great, and you're like,

"I can do that again."

# On with the... #

Whether it's a Broadway belter...

# ..show... #

..or a power ballad...

# All by myself... #

We all love that climactic moment.

# Any more... #

Hitting the high note in a performance,

it's like a slingshot of emotion.

A release of power and energy which you want to express to the audience.

It's an extraordinary feeling when you do it.

# Rest here in my garden wall... #

A great show-stopper uses their power to share emotion.

Putting belief at the heart of what you're singing is something I

learned in church, here in Bakersfield, California.

# Take me to the alley... #

My mother was a minister and this is the place where I learned to sing.

It's been nearly 25, 30 years, since I've been here.

It's still emotional, because this is where she took me.

She took me by my hand as a little boy, and took me here.

So, you know, yeah.

It's still straight-up gospel music, sharing the truth,

and holding nothing back.

# Hosanna, blessed be the rock

# Blessed be the rock of my salvation

# Hosanna, blessed be the rock... #

Singing has bound black Americans together from the first.

In a way, that was the one thing that we had control of -

nobody could stop us from singing while we was working in the fields.

Music, just traditionally, has been this thing to bring solace

and comfort to whatever you're going through.

You're a vessel for a godly message, supernatural message,

so there's a confidence that you have, but it's not one of your own.

It's...

It's God confidence.

# Why should I feel discouraged? #

No matter what stage I'm on, I think about those things that my

mother said to me at a very early age.

Sing with an understanding, express yourself directly to the lyrics that

you're singing, and so that's something that I developed and

listened to on a weekly basis in the gospel church.

# I sing because I'm free

# And oh, I know

# I know his eye is on the sparrow

# I know he watches over me. #

God bless you, thank you so much.

It was one woman's transcendent voice that brought gospel out of the

church and into the mainstream.

The Queen, Mahalia Jackson.

You know, as I was telling a young lady today,

it's not about how big a voice, or how great a voice,

it's the way you handle it.

And that's what I want you to get this evening.

Put yourself in it.

# Didn't it rain, children

# Rain on my Lord

# Didn't it, didn't it, didn't it, oh

# Oh, my Lord, didn't it rain

# Didn't it... #

She was lost in song, she touched on some energy that

a radio or record player couldn't just hold.

To me, she reminded me of water.

Water heals us, water makes us feel better, water makes us grow.

That's how I hear her voice, like, "Oh, my God!"

# Rain, children

# Rain on my Lord

# Didn't it, didn't it, didn't it, oh... #

She wasn't just a gifted, incredible virtuosic gospel talent,

she was a superstar.

Mahalia grew up in a shack on the banks of the Mississippi and New Orleans.

Along with thousands of black southerners, at the age of 16,

she migrated north to find work in Chicago.

There she met Thomas Dorsey,

a gospel pioneer who fused jazz and blues with the word of the Lord.

Thomas Dorsey started writing songs like Precious Lord, Take My Hand,

and he is not as great of a singer.

And Mahalia Jackson is the voice of his compositions.

# Through the night

# Lead me on through the light... #

In a segregated United States, Precious Lord, Take My Hand became

an anthem for the civil rights movement.

That song makes non-believers believers.

It ignites a whole community to do better things and greater things.

It starts trouble too, I love all that.

The whole movement, it made a whole movement.

And Mahalia was a part of that.

At the march on Washington in 1963,

she stood alongside Martin Luther King.

Before he gave his address, Mahalia's voice soared above a

quarter of a million people.

# I'm gonna tell my Lord

# When I get home... #

I think she understood that she could be of assistance with her voice.

I think she took that responsibility seriously.

I think that she chastened us and empowered us through her song.

Even watching it, 60 years after it happened,

it brings about a wealth of emotion

and a sense of the righteousness of the cause.

SHE SINGS

It was Mahalia that pushed Martin Luther King to deliver his

most famous speech.

She knows you've got to have that rousing, closing moment.

She reminds him, you've got to take it home, tell them about the dream.

Now that you've told them all, you've got to bring the people to

the mountaintop. And she knows that he will hear her if she says this,

and he does.

And he tags his sermon with this part that we all know about

his dream.

I have a dream...

..that my four little children will one day live in a nation

where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin,

but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today!

# Just a closer walk with thee... #

Louis Armstrong tried to persuade her to, you know,

sing a little jazz.

Many people, they offered her money, but she felt she had a calling

and a purpose on her life to sing gospel music.

# Every day I pray just a closer walk with thee... #

It's one of my mother's favourite songs.

It's a song I learned to sing.

And she's doing what every artist of any genre wants to do.

To be so inside of the music, that everything else disappears.

# Let it be, Lord

# Oh, dear, Lord

# Oh, let it be... #

It's real. It's just so real.

It didn't matter that there were microphones around her,

that there were cameras, because she was in the spirit.

# Won't you guide me

# Guide me gently o'er

# O'er to Thy kingdom

# Thy kingdom, kingdom shores... #

Whatever the genre, show-stopping voices speak straight to our hearts.

And those same voices can bring us all together for a higher purpose.

For me, there's one rock front man who could whip up a congregation

like no-one else.

# Ey-oh

# Ey-oh

# Ey-oh

# Ey-oh

# Ey-ey-ey-ey-ey-ey-oh...#

Call and response like he's in church.

But a church of a different kind.

The church of rock and roll.

# Ey-oh... #

All of those people out there, in a way, are worshipping him.

That's got to make you feel like God.

# Di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do

# Di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do

-# Di-do

-# Di-do

-# Di-do

-# Di-do

All right!

Freddie Mercury's command of an audience was rooted in the

confidence he had in his instrument.

I'm speaking to some of his biggest fans about what set

Freddie's voice apart.

# Mama, just killed a man... #

You don't even need to see a picture of the person,

you just hear the voice you know, like, "Oh, my God!"

# Mama, ooh... #

It's operatic, but then it's rock and roll.

There's times where I listen to him, and it's like,

"He kind of sounds like Little Richard right here."

Then you hear something else, and it's like, "Is that Pavarotti?"

# So you think you can stop me and spit in my eye... #

The passion with which he sings,

he fully believes in it and he's over the top half the time,

as a choice.

-I love that, over the top as a choice.

-Yeah.

I think that he's the greatest rock and roll vocalist of all time.

# Each morning I get up I die a little

-# Can barely stand on my feet

-Take a look at yourself

# Take a look in the mirror... #

Queen's stacked vocal harmonies were given a focus by Freddie's laser-beam voice.

When digital technology started taking over ten, 15 years ago,

all of the old recording tapes that people had used were deteriorating.

So you'd dump what's on the tape into a hard drive.

All of a sudden, there were these CDs going around of isolated vocals.

But the isolated Queen vocals were just phenomenal.

-# I get down

-Down

-# On my knees

-Knees

-# And I start to pray

-Praise the Lord

# Till the tears run down from my eyes

-# Lord, somebody

-Somebody

-# Somebody

-Please

# Can anybody find me somebody to love? #

For the first time, you really got to hear what Freddie sounded like

just on a microphone.

It was unbelievable, you know, it changed everything.

# Can anybody find me somebody to love? #

He's not shy when he would sing, he would just bite the words.

He had them by his teeth.

-Yeah.

-There's something about his attack that I've always loved.

# I just gotta get out of this prison cell... #

He's an opera singer with a rock band around him.

He had all the drama that's just required for a performer.

# How do you think I'm gonna get along

# Without you when you're gone... #

You watch him live, and it's just like... "OH!"

You just go, "Oh, my God, he rang every bell in here."

Champagne glasses are being destroyed before the cheers.

It's powerful. Powerful.

# Another one bites the dust... #

Come on, do it.

# Another one bites the dust... #

In Montreal, where he's running around with no shoes on,

in a pair of white, tiny little shorts

and he's just totally into it.

And he's a goof, and he's playing around,

and he's having the time of his life.

I'll always walk around like a Persian popinjay.

And no-one's going to stop me, honey.

That talent, that flamboyance, the shorts, and that glorious moustache.

Even weird things like half a mic stand, that's amazing.

How did you make that cool? I don't understand. It's not even necessary.

You talk about a show.

# Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

# All right... #

He just cranked up the special sauce, you know?

Just put it all over the damn thing, you know.

And that's what made him Freddie.

That's what made everybody remember Freddie.

Freddie's flamboyance on stage was backed up by his vocal bravora.

With an estimated 2 billion people watching on TV,

in 1985 he gave a breathtaking performance that the world would

never forget.

I used to have this picture on my phone

of Freddie Mercury at Live Aid.

It was this shot from behind and this picture of him kind of going

like this, with an entire stadium of people in the palm of his hand.

# Radio goo goo

# Radio ga ga

# All we hear is

# Radio ga ga

# Radio goo goo... #

His energy, his power, electricity,

is a reflection of what those 75, 80,000 people are giving him.

They complete the song, they complete his power,

one doesn't exist without the other.

Do you get intimidated by the size of that crowd?

No, the bigger the better! In everything!

THEY LAUGH

It was about how to connect with that many people, in a live setting,

all at once, and that skill that he had made its way into the recordings,

into the way he thought about how to lay a song down.

The microphone was this close, he still was giving you 200%.

-Fearless.

-Yeah.

# Empty spaces

# What are we living for... #

Freddie gave one of his finest performances just months before he

died from AIDS in 1991.

The last track on his final album with Queen,

The Show Must Go On.

# Another hero... #

In spite of his frailty,

Freddie Mercury produced an extraordinary performance.

This is the performance of my life, because this is my life.

In one take, you see his virtuosity, in one take.

# The show must go on

# The show must go on

# Inside my heart is breaking

# My make-up may be flaking

# But my smile still stays on... #

It's demanding. It's high, it's intense.

When you read into the lyrics,

knowing that he was being faced with his own mortality.

-A great performance.

-Damn right!

It's like...

The power, the will, and the desire.

All of it is intact.

You feel it when you listen to it.

When he says, "Inside my heart is breaking, my make-up may be flaking,

"but my smile still stays on."

Back up! Back up!

# I'll face it with a grin

# I'm never giving in

# On with the show... #

In the ultimate act of vocal defiance,

Freddie faced down the world.

He would basically do a shot of vodka, get up to the microphone,

and say, "Just roll."

Knowing that he did it in one take, that, to me,

means he wanted the world to hear his heart, you know?

If only everything was that beautiful.

# On with the show

# The show must go on. #

Like all show-stoppers, Freddie was an innovator.

And when it comes to vocal athleticism, for me, it's all about jazz.

So I'm heading up to a place where I spent my early years as a singer.

Harlem. By the '30s it had seen an explosion of creative energy

and clubs Lindy Hopped to an infectious swing sound.

JAZZ PLAYS

The Apollo Theatre, this is the place where stars are born and

legends are made. Every Wednesday night is amateur night.

It's still going on after 80 years.

And way back in 1934, a teenage Ella Fitzgerald took the stage here

for the first time.

# Give me a song that's robust

# Feeling the way I am

# Any old band'll go bust... #

A young Ella danced on street corners for tips.

But that night her world changed.

When she goes to the Apollo, her first choice was to dance,

and at the last minute, she's, like, "Well, maybe I'll sing instead."

She wins her amateur-night appearance,

and eventually goes on to sing with Chick Webb who holds court

as the drummer in the hottest band in town at the Savoy ballroom.

In 1938, Ella and Chick's band made a record together that turned her

into a pop sensation.

# A-tisket, a-tasket

# A brown and yellow basket... #

The first song I ever learned was Ella Fitzgerald, A-Tisket, A-Tasket.

And I learned it backwards, I loved it.

-She was my idol.

-Yeah.

The voice of youth.

# She was trucking on down the avenue

# Not a single thing to do

# She went peck, peck, pecking all around

# When she spied it on the ground... #

The sweet little voice out of this chubby little body, you know,

people don't know whether to put the voice with the body together.

They're confused, you know.

So they close their eyes and they just completely go away,

they go off with this wonderful voice.

How could she ever feel that she wasn't pretty enough?

All you've got to do is listen to that voice.

-Just listen.

-Yeah.

-Just listen.

-Listen.

# A-tisket, a-tasket

# I lost my yellow basket

# And if that girlie don't return it

# Don't know what I'll do... #

But Ella's sweet, youthful voice would be elevated to new levels of

virtuosity by a cool, fresh post-war jazz - Bebop.

MUSIC PLAYS

52nd St, New York City. 1947, wish I was there!

All of a sudden you had cascades of notes and harmonies,

and you've really got to pay attention

to what you're doing and what the musician next to you is doing,

and what they're doing. And if you can get that group mind going,

you have something that can't be written on a score.

Ella had ears bigger than the Empire State Building.

She was phenomenal.

# You must take the A train

# If you really want to go to Harlem... #

She knew how to phrase, she knew

where to go from the bottom of her register to the very, very top.

She never run out of ideas.

Never ran out of ideas.

-That's what's extraordinary about her.

-Oh!

Ella toured with the high priest of Bop, Dizzy Gillespie, in 1947.

And he encouraged her to develop her wordless improvisation,

known in the business as scat.

ELLA SINGS SCAT

When she got into her groove, nobody messed with her.

The musicians jumped behind her and pushed her to the moon.

ELLA SINGS SCAT

I believe she had an ear for a horn,

and so her improvs seemed like trumpet lines.

The human instrument played like brass.

ELLA SINGS SCAT

She scats like horn sections.

In a way, competing and battling horn sections.

ELLA SINGS SCAT

She does call-and-response with herself.

HE SINGS SCAT

I can hear two different big bands just wailing away with these

interesting horn lines going...

HE SINGS SCAT

But it's all contained within her.

Her 1960 recording, Ella in Berlin,

captured Ella at her show-stopping peak.

ELLA SINGS SCAT

SHE SINGS SCAT

That was Ella. Because it was at the front of the mouth

and it was all Bs and Ds,

you get such precision and accuracy and it's really satisfying.

You can hear every note, clear as day.

She had shoo, she had the, she had ra, she had every sound the body

can make as part of her vocabulary.

ELLA SINGS SCAT

HE JOINS IN

She could take anything and turn it inside out.

And the more she went outside, the more people enjoyed it, and said,

"Where is she going now?"

# I fell in love with you the first time I looked into them there eyes

# You've got a cute lil' certain way of flirtin'

# With them there eyes... #

She was exploring and opening up avenues of melody that singers

two generations, three generations down the line

don't even know where it came from.

You know, Ella was doing that.

# There's danger lurkin'

# You're overworkin' 'em Them there eyes... #

Today, I've got the rare opportunity to sing alongside the first lady of jazz.

Thanks to the wonders of modern technology,

I'm recording a duet with Ella Fitzgerald.

I'm very excited about it. This is a dream come true,

that's not supposed to come true, you know what I mean?

There are certain dreams you didn't know you could dream, you know?

We're laying down a number called People Will Say We're In Love,

which Ella originally recorded back in 1954.

# Your eyes mustn't glow like mine

# People will say we're in love... #

Even though she would keep the line pretty straight,

she would always do just a little...

# Ah-ah... #

Just to let you know this is Ella Fitzgerald.

And I have complete control of this Cadillac of an instrument that I have.

# Sweetheart, they're suspecting things

# People will say we're in love... #

Yes, you can have mastery of your instrument,

but then there's that other thing that is inspiration, to have

fingerprints on your music.

Ella Fitzgerald does that.

# They'll see

-# It's all right with me

-It's all right with me

# People will say, they will say

# They will say, they will say

# They will say we're in love. #

Ella's voice is fluent from the bottom to the top of her range.

She's always taking my breath away.

For us guys, mastering those high notes can be quite tricky.

But it's definitely worthwhile.

It's been scientifically proven that when it comes to partners of the

opposite sex, ladies prefer a deep, sonorous speaking voice.

But when they're getting down,

girls and guys like their boys to sing high.

# Well, you can tell by the way I use my walk

# I'm a woman's man No time to talk

# Music loud and women warm

# I've been kicked around since I was born... #

For a male singer going up into that range,

it's one of the few devices you have to kind of break out.

From the stratospheric harmonies of the Bee Gees,

to the Fab Four...

..to Justin Timberlake...

# I just want to love you, baby... #

..the male falsetto has always set pulses racing.

It's a lighter, in a way, more sensitive sound.

Maybe even playing with masculine vulnerability, or even femininity.

# Just take a good look at my face

# Oh, yeah, you see my smile... #

Singing more in a register a woman might sing, naturally,

you suggested a feminine vulnerability that was somehow

sexy to women. Right?

# Hey, baby

# Whoohoo... #

Falsetto has been a mainstay of the American R&B sound,

but the maestro of gender fluidity and high-pitched sexual potency was

his royal purpleness.

# You don't have to be beautiful

# To turn me on

# I just need your body, baby

# From dusk till dawn... #

His falsetto is formidable.

-Yeah.

-If you take a song like Kiss.

Had he sung that an octave lower - I've actually heard the demo, the

original version of Kiss was sung in a lower vocal range,

and he flipped it up to the falsetto.

It makes the song completely come to life.

# To rule my world

# Ain't no particular sign

# I'm more compatible with

# I just want your extra time and your

# Kiss... #

He used it to denote intimacy and vulnerability.

But also, I think there was an element of subversion happening

there, as well.

He wanted to be able to call on feminine as well as masculine energy.

# I wanna be your lover

# I wanna be the only one that makes you come running... #

Prince scored his first hit with I Wanna Be Your Lover in 1979

and purposefully embraced falsetto as part of a sexually ambiguous persona.

I was really shocked at his speaking voice, which was really low.

He sounded absolutely nothing like what I heard on the records.

I'm here, I'm living, breathing, I'm happy.

I'm among wise people.

I have no complaints.

I would expect him to speak and sound like how the

Karate Kid sounded.

Kind of like, up here, and, hey.

But there's something about him being like, "Hey, what's going on?"

That's like, yo, what is that?

It's an oxymoron.

I want that.

# But with you I just go on... #

For Prince, in the '70s,

as a black man,

with heels and eyeliner,

and you love women?

Hero.

# Our clothes, our hair

# We don't care

# It's all about being there... #

He's learned a lot of it through studying women and what

that means for a man to take ownership of that kind of sensuality

and drama and seduction.

# White, black, Puerto Rican

# Everybody just a-freakin'... #

You know, there's this, sort of, like

Tim Curry-ish Rocky Horror sexuality about Prince that comes

directly from the gay community, or comes directly from a woman.

At the dawn of the '80s, America reached the peak of a sexual revolution.

Attitudes towards gender roles and casual sex were changing.

As the US got more open, Prince took his falsetto to new levels of

transgression on his album Dirty Minds.

# There's something about you, baby

# It happens all the time

# Whenever I'm around you, baby

# I get a dirty mind... #

That was my first tour and album with him.

It was the work of a restless soul.

It took the energy of, like, a teenager,

and the passion and anger and the want for attention

and finding a way to do it.

Prince's erotic lyrics and look pushed at the boundaries.

Lisa Coleman provided the voice of a seduced bride on his song Head.

# I'm just a virgin and I'm on my way to be wed.

# But you're such a hunk, so full of spunk

# I'll give you head

# Till you're burning up

# Head... #

In this nightclub in New York City, the first time I almost fell

backwards out of my seat when he did Head.

People didn't write songs about head in 1981.

Not anybody who's actually a black artist.

Of course, he also was wearing black bikini underwear,

and thigh-high boots.

So a lot of guys were like, "Oh, he must be gay."

Did you ever wonder if Prince was gay?

-No!

-No.

-BOTH:

-No.

-I kind of just thought he was just sexual.

I think the biggest stars

want everyone to feel like they're going to be made love to by them.

-I think they all do that.

-Yeah, a man crush, a bromance.

-Yeah.

-It's like, it's OK, because it's Prince.

Dearly beloved, we have gathered here today.

To get through this thing called life.

Prince used his high voice to help craft an enigma.

And in 1984 he brought it to American multiplexes

with his film Purple Rain.

Let's just say it blew my mind. You know. It was amazing.

Between the music and the imagery, it was just,

you know, I think I probably was 11 or something like that.

It was a really sexy movie.

Yeah, I enjoyed it.

The emotional climax of Purple Rain is built on Prince's show-stopping falsetto.

We were back in Los Angeles,

two of us got a phone call about three o'clock in the morning.

He said, "Are you up?" "No. No."

"I'm outside. Can you come out to the car?"

So the two of us went outside, and he played The Beautiful Ones.

He had just fallen in love with my twin sister, Suzanna.

Part of his ache in the song, I think is just budding love.

It starts with this mournful

introverted, like, sort of a whisper.

# Baby, baby, baby

# What's it gonna be? #

Using the falsetto at first, expressing tenderness.

He knew how to work that tone up here with a beautiful vibrato.

# The beautiful ones

# You always seem to lose... #

He knew that when he would drop his vocal,

that's when he would really pull the listener in.

I don't know where this man comes.

# What's it gonna be, baby?

# Do you want him?

# Or do you want me?

# Cos I want you... #

He's so tortured by the idea...

..that he's unrequited, that it's not his yet.

Or that he's been screwed with, that's where that scream comes from.

# I'm begging down on my knees

# I want you... #

Do you know anybody who can scream like that

and continue a melody line screaming?

# Baby, baby, baby, baby, I want you... #

All of us on stage loved just watching him.

We were the ultimate voyeurs.

What else are you going to do?

We watched him carefully.

Every move he made, every sexual innuendo was our trigger

and we watched closer and closer.

Prince was a visionary who stretched the male falsetto to breaking point.

Exceeding expectations of what we're physically capable of is another

trait of a show-stopping singer.

Today, singers are pushing their voices further than ever.

Riffs, runs, impressive high notes have all

become staples of our Saturday night entertainment.

Love it or hate it, it's part of the default American pop sound.

# Oh

# Got me looking so crazy right now

# Your love's got me looking so crazy right now... #

Much of the virtuosity in modern singing is built on a vocal style

called melisma.

Multiple notes on a single syllable.

# Yeah-oh-yeah... #

# You know how I'm feeling inside... #

# You need a bad girl to blow your mind... #

What's that word again, melismatic?

Ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous.

I want to hear the word love, I don't want to hear...

HE SINGS MELISMATICALLY

When this style of singing is connected to real emotions and

backed up by the words, it can be an extraordinary way to express yourself,

just like the original style of the Gospel church.

Those riffs and runs have their roots in gospel.

Mahalia Jackson may have opened America's ears to that sound,

but it was a young protege who took things a step further.

# And he talk to me

-# He tells me

-He tells me... #

Aretha was a phenomena of her time.

She would've been under any circumstance,

because she was a natural.

She was born to sing.

And when she opened up her mouth, it doesn't make any difference whether

she was talking or singing, that same quality came out.

Great dynamics and power.

# What you want

# Baby, I got it... #

Unlike Mahalia, Aretha fused her Holy Ghost riffs

with secular lyrics.

Her string of hits in the late '60s set her apart as the Queen of Soul.

When I hear Aretha songs, I see my mum with her eyes closed,

or my aunt with a cigarette with her eyes closed.

Any time Aretha comes on, you like... "Oh, my Lord."

# All I'm asking is for a little respect... #

She's had the words that women wanted to say at that time,

that they couldn't say about their man, about falling in love,

falling out of love or trying to make it work.

# Is to give me my propers

# When you get home... #

It's that constant conflict and tension with R&B, soul

and the spirit, the church hymns.

# R-E-S-P-E-C-T

# Find out what it means to me

# R-E-S-P-E-C-T

# Take care, TCB... #

Aretha opened the door for the female gospel sound to become a

mainstream vocal force.

In the mid-80s, her goddaughter, Whitney Houston,

emerged from that rich gospel lineage.

Her mother, Sissy, used to sing with Aretha Franklin,

took her with her everywhere she went.

From the time she was a little girl.

So can you imagine, the first thing

she heard in her life was Aretha Franklin?

That set the standard.

# How will I know if he really loves me?

# I say a prayer with every heartbeat

# I fall in love whenever we meet

# I'm asking you what you know about these things... #

It was an extraordinary pop voice,

that had this undercurrent and power of a gospel singer.

# How will I know

# How will I know? #

Even How Will I Know, where she did the up-tempo things,

there's a power to her voice that's not like the dance divas.

# Yes, I'm saving all my love

# Yes, I'm saving all my love for you... #

The flawless delivery and direct lyrics of Whitney's power ballads

made her a crossover star.

In the 1980s, you would hear three black artists on top 40 radio -

Michael Jackson, Prince and Whitney Houston.

Maybe Janet Jackson, and that was it.

Radio played her songs because they were songs, they weren't a style,

you know, trying to make people jump up and down.

Gospel, you know, it wasn't that.

They played them on radios that other black artists didn't have a

chance to get played on.

# Cos tonight is the night

# That I'm feeling all right... #

She crossed over to white audiences because she had a style that didn't

have a colour line.

She looked like a model.

Some of the people in the Midwest, who might not have been interested

in a black woman as a sex symbol, right, they're still like,

"Oh, she's really hot."

Allied air strikes in 1991 marked the beginning of the first Gulf War.

11 days later, Whitney took the mic at the Super Bowl.

A black female singer became an all-American hero.

# O'er the land of the free

# And the home of the brave? #

People were calling into radio stations asking to hear her sing

The Star Spangled Banner after that Super Bowl.

People who didn't care about the song wanted to hear her sing it

because her rendition of it was just transcendent.

# So I'll go... #

The following year, Whitney's cover of a Dolly Parton country ballad set

the blueprint for pop vocals for the next 25 years.

# The way

# And I

# Will always love you

# I

# Will always love you... #

She could sing clear lyrics, two or three octaves up.

Clear, without turning it into a gimmick.

She sang.

# And I

# Will always love you

# I will always love you... #

It's both a walk in the park and a rocket taking off for space.

Her power and her vibrato, her clarity...

..and then her falsetto.

# You

# I will always love you... #

This love doesn't die. It won't die, it can't die.

It does it for me.

It did it for millions of other people too.

# Treated me kind

# Sweet destiny... #

Whitney inspired millions of American pop hopefuls.

At the beginning of the '90s, one in particular was hot on her heels.

She's almost like a pop soprano singer with all of these

extraordinary frills and melisma.

When she came out, what she was doing was fresh and new and interesting.

# I had a vision of love... #

The ad libs on Mariah Carey's debut single, Vision Of Love,

redefined vocal agility.

# Right through the night... #

In this little short amount of time, the amount of notes she can squeeze

in, in that one little bar, two bars, was fascinating to me.

And that's kind of when I started trying it,

and it's something that I love to do in my music,

but she completely inspired me.

I like Visions Of Love. It's got some good chords in it, actually.

And then she does the thing... And that thing became the thing.

# All

# That you turned out to be... #

Those five melismatic seconds influenced not just Beyonce,

but every wannabe show-stopper since.

I think she sings in eight octaves, something like that,

if I'm not mistaken.

She has one of the most amazing voices that we had heard at that

particular point in time.

# You've got me feeling emotions

# Deeper than I've ever dreamed of... #

Mariah released the single Emotions in 1991 and took

the female pop vocal to new heights.

There's a choir in the back.

All of it suggests a gospel celebration.

It's a party.

You know, she came out and was doing that in her songs, people were like,

"That's stratospheric. Nobody sings there. Nobody has that."

Mariah's glass-shattering whistle register wasn't studio trickery.

On MTV in 1992 she performed Emotions live.

SHE SINGS HIGH NOTE

You're hearing her do it on beat, that makes it sound even crazier,

to do it when the tempo is like...

HE SINGS

When she's doing it, I'm out of key, by the way, so don't...

But when she's doing it that way, that's what makes it amazing.

SHE SINGS

You're not sure if that's a whistle or a voice.

HE LAUGHS

# There can be miracles

# When you believe... #

Spectacular range and flawless riffs have become trademarks of today's

pop show-stoppers.

Every kid on American Idol basically grew up with Whitney and Mariah.

They are the definers of the last 30 years of American pop singing.

If you believe you can sing,

sing a Mariah Carey song and prove it to me.

# There can be miracles when you believe... #

As long as the artist is using their instrument to put forth the

message of the song as well as showing their incredible virtuosity,

it's great. Mariah Carey does it.

Definitely Whitney Huston has done it.

There's something in their musicality, their approach,

that doesn't make it feel like it's too much.

MUSIC: I Wanna Dance With Somebody by Whitney Houston

All of these show-stopping voices that I love

do things mere mortals can't.

Caruso's power, Mahalia's belief,

Ella's virtuosity, Freddie's bravora, Prince's falsetto

and Mariah and Whitney's riffs and range.

They're more than technicians.

They have complete mastery of their instrument and that allows them the

freedom to express emotions straight into the heart of the listener.

For me, it's this that makes them not just great singers,

but show-stoppers.

# Oh, I wanna dance with somebody

# I wanna feel the heat with somebody

# Yeah, I wanna dance with somebody

# With somebody who loves me

# Oh, I wanna dance with somebody

# I wanna feel the heat with somebody

# Yeah, I wanna dance with somebody

# With somebody who loves me. #