Sennheiser 2012 Annual Report Download - page 22

42
2,800 Hz
VOICE TRAINING
of lessons and started studying opera. Were those studies
the basis of your technique?
Yes. I was going through a vocal transition, becoming a
Heldentenor [“heroic tenor”: the term given to the few voic-
es that can sing the great tenor roles of German opera, es-
pecially Wagner]. But it took me 11 years because I could
not find the teacher to move my voice up. Until I found the
great British tenor Benvenuto Finelli in London. And in
10 minutes he did what none of the other teachers in 11
years could do. He had me singing an F above high C. It was
unbelievable.
So what exactly is the Ron Anderson technique?
It’s the combination of several technical skills. There’s the
German skill, there is the Italian skill and there’s also the
French skill. They all have their own individual placements,
and each person has their own, which is what I find in the
very first three to five minutes of working with a singer.
You’re also known for fixing voices on stage …
True. Take Björk: She was having problems. She also had a
nodule, which I ended up getting rid of on the road with her.
Seal, too, when he came to me, he had a nodule, and in three
weeks I got rid of it, and then he said, “I need you to come
on the road with me, I leave tomorrow.”
Seal, in fact, uses Sennheiser microphones. What’s special
about the Sennheiser?
The Sennheiser is one of the top mikes in the market. They
are very clear, they give a full-bodied sound, they don’t fade
during the middle register and going into the top part of the
voice – the upper registers – so the singers who use them
really sing, and sing well.
An average human can hear between 20 and 20,000 Hz.
Does the Sennheiser pick up this whole range?
Yes. There is a chip in that microphone, the Neumann
Sennheiser Solution D, that goes from analog to digital
immediately. So that makes everything much more even
through register changes, right up to the higher part of the
voice, where it can withstand all the power and softness. It
has both ends, the light and the heavy.
Pink was your student, and is a Sennheiser artist. What was
it like working with her?
I worked with Pink many years ago. She was very strong-
willed, very opinionated of what she was and how she was
and how to get there.
When laypeople hear a rock star seemingly scream for two
hours – what don’t they know that you know?
I’ll give you an example. With Axl Rose from Guns N’ Roses,
it took us six years to really develop his sound. Axl actually
was a bass. He literally could go to a low B-flat below a C
without a problem. It was a really deep, rich sound. But when
we stretched the voice in the top he found the pharyngeal
voice very quickly, which forms inside of the larynx and gives
a very piercing sound. It worked for all the material.
Clearly, the human voice is a fascinating thing to work with.
What does it have that no other instrument has?
The flexibility to say words and the flexibility to sing those
words with a great deal of feeling and a great deal of pas-
sion. Because without the feeling and the passion, you only
have a voice.
a1. Anderson worked
with US star Pink early
on in her career.
e2. The voice coach also
likes to sing – he is a
trained Heldentenor.
j NEUMANN TLM103D
Pure Neumann sound on the digital level. Because signal
conversion happens directly in the capsule, A/D converters
and pre-amps are no longer needed.
Neumann TLM103D digital studio microphone
Frequency response 20 Hz – 20,000 Hz
Pick-up pattern cardioid
Nominal impedance 50 Ohm
Weight 460 g (1 lb)