Economic View...

The Economic Voice: Has Whitney Houston Lost it?
April 27th, 2010
Author: Richard Henley Davis

She was regarded as one of the world’s greatest singers but, after a succession of bad reviews and disastrous concerts, the public are beginning to ask if the years of abuse have robbed her of her talent?


Well maybe and maybe not.

Her voice and lung capacity has been damaged by years of drug addiction but she does have a husky thing going on that could be developed.

She may not be able to sing what the audience wants to hear and that is her repertoire of big ballads which made her famous in the first place, but if that is no longer possible and she still has ability to create then let her do what she can with her new voice.

We should stop and ask what can her voice do now today and not what could it do fifteen years ago.

Robert Plant’s voice has changed over the years. The Led Zeppelin front man no longer attempts some of the vocal acrobatics he could do as a young man but like a fine wine he has matured and sings what suits his voice today and that is a brave move for any singer to make and also a wise one.

Listen to Johnny Cash before he died, his voice had always been great but at the end it was so haunting because of its rich, warm roughness he did not have in his early career. He always had a great tone but that tone improved as the vocal range fell.

And so it is for Whitney Houston.

Why are we expecting her to do what she did before the damage was done? She should take stock of this tour and go away to find herself in her new voice and maybe sing the odd classic but drop it a few semi-tones.

The complaints about her performances in Australia and now in the London O2 arena, which have resulted in some fans demanding their money back may be a bit harsh, what were they expecting?

If Elvis made a comeback today would you expect him to come on stage in a jumpsuit shaking his stuff doing Karate?

No.

There is a future for Whitney Houston and it may be a very different singer we see next time around.
 

NEWSFILE: 27 APRIL 2010