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World's lowest voice

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chamcham

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I know we like to talk about high notes, but I thought this was cool.

Tim Storms boasts a vocal range of 10 octaves and his lowest note

is so deep it can only be heard by elephants.

http://www.cnn.com/video/?hpt=hp_t3#/video/world/2012/08/23/mclaughlin-worlds-lowest-voice.cnn

Any advice on how to get that low?

The sound is so low humans can only feel it.

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I know we like to talk about high notes, but I thought this was cool.

Tim Storms boasts a vocal range of 10 octaves and his lowest note

is so deep it can only be heard by elephants.

http://www.cnn.com/video/?hpt=hp_t3#/video/world/2012/08/23/mclaughlin-worlds-lowest-voice.cnn

Any advice on how to get that low?

The sound is so low humans can only feel it.

I think it's vocal fry, which is not a voice range, and i don't consider the note to be existant if it is not heared at least few meters away.

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That is a stupid video ahah, definately not the lowest singer. AND have you ever heard a 'giant's voice? lower than a normal persons voice by far...

That is fry, and he just exploited the news reporter's lack of knowledge on the subject, that's all.

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At least as far as I can tell, he is considered a contrabass. There is nothing wrong with fry if you can make it sound good. Of course there's a certain point where you lose the majority of the resonance, which for him is well before Eb0, as it is for most humans even with extreme low voices. Eb0 is the lowest note a human can hear, and saying that he can hit a g-7 at .79hz has no merit as to having a "10 octave voice" especially if you can't hear it and it's just very slow muscle action.

I'm not saying fry is bad, but the way the voice works, I just wouldn't ever consider a g-7 a real note to judge range by. It's supposed to say "world's lowest note", not 10 octave range with the worlds lowest note.

From his other videos, he demonstrates some low contrabass notes with ease. But for a record breaking performance, I'd be more impressed if he had a demonstration of a E0 to D0 scale, just to hear that he can sing down there and below the hearing range.

10 octaves is just ridiculous. adam lopez has a range over 6/7 octaves with real notes(that you can at least hear). The 6/7 is Dependant on if you use a root and octaves, or octal sets.

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It's known as infrasound (notes lower than 20Hz).

Whales can use infrasound to communicated HUNDREDS of miles away.

Elephants are also known to use it for long distance (up to 6 miles according to Wikipedia) communication.

Imagine talking to your best buddy miles away without a cell phone using your

booming bass voice......LOL.....

Here is an article about infrasound and elephant vocal folds:

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/342777/title/How_the_elephant_gets_its_infrasound

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Saw the video...

Somehow I am really not impressed by guiness freak shows, I did like the quality of his singing later on though, and he surelly can make some fun stuff for cartoon characters... As for being a bass or not, is there a video of him performing a Bass aria?

I also recommend doing a search for some videos on russian deep bass on youtube. Some neat stuff there, not only the notes, but a lot of power, projection and clarity.

And guys, seriously... infrasound? What is the point?

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From Wikipedia:

Storms's Guinness World Record for the lowest note produced by a human was certified in January 2002.[3] Storms also holds the Guinness World Record for the widest vocal range for a male. His records have been published in the Guinness World Records 2006. He broke both of these records in August 2008.[1] As of 2008, the new record for lowest note was .7973Hz (point 7973Hz), and the new record for Widest Vocal Range For Any Human was ten octaves.

Updated: 30 March 2012, Tim Storms reclaimed the record for the Lowest Note Produced by a Human. The new record is G-7, or .189Hz (point 189 Hertz). That is 8 octaves below the lowest G on the piano. Although the record of ten octaves for Widest Vocal Range has not been formally broken, based on Tim Storms' previous record of ten octaves, his new record for Lowest Note would put his range, unofficially, at twelve octaves. Guinness World Records dot com has not yet updated their website to reflect the newly certified record.

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Infrasound can't be heard but it still affects human beings.

It's been theorized that tigers paralyze their victims through infrasound made when they growl.

Infrasound can also cause nausea and headaches, and has often been mistaken for ghosts.

Some people think it's also how animals know an earthquake is happening well before humans realize it.

Those low frequencies (0-20Hz) are on the order of brain waves.

If someone could find a sweet spot for infrasound, they could

make some killer music. Imagine sending infrasound signals

to buy your album. People would get a sudden urge to buy your

music and they wouldn't be able to understand why....haha....

Mind control, anyone? :D

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Damn ive always thought My intense highnote chasing when i was Young was crazy, im bordering on normal compared to this guy. Like 5 octaves you cant hear haha...

Lets hope he makes an entire album in those last two octaves

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I just realized.

Can microphones/speakers today even capture/playback sound in the 0 - 20 Hz range?

If not, then the video isn't even able to give an accurate representation of what his notes sound/feel like in person.

That would be impressive.

Sounds so deep that not even the high-end audio equipment could capture it. :D

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I just realized.

Can microphones/speakers today even capture/playback sound in the 0 - 20 Hz range?

If not, then the video isn't even able to give an accurate representation of what his notes sound/feel like in person.

That would be impressive.

Sounds so deep that not even the high-end audio equipment could capture it. :D

chamcham: depends on the mic, recording and the playback equipment.

If you take a vocal fry and practice it until the frequency becomes consistent, tune the vocal tract so that the harmonics align with the resonances to make a Formant, and allow the vocal band motion to become modal, the note will be real. Most of the power, and the perception of the fundamental, comes from the presence and resonance upper harmonics.

This technique is trainable, and not difficult to learn, but does require practice to be useful. I learned it as a freshman in college, and employed it in my choral singing. The lowest note that we basses in the choir performed that way was Ab1. In other parts of the world, the lowest Basses (Profundo, or in German 'TiefeBass') often double the written Bass part down 1 octave, descending to G1, F1 and E1 quite commonly.

All of that without using microphones.

I hope this is helpful.

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Even the Neumann U87 (a $3500 mic) only has a 20Hz-20kHz frequency response.

A lot of speakers only go 30Hz-20kHz.

So once he gets below 20Hz, would the mic be able to capture anything?

chamcham: The fine print on the frequency response stats will say that the bandwidth documented is limited to the section where the response is consistent to within +- 3 dB tolerance. However, these devices have frequency response above/below the published.

The answer for -20Hz pickup... you bet, especially if the mic is brought close to the mouth.

I hope this is helpful

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  • 2 weeks later...

If you take a vocal fry and practice it until the frequency becomes consistent, tune the vocal tract so that the harmonics align with the resonances to make a Formant, and allow the vocal band motion to become modal, the note will be real. Most of the power, and the perception of the fundamental, comes from the presence and resonance upper harmonics.

This technique is trainable, and not difficult to learn, but does require practice to be useful.

I hope this is helpful.

Hi,

could you describe this to me a little bit more? I was always fascinated by low-voiced singing, and I think I have a pwoerful fry, but it is still a fry. How can someone "allow the vocal band motion to become modal"? Does this mean, that it will sound like a full sound, not just popping/rattling sound? How could you train this? Is there some special ecxercise for this?

Thanks in advance,

Norbert

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could you describe this to me a little bit more? I was always fascinated by low-voiced singing, and I think I have a powerful fry, but it is still a fry. How can someone "allow the vocal band motion to become modal"? Does this mean, that it will sound like a full sound, not just popping/rattling sound? How could you train this? Is there some special exercise for this?

Thanks in advance,

Norbert

Hi, Norbert.

Yes, there are exercises for this, and not too difficult to understand or do. Here is one of them.

Begin with an /ae/ vowel (as in the english words hat, mat, cat, fat...) and brightly but softly say it on G2, which should be possible for almost any male voice type. Don't sing it, just say it in a sustained way. Repeat, and 'fry' it at first, and then increase the volume slowly until the tone solidifies into a real note. Repeat that a few times until you can identify the sensation of singing in that nearly-fry way.

Take a moment's break, and then onset that /ae/ vowel at the nearly-fry volume a few times. Its likely to feel like you are just 'softly saying' the note. For me, that is a very helpful image for this development.

Now, transpose the onsets down 1/2 step at a time, repating each note a number of times, and testing the modal/fry boundary. Your goal here is to find the softest /ae/ that us modal, just on the modal side of the fry/modal boundary.

As you progress downward, it will less and less like singing, and more and more like you are just bringing the bands together as if saying the note. Keep the vowel bright.

Proceed as far as you can go downward in the scale. At the lowest end, it will get softer. That is fine. Your tonal goal is 'bright'.

When you get to your current bottom of this modal voice, the next note will be get a bit fry-ish, but keep going. The reason for this transition is that the muscle coordination at this pitch range is not consistent enough to maintain the glottal wave characteristic of the lower modal voice. However, consistency will improve with practice.

Repeat the exercise for 15 mins a day. After 2-3 weeks, you will get more familiar with how all this works, and you'll be able to get good tone on lower notes than before.

I hope this is helpful.

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