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I.8Part I, The Signs of Notation

Voices

This lesson explains how human voices are classified, and how each kind is traditionally subdivided.

6 min7 questionsDanhauser § 27 to 30

There are two kinds of voices:

men's voices;
women's or children's voices, which sound an octave higher than men's voices.

Each kind is divided in turn into high voices and low voices:

	High voice	Low voice
Women or children	Soprano	Contralto or alto
Men	Tenor	Bass

The subdivision of voices

Kind	Category	Voice (Danhauser's names)
Woman or child	high	Soprano, or first soprano, or “premier dessus” (first treble) Mezzo-soprano, or second soprano, or “second dessus” (second treble)
Woman or child	low	Contralto
Man	high	First tenor Second tenor
Man	low	First bass, or baritone Second bass, or “basse-taille”

Table of the subdivision of voices (§ 29).

These voices have an ordinary range of twelve or thirteen consecutive notes, about an octave and a half. Since they don't occupy the same register of the range of pitches, they aren't all written in the same clef. For the same reason, instruments are written in different clefs, and some of them, with a very wide range, even have one clef for their low notes and another for their high notes. That's the subject of the next lesson.

Voice	Usual range (approximate)
Soprano	C4 to A5
Mezzo-soprano	A3 to F5
Contralto	F3 to D5
Tenor	C3 to A4
Baritone	A2 to F4
Bass	E2 to C4

About thirteen notes per voice, for a trained voice that is not a soloist's. Professional singers often go beyond these limits.

WorkshopVoice RangesFull screen

See and hear the range of each voice on the keyboard.

Usual clef today

Voice: Soprano, high female or child voice
Usual range: C4 to A5 (do3 to la4)
Danhauser's clef: soprano clef (formerly)

Middle C = C4 (French: do3)

Press a key: you hear the sound and see its name and its place on the staff.

Typical ranges for amateur choir singers; professional soloists often go beyond. Danhauser counts “twelve or thirteen successive notes”.

Today.

Today, six main voice types are commonly recognized: soprano, mezzo-soprano and contralto for women, and tenor, baritone and bass for men. The baritone, which Danhauser files among the basses as the “first bass”, is now considered a voice type in its own right.
To these we add the countertenor, a male voice singing in the alto range, prominent in Baroque music, and the basso profondo, a very deep bass. Don't confuse the countertenor with the “haute-contre” of French Baroque music, which is a very high tenor.
In opera, voices are also described by character, as light, lyric or dramatic: you'll hear of the coloratura soprano, the lyric tenor, the basso buffo and many others. The German “Fach” system takes this classification very far.
An unbroken child's voice, a boy treble for example, sings in the soprano or alto range. That explains why Danhauser groups women and children together.

Exercisein the method's spirit

Reproduce the table of the subdivision of voices from memory.

Check your understanding

7 questions

How much higher are women's or children's voices than men's voices?

What is the low female voice called?

In Danhauser's table, the “first bass” is another name for which voice?

Danhauser also calls the mezzo-soprano:

What is the ordinary range of a voice according to Danhauser?

Which of these is a male voice?

The countertenor is:

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