Celine's voice

[MJaque]

It's not that we think she lipsynchs it, it's that we know that she lipsynchs it.

 

How do you know? and where are admins of this forum? They used to monitor my posts for no reason, so I wonder how can you keep saying she lip synchs...She is in a good shape and can handle Live. Vegas was amazing!!!

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPeSIRhKzAw

[MJaque]

Sorry guys, I know it's not the first time I talk about bad live performances in this topic, but anyway, here's one of her worst, I think she was sick that night:

 

 

before saying bad, please mention this is LIVE- pure LIVE...she might've been sick but she hit the note baby!

[justinecoria]

Celine making that many shows is a choice ! And no she doesn't work harder than Christina who doesn't perform 5 nights a week, sorry. Doing Vegas the way she does it, is way less hard than what she did at the beginning of her career, when she really made sacrifices !

They're favoring quantity over quality, and it's sad, but one has to come the fact that it's easy money. They're using Celine's image she's been molding for decades. Put her performances on someone else, and you wouldn't be that thrilled.

 

And no, lipsynching is not what made Celine stay in good shape and Whitney/Mariah's voices fall down. Crack destroyed Whitney's voice. Mariah's problem is the same as Celine, except way worse. It's just laziness, and I understand it. Thing is that Mariah is not considered as the best voice ever anymore as she once was !

 

The live performance of LBDB is just a mess, voice wise. No control at all, her voice is hoarse, she's having so much trouble singing. It's just a pain for the ears to me. You can like it, but come on, it's bad.

 

This one :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5W2mx8URZ54

 

is pure melody/control. A voice so pure, one sharp note at a time. You have the right not to like this performance, but voice wise, there's not much criticism one can make.

Edited August 29, 2011 at 06:49 AM by justinecoria

[pat200]

the first LBDB shown was bad. she had problems that night and she was having problems with her transition to the upper middle range notes. circa this era her voice reached its absolute worse. the one at the millenium concert is a marvel to listen to. the power, the smooth legato, the ease of holding the note... just wow

 

As to not working hard, i dont agree with justinecoria. Going on stage 5 nights a week singing 50% live is more demanding than what any other diva does. you forget there is sound test before the concert and some might think this is a joke, but knowing exactly which parts to lip is nerve wrecking somehow because if you mess up clearly, you are caught for good!

 

We all know she lips, but this repetitiveness in this topic is becoming too irritating. I am the first to say she should do less concerts and sing them live. I am the first to say i am against lipping. But i am the first to say that i would not go all around the web like youtube and comment that she is lipping so that everyone can know. last time i saw a video by a fan who was proving where celine was lipping. i mean that is just ridiculous to call yourself a fan and still want to hurt her image like that, because when you post it on such websites this is exactly what you are doing. if you are a hurt fan, dont buy her albums or her tickets, as simple as that. if you are buying a ticket knowing 30% of the show is lipped then you have no one but yourself to blame.

 

Either just live with the fact she lips and go with it, or enjoy the marvels she has given us when she was singing live. and anyone who thinks her 91-96/97 voice is back, seriously be realistic. it is much better than all her vegas and TC years, but it is nowhere near those years. She was even much better in 2002. Just listen to la fureur de celine, and you will obviously see that the crystal clear bell like sound to her voice is not there and even though she still has very powerful belts all the time, they are a tad less powerful, case in point being the last belt of because you loved me.

 

She has done enough to be considered the best ever and no one can expect her instrument to stay at its best, especially considering that her technique for a decade now has been flawed. Speaking of flaws, i leave you with a flawed performance of one of my all time fave songs, a flawed performance that was perfect because of its flaws. enjoy!

 

[Timster]

Her voice improved in 2007 over 2004-2006, but it was not as good as 90-95 or as good as 02-03.

 

Her voice is better in 2007 only because she/Rene knew that they'd have to get their act together a bit. They had two new albums coming out, two TV specials (well really not even one after you look at all the lipping), a live DVD of the Vegas show, a pretty decent promo tour for Taking Chances in the US, some other events (such as Sainte Justine, Foster and Friends, Elvis special, etc), and an upcoming tour.

 

So naturally with all that was around the corner, it just wasn't feasible to deliver the kinds of performances with her 04-06 voice, so it improved a little bit. But let's see here. BYLM was still nasal in all of her 2007 performances. A lot of the 2007 Vegas DVD was pretty good - RDMH was amazing and is the last time she performed it right (unlike the rubbish she has been doign with that song since 2008). All The Way, A New Day Has Come, etc....all those were good.

 

Her promo tour... The TC performances were all lacking. It's no wonder why she didn't sing the song completely live on tour - the live version simply lacked that punch the CD version did. Her Alone performances were borderline terrible with squeezed, strained, nasal belts... the IDAN performance on Tody was pretty good, and the MHWGO performance on DWTS is one of her best of the song.

 

So yeah, overall it wasn't to bad. She delivered great performances in 2007 with IDAN at Today, MHWGO on DWTS, and RDMH in Vegas. But overall, it was still a bit mediocre when looking at the performances of I'm Alive, Seduces Me, Taking Chances, Alone, Because You Loved Me.

 

To me, her voice in 2008 was very good. That was when we saw some improvement - when she had that break after Vegas. She sounded better in February and March of 2008 than she had in the last 15 years. She was NAILING that F5 in Alone and It's A Man's World. She was blowing us away with I Got The Music In Me, RDMH was still good, The Show Must Go On was amazing, Think Twice was respectable considering she hadn't done it in 10 years, BYLM had improved a little bit, Fade Away was pretty awesome (well especially in Pretoria), etc.

 

Of course things went downhill. Alone and It's A MAn's World were getting pretty mediocre. RDMH became LCMM part 2. TSMGO was removed from the setlist, as was IGTMIM and Think Twice.

 

I agree with everything you said, except for that MHWGO performance on DWTS - how can you say it was "one of her best of the song"? The high notes were so shaky!

[takeachance]

the first LBDB shown was bad. she had problems that night and she was having problems with her transition to the upper middle range notes. circa this era her voice reached its absolute worse. the one at the millenium concert is a marvel to listen to. the power, the smooth legato, the ease of holding the note... just wow

 

As to not working hard, i dont agree with justinecoria. Going on stage 5 nights a week singing 50% live is more demanding than what any other diva does. you forget there is sound test before the concert and some might think this is a joke, but knowing exactly which parts to lip is nerve wrecking somehow because if you mess up clearly, you are caught for good!

 

We all know she lips, but this repetitiveness in this topic is becoming too irritating. I am the first to say she should do less concerts and sing them live. I am the first to say i am against lipping. But i am the first to say that i would not go all around the web like youtube and comment that she is lipping so that everyone can know. last time i saw a video by a fan who was proving where celine was lipping. i mean that is just ridiculous to call yourself a fan and still want to hurt her image like that, because when you post it on such websites this is exactly what you are doing. if you are a hurt fan, dont buy her albums or her tickets, as simple as that. if you are buying a ticket knowing 30% of the show is lipped then you have no one but yourself to blame.

 

Either just live with the fact she lips and go with it, or enjoy the marvels she has given us when she was singing live. and anyone who thinks her 91-96/97 voice is back, seriously be realistic. it is much better than all her vegas and TC years, but it is nowhere near those years. She was even much better in 2002. Just listen to la fureur de celine, and you will obviously see that the crystal clear bell like sound to her voice is not there and even though she still has very powerful belts all the time, they are a tad less powerful, case in point being the last belt of because you loved me.

 

She has done enough to be considered the best ever and no one can expect her instrument to stay at its best, especially considering that her technique for a decade now has been flawed. Speaking of flaws, i leave you with a flawed performance of one of my all time fave songs, a flawed performance that was perfect because of its flaws. enjoy!

 

 

Agree with you, people should not be writting everywhere on the web that she is lipping,

And that performance of L'amour existe Encore" .......... Unreal !!!!

[justinecoria]

the first LBDB shown was bad. she had problems that night and she was having problems with her transition to the upper middle range notes. circa this era her voice reached its absolute worse. the one at the millenium concert is a marvel to listen to. the power, the smooth legato, the ease of holding the note... just wow

 

As to not working hard, i dont agree with justinecoria. Going on stage 5 nights a week singing 50% live is more demanding than what any other diva does. you forget there is sound test before the concert and some might think this is a joke, but knowing exactly which parts to lip is nerve wrecking somehow because if you mess up clearly, you are caught for good!

Come on. You're gonna convince me on that. Plus, it's a concert, she's far from the audience. She can easily hide some mistakes.

 

We all know she lips, but this repetitiveness in this topic is becoming too irritating. I am the first to say she should do less concerts and sing them live. I am the first to say i am against lipping. But i am the first to say that i would not go all around the web like youtube and comment that she is lipping so that everyone can know. last time i saw a video by a fan who was proving where celine was lipping. i mean that is just ridiculous to call yourself a fan and still want to hurt her image like that, because when you post it on such websites this is exactly what you are doing. if you are a hurt fan, dont buy her albums or her tickets, as simple as that. if you are buying a ticket knowing 30% of the show is lipped then you have no one but yourself to blame.

I'm a fan of her voice.

And I'm sorry, but I find it really disgraceful for Celine to accept the applauses, the praises of her modified-through-computer playbacks. What's the point of lipping ABM, really ?

She's cheating, deceiving and keeping on trying to deceive every one. And this is not good, I'm sorry.

When people go see Britney, they do not go to hear her voice. When people go see Celine, they go to hear her voice, not a CD. People should know the lipping ! If they still wanna go see her, no problem then.

 

She has done enough to be considered the best ever and no one can expect her instrument to stay at its best,

Exactly. So what now ? She's trying to get easy money from us because she deserves it ?

 

... especially considering that her technique for a decade now has been flawed. Speaking of flaws, i leave you with a flawed performance of one of my all time fave songs, a flawed performance that was perfect because of its flaws. enjoy!

 

This live is just perfect ! Okay, one note not reached, but it makes the song more beautiful. And this is the kind of "flaws", I easily accept. You cannot ask her to be perfect on every note, but she's spot on like everywhere.

 

Look at that at 3:45 :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2nYLAirtM8

 

She lived the note so hard. And there's no comparison with the fake pseudo-live note.

[Shaun]

You make some very good points Justine. At the risk of bringing this heated debate back up though I think the most disappointing thing for me in recent years was the decision to re-record new playbacks for the "Taking Chances" DVD's. That showed us that the team around Celine knew exactly what they were up to. Everyone was onto them and they had to do something about it.

 

Are we to honestly believe she couldn't have performed the entire concert live for these special dvd recording occasions? Clearly it was easier to edit them afterwards. I do wonder if the entire show would've been live had it been a private concert...

Edited August 29, 2011 at 08:24 PM by Shaun

[Thomas]

Are we to honestly believe she couldn't have performed the entire concert live for these special dvd recording occasions?

Seems not! I think it would have been so easy if they just had Celine sing ONE extra song live per night night, for a series of nights, until the entire show has been covered. e.g she sings IDAN live the first night, TPOL live the second night, EOM the thirdnight etc. Less strain on her voice than singing an entire concert live and this way instead of having her go back into the studio to record songs to be dubbed long after the event, they'd have them to hand to just swap out and they'd be more genuine as they were really from a concert environment. With Boston and Montreal alone they did 8 shows in a row uninterupted, so this would have been a good opportunity for continuity reasons etc.

 

But then again, I said the same thing with A New Day. They had 700-odd chances to have her perform just one extra song live to makeup an entire live show and they didnt. lol

[QueenCeline]

Although I have come to terms with her lipping and stuff. What I am surprised at is despite the risks, they do it all the time, night after night, show after show. Every time I think about it, I always wonder what would happen if the playback all of a sudden stopped, or skipped, or Celine fell, or somehow lost her mic. With the amount of shows she does, it's a HUGE risk. Yet, they seem to have pulled if off without many mistakes for so many years now. The only two mistakes I've seen were during TCOML concert during TPOL, and IDAN in Vienna during the TCWT. If ever there was a problem with the playback, I can't imagine that it wouldn't be all over the internet/news and so many people would lose respect for her, and her career would crash and burn finally once and for all. Edited August 30, 2011 at 12:23 AM by QueenCeline

[LVCeline]

I had a dream a couple weeks ago that I was at a Celine show and she started lipping to WDMHBN and the track started repeating itself and most of the audience got up and walked out and Celine went offstage and never came back again. It was more like a nightmare! Milli Vanilli style!

[QueenCeline]

I had a dream a couple weeks ago that I was at a Celine show and she started lipping to WDMHBN and the track started repeating itself and most of the audience got up and walked out and Celine went offstage and never came back again. It was more like a nightmare! Milli Vanilli style!

 

Oh boy! What a nightmare! Yeah, whatever would she do if what happened to Milli Vanilli happened to her? And more importantly, what would other people do to her??

[takeachance]

Although I have come to terms with her lipping and stuff. What I am surprised at is despite the risks, they do it all the time, night after night, show after show. Every time I think about it, I always wonder what would happen if the playback all of a sudden stopped, or skipped, or Celine fell, or somehow lost her mic. With the amount of shows she does, it's a HUGE risk. Yet, they seem to have pulled if off without many mistakes for so many years now. The only two mistakes I've seen were during TCOML concert during TPOL, and IDAN in Vienna during the TCWT. If ever there was a problem with the playback, I can't imagine that it wouldn't be all over the internet/news and so many people would lose respect for her, and her career would crash and burn finally once and for all.

 

i know, it seems like a HUGE risk to take

[Jeffieboi]

IDK how popular this opinion is, but I felt it was a positive one and I might as well share it. I'm interested to hear people's opinion's on this issue.

 

When I think back to 1990, and I listen to Mariah's voice on her album "Emotions"....I think she still sounds exactly the same. Older of course, but it sounds like the same voice. With the exception of the hardcore drugs by Whitney Houston, she sounded the same too. When I listen to Christina Aguilera's late 90s music....she still sounds the same as well.

 

Then we have Celine....

 

I finally put the voice to a name because of IACBTMN. I thought FIY was her first album. When I saw Unison in the front at Best Buy a few months later....I bought it. When I listened to it, I was a little upset because she sounded NOTHING like she did in FIY. The voice was beautiful of course, but it was nothing compared to her FIY voice. I totally noticed a difference. To me it sounded like it was a completely different singer. Eventually when I begab to research her in the 'at that time privitive' internet era.....I learned she had tons of CDs, which I eventually bought all of, lol.

 

Then LTAL was announced...

 

I remember wondering if she would sound like she did in Unison, or FIY. When the 30 second clips were posted on the official website, I learned she sounded like she did in FIY. Looking back....I think she sounds even BETTER on LTAL. That makes total sense since LTAL was released a year and a half after FIY, so her voice wouldn't have changed THAT much in a year.

 

The point is....

 

Now it's 2012, and when I listen to FIY and even LTAL....she sounded SO different back then, than she does today. I remember playing a song from Unison for a friend of mine, and she definately agreed that it sounded like a completely different singer. Personally...I think Celine's voice keeps getting better and better. I just keep enjoying the sound more and more. If you compare her voice in "La Voix Du Bon Dieu" to her voice in "C'est Pour Toi".....she sounds so different and SO much better. When you compare her voice in CPT and "Unison"....she sounds very different and so much better. When you compare her voice in Unison to her voice in LTAL.....she sounds very different and SO much better. IMO....the pattern goes on and on.

 

Does anyone else notice this?

[celinedionfan1]

Yeah, its a very interesting topic. I've noticed too how Celine's voice has always changed through the years, like it's got a total different sound now than it did back in the early days. I feel like this is onlye the case with Celine and not a lot of other singers as you mentioned. I wish she would be more open about talkin about her vocal cords, and her voice, because it's a really interesting thing to discuss.

[smw]

Celine's voice is continually morphing. I was so blown away when I saw the "Celine" premier last March. She sounded like her 1990s prime self. I was just so used to the harsher, more nasal version of her voice -- that we grew accustomed to during A New Day… and Taking Chances eras. I think if she was asked to sing a song and sound just like she did on any one of the Unison albums songs, she could do it with a little prep time. She would sound a little older, of course. But she could "mimic" her own voice during that era.

 

This "mimic" ability has been discussed before. But it's an important one -- and one that will be discussed more and more as we gain more perspective on her entire career. She can "mimic" Adele. She can "mimic" Michael Jackson. She can "mimic" Madonna. Etc, etc.

 

When Celine is sent songs to consider when recording an album, there are other sings (sometimes the songwriter themselves) who are singing the songs. So Celine can copy their way of singing. Of course, then the producer can help her layer in her own touch from there.

 

That's an incredible ability that Celine has. But it also keeps her from holding onto one, distinct sound. She can get lost within all that her voice is capable of. She does have a certain "sound" that people identify with, though. We all know those sounds/cadences. You can hear them in so many of her songs, when she was in her groove.

 

I think Celine can get fed up with being associated as one of the greatest vocalists. You can see that in her recent Today Show interview. I'm sure she's just as sick of lip synching as we all are! But she doesn't want to sing her songs and sound differently -- thus, disappointing her fans. The one thing Whitney never did, no matter how rundown her voice was by the end, was lip-sync.

 

Celine's voice is incredibly interesting. It's the reason we're all here in the first place. So, of course, it should continue to get discussed.

[volleyceline]

Best voice 1996

[justinecoria]

Of course Celine's voice has always changed. But the thing is that, at the beginning it was a rough diamond. Then she learned to sing, and just made the best voice ever out of it. And then, well, she forgot how to sing. That's where we are now. Of course, she's still Celine : her singing bad is not as catastrophic as mine of course, but it's not good anymore. With the way she's singing now, she would just have been anonymous.

 

The real problem is that Celine used to be a musician (of her voice), a perfectionist. She used to feel the song so much, put every emotion in her voice, and accordingly trained/used her voice for that.

Now I'm sure she just doesn't feel herself as a singer anymore. In her head she's more a performer. And her being just Celine is more than often enough to perform and make the public somewhat happy in concerts etc. She'd train her voice, ok, but just not to sound so bad. At one moment, she would train her voice, just to deliver the best out there, she would spend weeks/months to prepare an album.

[karatedude317]

Of course Celine's voice has always changed. But the thing is that, at the beginning it was a rough diamond. Then she learned to sing, and just made the best voice ever out of it. And then, well, she forgot how to sing. That's where we are now. Of course, she's still Celine : her singing bad is not as catastrophic as mine of course, but it's not good anymore. With the way she's singing now, she would just have been anonymous.

 

The real problem is that Celine used to be a musician (of her voice), a perfectionist. She used to feel the song so much, put every emotion in her voice, and accordingly trained/used her voice for that.

Now I'm sure she just doesn't feel herself as a singer anymore. In her head she's more a performer. And her being just Celine is more than often enough to perform and make the public somewhat happy in concerts etc. She'd train her voice, ok, but just not to sound so bad. At one moment, she would train her voice, just to deliver the best out there, she would spend weeks/months to prepare an album.

It's funny because I actually think she sounds better and stronger now than ever before. Listen to her sing "The Prayer" at Central Park, she sounds better singing it there than she did 10 years ago. TPOL sounds amazing live in the shows now. I think she sounds more polished and has a broader range now. Of course if you preferred her sound in the 90's better than now, you'll think she sounds terrible now, it's all a matter of perspective. She doesn't sound nasal or weak at all, her voice isn't raspy or all over the place. When you compare the metamorphosis of her voice compared to others who started when she did in the 90's, I think we can agree that she has outlasted the others, and has changed for the better, as opposed to the worst.

[Bell]

When I think back to 1990, and I listen to Mariah's voice on her album "Emotions"....I think she still sounds exactly the same. Older of course, but it sounds like the same voice. With the exception of the hardcore drugs by Whitney Houston, she sounded the same too.

 

I have to disagree. I think Mariah's voice changed a lot around 1995. As for Whitney, when I first heard some of her early songs, it was a little hard for me to believe this is Whitney. So her voice changed, too. And Celine's voice changed, of course. This is normal when you grow up and get mature and no one can ever avoid it.

Edited July 30, 2012 at 07:42 AM by Bell

[Jeffieboi]

I have to disagree. I think Mariah's voice changed a lot around 1995. As for Whitney, when I first heard some of her early songs, it was a little hard for me to believe this is Whitney. So her voice changed, too. And Celine's voice changed, of course. This is normal when you grow up and get mature and no one can ever avoid it.

 

That's very true. But you gotta admit....Celine's voice has changed much more than Whitney or Mariah's ever did.....not counting the drugs, lol. And I mean that as a good thing. I think Celine's voice is getting better all the time.

Edited August 2, 2012 at 02:18 PM by Jeffieboi