Best Shallow Live Vocal Performance

[derpmonster 22,412]

IMO, the Shallow performance for Enigma at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, NY was her best live vocal performance (of the song) to date. And this one's in high quality.

Hopefully this will satisfy people who think she doesn't sing this song well enough.

 

Some notes:

The highest note in the song is a D5. The first one she sings is, "I'll never meet the ground" and it's very clean! It's beautiful. The second one is "we're far from the shallow now". That one's a little bit distorted (slightly strained) but she still sings it. Her voice does NOT break on any of the D5s in the song like it did at the Grammys and Oscars.  Her larynx seems to rise a bit for "shallow" which is the distorted one. It's really hard to sing "shallow" on a high note because your mouth needs to be almost closed to make the "sh" sound which is unvoiced and then suddenly you change to a very open "all" right on pitch.

Her "watch as I dive in" is still slightly sharp but I think at this point that's just her style. She also sings with much more closed vowels than she does in the movie which is another reason for the differences. Instead of singing "surface" with an open "aaayyy", she almost sings it as "surfis" or "surfess" which is closer to how Americans pronounce the word colloquially. Closed vowels are harder to sing especially on high notes. Not sure why she does it. Anyway, it worked this time. As @Didymus, she's likely doing it to cut short the phrase because she's running out of breath. This is not just a relic of this piece, we have to remember she did a 90 min show before this performance and always does at Enigma. That's likely to wear one out and make one run out of breath. Putting it at the end of Enigma works thematically but vocally, it's a choice...

In the bridge, her pitch was slightly off but she had good control and sustained it for almost the same amount of time as in the soundtrack! She even did the straight tone sustain and then added vibrato at the end.

At no point does her voice break or fail to phonate which is one of the best things about this performance. It's great overall despite its little flaws. And the flaws only make it more real. Like if y'all want a vocally perfect Gaga performance, go watch her Sound of Music tribute.

Spoiler

That tribute has one flat note too. Guess what, she's a human .

Point is let's not obsess over minor pitch differences. What matters more is healthy singing and not breaking which is something she does in this performance despite all the screaming she does during Enigma. There is no reason she should be unable to sing a D5 (at the Joanne World Tour, she sang a G5) but with some rest, hydration, and practice, she'll be fine. And she's a professional who knows what she's doing. I'm confident she'll get much better again. And she's capable, we know that already. Let's give the "deterioration" comments a rest. It's not a permanent thing. It's about technique and conditions.

Thoughts?

[derpmonster 22,412]

@skedaddleBItCh @KatieJudasGaga4 @Didymus 

[KatieJudasGaga4 67,907]

I love this performance, however I do find this performance better vocally:

 

[ThatAsianGuy 2,365]

But she will never again perform that good. Its the sad truth.

[Didymus 32,745]

4 minutes ago, derpmonster said:

Let's give the "deterioration" comments a rest. It's not a permanent thing. It's about technique and conditions.

It is a much better performance indeed.

It's a tough situation for her. If she wants to sing this song in its original tempo and key she is almost doomed to run out of breath and ruin her vocals unless she shortens her sentences, which also sounds kinda bad and ruins her emotional delivery ("crash through the surfess-" etc. rather than "crash through the surfaaayce" and straight into the next line). It makes her sound like she's just going through the motions and hitting the notes without really understanding what she's singing. So even if she does well it's like she's still not doing good

It's just sad because they probably figured out it was a tough ass song to sing in the version they went for in the studio already and still went through with it despite it being so hard to reproduce live. I think we'll only really get a truly magnificent performance of this song when she just performs it alone on her piano or guitar and just takes all the time she needs. Now she's just shouting the notes out, hoping to please the audience, and it just doesn't sound right (imo).

[HitTheBoat 4,077]

That was a great analysis and performance! and I agree, that first "meet" was beautiful

[derpmonster 22,412]

Just now, ThatAsianGuy said:

But she will never again perform that good. Its the sad truth.

not you

You just have an agenda and narrative against her. Don't feed trolls @everyone else

4 minutes ago, KatieJudasGaga4 said:

I love this performance, however I do find this performance better vocally:

 

I love this one too. In fact, the bridge was amazing. Her voice did break on one note during the last chorus though. Otherwise it was amazing.

[S0436 10,215]

One of my favorite Shallow performances is at the Oscars.

[ThatAsianGuy 2,365]

2 minutes ago, derpmonster said:

not you

You just have an agenda and narrative against her. Don't feed trolls @everyone else

I love this one too. In fact, the bridge was amazing. Her voice did break on one note during the last chorus though. Otherwise it was amazing.

Im not against her. Im just saying what's happening. plays TruthHurts.Mp3

[derpmonster 22,412]

Just now, ThatAsianGuy said:

Im not against her. Im just saying what's happening. plays TruthHurts.Mp3

It's not the truth. It's a half baked conjecture. Do you have any qualifications in singing again? What makes you so sure about your theory of her vocal "decline"? I am actually a student and not to brag I know how voices work fairly well. Her level of "deterioration" is something I have if I don't drink water enough for a week. And it's entirely reversible.

[Didymus 32,745]

6 minutes ago, ThatAsianGuy said:

But she will never again perform that good. Its the sad truth.

[ThatAsianGuy 2,365]

1 minute ago, derpmonster said:

It's not the truth. It's a half baked conjecture. Do you have any qualifications in singing again? What makes you so sure about your theory of her vocal "decline"? I am actually a student and not to brag I know how voices work fairly well. Her level of "deterioration" is something I have if I don't drink water enough for a week. And it's entirely reversible.

Or if you intoxicate yourself with alcohol and smokes too much.

[derpmonster 22,412]

Just now, ThatAsianGuy said:

Or if you intoxicate yourself with alcohol and smokes too much.

Again, any qualifications or are you making guesses?

[Noir 12,681]

Grammys for me, sorrynotsorry

[Didymus 32,745]

Just now, ThatAsianGuy said:

Or if you intoxicate yourself with alcohol and smokes too much.

 But the performance in the OP wasn't even that long ago You think she ruined her vocal talent forever in just a few months?