Microphones in Middle-earth...the BBC Lord of the Rings

[Mithalwen]

Originally Posted by Mnemosyne

Oh, good... I thought it was my youth and/or Americanism that made that so off-putting for me. The notion of a singing eagle is already difficult to dramatize without it sounding silly, but the notion of his being a counter-tenor (and I'm imagining the bells attached to his talons, too) just kills my secondary belief with one hit.

I love the countertenor voice and David James is one of the best but this isn't my favourite piece of music - the other counter tenor tracks were a revelation and turned me into a bit of a "falsetto fancier" . I think singing eagles were always going to be difficult but there is an operatic convention of using the voice for supernatural and otherworldly characters (eg Oberon and Voice of the mask in Britten's Midsummer Night's Dream and Death in Venice) or the alienated Refugee in Jonathan Dove's "Flight" .

More interesting I think is his use of a countertenor for Galadriel's song. I wonder if it were for practical reasons or for the purer timbre. The range may be the same as a mezzo but even going easy on the vibrato the tone isn't.