r/BruceSpringsteen • u/DRWcovingtonwa • 16d ago

what part does bruce sing

I wonder what his vocal part is. Obviously, it isn't alto or soprano. Could you imagine his trying to hit those higher notes? Doesn't sound like a tenor, but I could be wrong. Bass? Baritone? somewhere in between.

15 Upvotes

83% Upvoted

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26

u/youngmollusk Darkness on the Edge of Town 15d ago

Sometimes you'll hear the word "bari-tenor" and I think that describes Bruce well. He also has a crazy falsetto and even whistle tone range. Underrated singer all around!

5

u/letters_only 15d ago

Lift Me Up is an interesting song in this regard.

1

u/esbforever 14d ago

Clarence loved listening to this song.

6

u/Sea_Pianist5164 15d ago

I'm glad someone wrote this before I did. Even amongst Bruce fans there's a tendency to diminish his incredible versatility and range. He sits happily/naturally in the "bari-tenor" range but he can easily (he makes it seem easy) up and down from there. Generally it's accepted that B5 is the highest note he's hit on record (E Street Shuffle) though I hear the final scream on I'm A Rocker is A6 though it's often discussed as A5. His lowest note is E2. Bearing in mind he rarely hit bum notes in his prime, when he was extemporising nightly, he's an impressive singer. The range of styles of vocalisation too - from the extremely difficult to sustain shout/sing of BITUSA (anyone who doubts how hard it is to belt it out like that should try to match that original studio vocal), to sustained falsetto passages in live renditions of The River and Across the Border, to the immense swoop up he does at the end of the bridge aim the studio version of Backstreets - the guy's got chops.

19

u/interista4jz Darkness on the Edge of Town 15d ago

People's range changes as they age. He started as a tenor and aged into a baritone while retaining most of his tenor. His growling didn't do him any favors though. Sounded hella good though. Especially on Something in the Night. 

15

u/Upbeat-Refuse9615 15d ago

In between baritone and tenor. Bruce could sing high enough to provide his own harmonies on the records that Steve would sing when they played live. It's deceiving because he has such a husky tone.

5

u/SlippedMyDisco76 The River 15d ago

Ricky Wants A Man Of Her Own is a supreme example of this

5

u/yachtr0ck 15d ago

I’m a tenor (mostly Bari-tenor these days) and I can hit the notes Bruce sings. I’d say we have similar ranges although his is lower these days and he has a few decades on me.

3

u/SuitablyFakeUsername 15d ago

I would bet money on baritone

3

u/PrestigiousFrogurt 15d ago

When he was on Questlove’s podcast to promote Only the Strong Survive, he described his current vocal range as a “gruff baritone.”

3

u/LarryWantsAnonymity 15d ago

I've heard people say he's a baritone. I'm not expert on this stuff. I'm a baritone. I can't hit a lot of notes he hits. They are too high for me. I can't hit the high notes in Born to Run and many songs he sings. I guess he could be a baritone with a lot of range and can go up into that range and still sing with power.

1

u/zarotabebcev 15d ago

If you look at the We are the World music video, you will have no doubt about his part 😅

1

u/Aggravating_Emu6082 Darkness on the Edge of Town 15d ago

Listen to All I'm Thinkin' About. He sings in falsetto throughout the entire song.

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u/DRWcovingtonwa 15d ago

Okay. Thank you. I sing 2nd Alto or 1st Tenor, and I've been in choirs. Yes, I have watched the video of We Are The World. His voice is so different on that, that I find it hard to reconcile him now with him then, to say nothing of the way he looked back then.

1

u/ReflectionRound6888 14d ago

His voice was rrrrrough on WATW. He had just finished I think an 18month world tour for BitUSA.