The short version
- When five expert judges scored 22 classical singers live in a concert hall, the higher scores went to voices rated strong in vibrato, resonance and expressiveness.
- The best-scored voices had more energy between 2 and 4 kHz, the band singers call the singer’s formant, while sheer loudness made no difference.
- Faster vibrato counted against men and wider vibrato counted for women, though the study is small and shows links, not causes.
What makes a judge give a classical singer a high score? Researchers at Keio University in Japan set up a mock competition to find out, and published the results in the Journal of Voice on October 28. Twenty-two trained singers, 10 men and 12 women, each sang “Caro mio ben” unaccompanied in a concert hall. Five singer-instructors gave each performance an overall score out of 100 and rated six qualities on a 7-point scale. Microphones close to each singer recorded four acoustic measures from the vowels.
Higher scores went with better ratings for vibrato, resonance and expressiveness. Timbre, diction and intonation showed no clear link. Acoustically, the winning voices had more energy between 2 and 4 kHz, the band the researchers link to the “singer’s formant”. Loudness made no difference. Vibrato split by sex: faster vibrato went with lower scores in men, and wider vibrato with higher scores in women. Earlier studies mostly had judges listen to recordings, so live judging is what’s new here. “It helps translate what experienced listeners hear into a shared, measurable language,” said lead author Haruka Kondo.
The study had 22 singers, five judges and one song, and it shows associations, not causes.
