Lana Del Ray gives first televised live performance of "Video Games" on Jools Holland

Internet music sensation, and now it seems fully fledged pop star what with her EP debuting high on Itunes charts around the world, Lana Del Ray gave her first live television performance yesterday.

Taking to the stage on British music show Jools Hollland, Lana gave an emotive, if slightly fragile performance of the song responsible for the majority of her buzz, Video Games. It was a mesmerising rendition that though contained notes that sounded slightly off- whether this was due to artistic expression or nerves we'll have to wait for future performances to judge- it thankfully demonstrated that Lana Del Ray is  capable of singing live, and that her voice really sounds as beautiful and unique as her recordings suggested it did.

With even veteran performers shying away from simple arrangements that leave no place for a voice to hide, Lana Del Ray took a real and gusty risk opting for such a simple and exposing arrangement at such a crucial performance. It's one that could have caused her train to mainstream success to derail if it had been bad, but that wasn't the case with Lana bringing the requisite goods, and as such it should only add to the growing hype and intrigue around the singer.

Utada Hikaru- Vocal Profile/ Range

Utada Hikaru

Vocal Type: Contralto
Vocal Range: 2 Octaves  3 notes and a semitone E3-Bb5
Whistle Register: No
Vocal Pluses: Soft, and sweet timbre to the entire voice. Her midrange is the strongest part of the voice and it's where it finds a solid, and stable tone and colouring. She is able to fluctuate quickly to and fro between the breathy warm, head voice and the other registers with ease.
Vocal Negatives: Chest notes in the fifth octave can sound forced, and strained. 

Nicola Roberts Bests Other Girls Aloud Member's music with the release of "Cinderella's Eyes"

Girls Aloud member Nicola Roberts released her unashamedly 80's inspired debut album Cinderella's Eye on the 23rd of September. Being the quietest, and youngest, member of the girl group it was always a mystery what direction the singer would take if she decided to release any solo material at all. Honestly, I wasn't holding my breath for music and had assumed that her fashionista ways would taker her down the Victoria Beckham route into that world. But what do I know, and the release of her first single Beat Of My Drum-see end of post- took me totally by surprise with the left field sound she went for. That was the exciting moment that I sat up and took an interest, realising that Nicola Robert's may just be about to deliver something special on her debut album.

Vocal news: Adele cancels shows to recuperate her voice and Christina Aguilera FINALLY decides to take vocal lessons, a decade into her career.

Vocal news from two of our Divas today: one piece great, and one  piece bad, but both resulting in our singers going back to vocal school to brush up on their technique.

Firstly we look to Christina Aguilera for the good, no GREAT news that FINALLY, allegedly mind, she has enlisted a vocal coach- Seth Riggs -to tame that unwiedly bastion that is her voice! I can only drool at the thought of what some proper training and instruction will do for her. It may just make that "voice of a generation" title her fans so proudly throw about finally ring with some truth, because as she is, with technique that bad, it is both undeserving and a sad indictment on my generation of singers for her to be called that yet.

Lisa Gerrard-Vocal Range/ Profile

Lisa Gerrard

Vocal Type: Dramatic Contralto
Vocal Range: 2 Octaves 1 note E3-F5
Whistle Register: No
Vocal Pluses: Incredibly versatile voice that has many colours and timbres throughout the range. Her lower chest voice is heavy,rich and dramatic with a dark colouring and operatic timbre. This contrasts greatly to the higher part, that is bright, thin and piercing with a greater affinity for melisma.

The lower part of her head voice sounds warm and rounded and can either have an operatic mezzo-esque quality to it or a breathier lighter sound depending on the desired effect. The top part of the head voice shares the piercing and shrill qualities of the upper chest voice.

Vocal Negatives: The harsher, more penetrating, parts of her voice are not as easy to listen to as the more rounded and fuller parts.

Recommended listening: Now We Are Free, The Valley of the Moon, Come Tenderness, Sacrifice, Elysium

Listen to Mariah Carey's ENTIRE 5 octave range, Note by note. Haters doubt it no more!

Now there is no other way to sum up this video other than EPIC! I have wondered, since practically forever, why no one has ever created a video displaying all of Mariah Carey's 5 octave range, note by note. So intrigued was I, that I even contemplating doing it myself, but was just too darn lazy. It seems such a mammoth task was no bother for heroic Youtuber MCLAMB4LIFE1, who created just such a video.

Maria Callas- Vocal Range/Profile

Maria Callas

Vocal Type: Soprano
Vocal Range: 3 Octaves  F3-E6 (though the E6's vibrato touches an F6, so will count as 3 octaves)
Whistle Register: No
Vocal Pluses:Callas's voice was noted for its three distinct registers: Her low or chest register was extremely dark and almost baritonal in power, and she used this part of her voice for dramatic effect, often going into this register much higher on the scale than most sopranos. Her middle register had a peculiar and highly personal sound—"part oboe, part clarinet", as Claudia Cassidy described it—and was noted for its veiled or "bottled" sound, as if she were singing into a jug. Legge adds, "Even in the most difficult fioriture there were no musical or technical difficulties in this part of the voice which she could not execute with astonishing, unostentatious ease. Her chromatic runs, particularly downwards, were beautifully smooth and staccatos almost unfailingly accurate, even in the trickiest intervals. There is hardly a bar in the whole range of nineteenth century music for high soprano that seriously tested her powers."

Vocal Negatives: Rodolfo Celletti states, "In certain areas of her range her voice also possessed a guttural quality. This would occur in the most delicate and troublesome areas of a soprano's voice—for instance where the lower and middle registers merge, between G and A. I would go so far as to say that here her voice had such resonances as to make one think at times of a ventriloquist. . .or else the voice could sound as though it were resonating in a rubber tube. There was another troublesome spot. . . between the middle and upper registers. Here, too, around the treble F and G, there was often something in the sound itself which was not quite right, as though the voice were not functioning properly."

Note:I am in no position to be a judging a voice like this- you need college degrees and schooling to do that- so I pinched the positives and negatives from Wikipdiea. I am forever in your debt! Read the article here, its fascinating stuff.