Friday, June 17, 2011

Advice for Writers: Finding Your Tessitura

Author Kit Whitfield has a post up on the concept of tessitura as applied to writing.
For those of you who aren't familiar with the term, tessitura, when applied to a singer, means the range where the voice feels most comfortable and sounds the best. Above and below the tessitura are notes the singer can reach, but they're more of a stretch, more inclined to rumble or squeak, less suited to show the singer's voice to its best advantage. It only struck me when reading this bad prose, but it's actually an incredibly useful term to consider in the context of writing.
I mention this because it seems vastly more helpful than the advice commonly offered to writing students: "Find your voice." So if you're interested in writing, give it a read.

3 comments:

  1. I found my voice once, but then I went to a concert and I lost it.

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  2. I found my voice, too. It was under the couch.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Really, mine was in the back of my throat...

    But in all seriousness, this did get me thinking about my own views on writing... think I might write about it actually.

    ReplyDelete

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