The Highest Voice in All of Equestria? · 10:27pm Nov 1st, 2014
Readers be warned: this blog will contain (very minor) spoilers to Nothing to Fear: A Nightmare Night Story.
Are we good? Good. Now then, Fluttershy struggles quite a bit with her high notes in that story, but that got me thinking: who really has the highest voice? Is Rarity the highest voice in canon, or does Fluttershy beat her out? Sounds like an interesting question to investigate. I'm a university student doing a science major, so that means GO GO GO RESEARCH PROJECT!
And just for fun, let's format it like a real scientific paper!
A little disclaimer here: this "paper" was written informally and partially for comedic effect. It's not really scientific at all. Whatever you do, don't use this paper as a model for your own scientific writings. Besides the general structure, this thing is wrong in almost every way possible.
And another one: I might be reaching beyond my ken here. Though I'm familiar with music, I'm by no means an expert. These are the conclusions I've made based on my own knowledge and research. If I get my facts wrong, please correct me.
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THE HIGHEST VOCAL NOTE SUNG BY A PRINCIPAL CHARACTER IN THE FIRST FOUR SEASONS OF MY LITTLE PONY: FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC
Introduction
If you're not a musician, here's a little terminology to get you familiarized. You know middle C? The first note you've probably ever hit on a keyboard or piano?
Figure 1: A middle C.
Well, that's what I'll call C4. Eight white keys up, or one octavia-I-mean-octave up, and that's what I'll call C5. Same concept for going in the other direction: One octave down, C3. The general progression goes like this:
C4, D4, E4, F4, G4, A4, B4, C5, D5, E5 . . .
Oh, and if I use this (#) thing, it's not a hashtag; that's a sharp sign. If I say a note is C#4, it's halfway between C4 and D4. In my eyes, a decent male tenor (highest male vocal designation) can comfortably sing a G4; a decent female soprano (highest female vocal designation) can comfortably sing a G5 *. I think that's all you need to know for now.
Methods
Ignoring the Equestria Girls series (because I haven't watched Rainbow Rocks yet), I took all the songs I thought had high notes in the four seasons of MLP songs. For each one, I fed them into my audio editing program with spectrogram display. Filtering out all the errant frequencies from instruments and percussion, I analyzed each song for the highest frequency vocal note in the song.
Figure 2: A bit of spectrogram with blue lines highlighting the notes. See the D#5?
For the purposes of this project, the note had to be both controlled and sustained for some period of time (like a quarter to half second) **.
Results
Not every song is present in this section, but only the ones I think are the highlights.
Table 1: List of the highest frequency notes found in the first four seasons of MLP. General format: Note Character: Episode—Song—Line, where the highest note in the line is bolded.
C#5 Applejack: Magical Mystery Cure—What My Cutie Mark is Telling Me—My destiny is not pretty, but it's what my cutie mark is telling me
C#5 Scootaloo: The Show Stoppers—Cutie Mark Crusaders—We are the cutie mark crusaders, on the quest to find out who we are
D#5 Rainbow Dash: May the Best Pet Win—Find a Pet Song—the number one greatest perfectest pet in the world for me
E5 Rarity: Rarity Takes Manehattan—Generosity—Generosity, I'm here to show all that I can do; generosity, you are the key
E5 Twilight: Magical Mystery Cure—Life in Equestria (last song)—Everything, yes everything, yes everything is certainly fine, it's fine
F#5 Cadance: A Canterlot Wedding—This Day Aria—Oh the wedding we won't make he'll end up marrying a fake, Shining Armor will be
G#5 Sweetie Belle: Sleepless in Ponyville—99 Buckets of Oats—ninety-nine buckets of oats on the wall, ninety-nine buckets of oats, take one down, pass it around
A5 Fluttershy: Filli Vanilli—Music in the Treetops (first song)—Ah a-ah, ah a-ah, ah a-ah; ah, ah, Ah! that note she does at the very end
Discussion
Yeah, um. Fluttershy has actually sung the highest note in the entire series thus far. Even beating out Rarity, whom I touted as a soprano in my fic. Even beating out Sweetie Belle! SqueakySweetie Belle, who sang 99 Buckets of Oats at the top of her lungs! That's unexpected. In actuality, I think Fluttershy is just as much a soprano as Rarity is! Let me present a few of my further findings that bring me to this conclusion.
Let's go back to the A5. It's a high note for a soprano, but a very difficult one for an alto to sing, unless they've had extensive training. Fluttershy sings that note too well for her to be an alto. Could Rarity sing that note too? Likely yes. Even though she's never done that in canon, Rarity is a canon-confirmed soprano. She's part of the Ponytones, and she was the highest voice in it (until Fluttershy came along).
Fluttershy also has a distinctly soprano-like timbre. Timbre is the distinctive character of a sound that makes it unique to that instrument. A trumpet and voice can both hit a C4, but they sound very different. In the same vein, an alto and soprano can both hit a C5, but they will still sound very different. If Fluttershy and Applejack hit the same exact note, for example, Applejack's note would just sound more full-bodied and strong. Fluttershy's would sound headier, lighter, and brighter. All those features she shares with Rarity, and they are characteristic of a soprano.
Conclusion
So, did I miswrite Fluttershy in my fic? Maybe I did. Fluttershy's vocal range stretches a lot higher than I gave her credit for, though I still think Rarity gives her some fair competition. In any case, Fluttershy and Rarity are likely both sopranos. I think the real conclusion to be made is that though Fluttershy might be the Highest Voice in All of Equestria, she certainly has the Widest Range in All of Equestria. She's sung an A5, and:
B1 Fluttershy: Bridle Gossip—Evil Enchantress—She's an evil enchantress and she does evil dances
Yes, that is a B1. Over two octaves down from middle C. Fluttershy has displayed a (poison joke-enhanced) range of almost four octaves. Case closed.
Footnotes
* I use the definition of soprano as just a reasonably high female part, and not the formal one. Formally, a soprano should be able to reach a C6. The definition of soprano I use here is more in-line with a classical mezzo-soprano.
** The stipulations of "controlled" and "sustained" are in place for a reason. If I remove those restrictions and reword the title from "highest note sung by a principal character" to "highest coherent sound made by a principal character," this contest would have ended quite differently. Indeed, as you would expect, Sweetie Belle's squeaks would have taken the title; I've measured them going up to D#7.
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Wow, that was fun. If only all scientific papers could be this entertaining! So, how'd I do? Do you disagree with my breakdown? If there's a note I missed, feel free to point it out to me, and I'll see if it's remarkable enough to append to this "paper."
Fluttershy is also SEXIEST voice in Equestria. You, uh, you forgot to mention that.
Otherwise, good paper!
2568591 Oh, I did? Let me correct that:
There! And I even fixed your typo for you! Seems a little strange you would miss that many letters in Rarity's name, but that is what you meant, right?
Admittedly though, I think they tie for that title.
derpicdn.net/img/view/2014/2/15/552917__safe_fluttershy_rarity_animated_clothes_screencap_nuzzle_spoiler-colon-s04e14_filli+vanilli_nuzzling.gif
2569735
I'd be mad at you, but I'm enjoying the nuzzling gif, so you get to live ... for now.
2569740 Oh yeah? What are you going to kill me with? Cute Fluttershy pics? Yeah right, that's . . . actually a very effective method. Oh dear.
Next paper: The effect of prolonged Fluttershy exposure on risk for sudden myocardial infarction
2569806
I've already been doing my own study into that.