{"id":4684,"date":"2021-07-15T16:02:06","date_gmt":"2021-07-15T10:32:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ticketfairy.com\/word\/?p=4684"},"modified":"2021-08-18T19:10:17","modified_gmt":"2021-08-18T13:40:17","slug":"overtone-singing-nomadic-origins-and-culture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ticketfairy.com\/word\/2021\/07\/15\/overtone-singing-nomadic-origins-and-culture\/","title":{"rendered":"Overtone Singing – Nomadic Origins and Culture"},"content":{"rendered":"

Overtone singing is an innovative enhancement of tonality and resonance in your vocals that a singer can create in their throat, to add what are called <\/span>overtones. <\/span><\/i>These <\/span>overtones<\/span><\/i> are harmonic, and when I say <\/span>these<\/span><\/i> or <\/span>harmonic, <\/span><\/i>I do mean multiple tones at the same time from one person\u2019s throat! Never heard of this before? Well, time to check it out! This vocal technique\u2019s origin is ancient, with this style and its variations seen across almost all continents in the world. In this piece, we talk about Overtone singing, and where we\u2019ve seen it across the globe.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tracing Overtone Singing
\n<\/b>Overtone singing is said to have been developed in southwestern Mongolia, today\u2019s Khovd Province and Govi Altai regions in the country. <\/span>Britannica\u2019s dictionary<\/span><\/a> accounts for its origins being from <\/span>Turko-Mongol tribes of the <\/span>Altai<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>Sayan<\/span><\/a> mountains of southern <\/span>Siberia<\/span><\/a> and western Mongolia. The country of<\/span> Mongolia is, still today, one of the most common places where overtone singing is practiced in the world. There are several styles under each of these practices too, and they aren\u2019t limited to Mongolia. This most common singing style is Tuvan throat singing, Kh\u00f6\u00f6mii or Khoomei (Mongolian Cyrillic: <\/span>??????) and is further divided into many sub-categories. It is most commonly performed and practiced in the regions of Tuva, Mongolia and Siberia. This form of throat singing has been included in the <\/span>Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity<\/span><\/a> of UNESCO in 2009. Sygyt, Kargyraa and their variations are also some more popular forms of throat singing. <\/span>According to a more western interpretation of the musicality<\/span><\/a>, these melodies in throat singing were created using 6th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 12th, 13th and sometimes 16th harmonics, forming what we call a pentatonic scale, so the 7th and 11th harmonics are carefully skipped.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is important to note that these mostly nomadic people practicing the art were influenced by their location and regions majorly. Long pastures and open fields would carry sound through quite a distance, sometimes treading over mountains and stretches of land led them to travel more. Since many Tuvans and Mongols were believers in animism, they would pay close attention to every detail, sound, and even their words, as they felt it all held spiritual power. Mimicking animal and bird sounds from nature could probably be seen as one of the factors laying the foundation to throat singing. If we were all birds, we\u2019d probably think the Mongolian throat singers were like the <\/span>Australian Lyre bird<\/span><\/a>! Since there\u2019s much to cover, more details on the different styles of Tuvan throat singing here. I wasn\u2019t able to find a traditional video that covers all styles since they are practiced by different peoples of various regions in and around Mongolia, Tuva, and parts of Russia. This should suffice to explain the types for now.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n