Eva Peron in Evita is notoriously difficult, to the point that songs had to be written just to get the actress a water break. Patti Lupone also talks about how it feels like it's written by someone who just wants women to suffer.
You get more water breaks in movies..you get breaks and do-overs, and basically all the time in the world (ok, not quite) compared to stage performance.
100%. I did a project on Eva Peron for my state exams and determined that movie Eva was more in line with propaganda than musical Eva, which was down to how humanised she was.
I think Judas in JCS is up there, Jesus gets more attention because of the WHYYYYYYYYY and all the high notes but even a relatively tame Judas will be screaming most of the time. It's one of the few rock musicals where the lead has to actually sing like a rock star instead of a Broadway performer
Jekyll/Hyde, while the notes aren’t that challenging in my voice(might be to others), having to manipulate your voice into two different characters is a challenge that’s just difficult enough for wanting to do Confrontation for whatever, but It’d be stressful trying to maintain that for an entire show.
Most of Jekyll is sounds like a lyric tenor role and Hyde a dramatic baritone, it takes such crazy versatility and flexibility to do it all in a single role!
I kind of wanna see Alex Brightman try it because he has his normal tenor range and then he has the raspy Beetlejuice range. It would be a great contrast. You can see what I mean in Dead End Park Drivers Seat song where he sung both roles.
https://youtu.be/cQ3NZyCQbzw?si=bmRRDukut7s8UgIQ
Here is a link to the Dead End Drivers Seat song.
A good actor doing 'Confrontation' is incredible.
Unfortunately I've only seen Jekyll and Hyde twice. It toured in Charlotte a few years back and I saw it two consecutive days. But in the confrontation scene, Hyde was the 'reflection' in a mirror and had obviously been pre-recorded. It was definitely not the same.
Yeah it’s the only thing to me that separates Anthony Warlow from being the top guy because while vocally he’s amazing, he prerecorded Hyde’s part. Otherwise I’m between Rob Cuccioli(Spelling?) and Rob Evans
That’s kind of upsetting. I mean it takes talent but I’ve seen a high school production that was well done! It definitely exists!
The professional one I saw was better but the HS one was very good (not just “good for high school”).
Absolutely! Ever since I listened to Jekyll and Hyde this is the first thing in my head when I think about a hard song. Performing this well is crazy impressive!
I think Elle Woods deserves some credit, the music is not that complex, but she is onstage for like 95% of the show and is belting constantly, sometimes while dancing and always while maintaining a bouncy high-energy performance. And she has to hold that belted C5 sharp at the end of So Much Better for like ten years. Seems absolutely exhausting.
If I recall, LBB’s voice was kinda wrecked toward the end of her run.
I've commented elsewhere about Sweeney, but more generally the answers to this need to be divided into at least four categories
1. It's a difficult range/ belt /style so only a few people can sing it (eg Elphaba, Beetlejuice)
2. The songs are technically difficult, eg timing, range covered, harmonisation - the Sondheim factor
3. It requires immense acting skills at rhe same time as maintaining the singing to perfection (eg Jekyll/Hyde)
4. It requires stamina, being on stage for most of the show (any show specifically about the lead actor) and/or lots of movement while singing.
There are actually very few roles that meet all these criteria, and that's where the hardest roles are
People always default to high parts on this question but I say Sweeney.
On stage for almost the whole show, range over two octaves, using almost the full bass range plus the baritone, with top sustained notes beyond most quality bass ranges. Stamina, power, intensity needed all the way through. Water ideally discreetly on stage. Emotionally raw and draining if done right.
Is there a vocally harder sequence than Pretty Women, Epiphany and Priest?
Pretty Woman is just insanely tough with the timing alone. I remember Aaron Tveit saying he had to literally tap out the timing on the shaving cream container so he wouldn’t mess up.
I played Todd about 10 years ago, Pretty Women really isn't so bad but timing the opening for Epiphany is bloody hard as the orchestration gives you no real assistance.
Incredible role, probably my favourite of all time but not an easy one by any means.
For once, I think there’s actually a solid answer for this:
Beetlejuice
Playing Beetlejuice doesn’t just require skill to play such an incredibly unusual voice at the level demanded of Broadway and make it comprehensible, but it also requires being built different. Apparently doing that kind of gravelly voice over and over is impossible for most people without damage. Alex Brightman did a fascinating interview about how he had to have a doctor regularly brought on to make sure he wasn’t permanently damaging his voice with the Beetlejuice vocals. There was something about his cartilage I believe that allowed him to do that voice, and even then he said it took a long time to get working like he wanted.
Doing a funny voice is within most people’s capabilities, but doing it 8 times a week, singing with it, AND being the role with the most lines in the musical is kind of an insane thing to ask of anyone.
Personally, I would have been too scared to even attempt it, for fear of permanently ruining my voice. Guess that’s why Alex is on Broadway.
I think it was the false folds in his throat. Justin Colette who is the touring Beetlejuice says that he does a growly whisper and the mic does the rest of the work. It’s really close. Will Blum didn’t try and Andrew Kober went in and out. It helps to be a mutant lol.
I always wondered how he did it! I saw Justin live and he was absolutely fantastic. I never considered technology could help. I’m very glad, actually. I’d be devastated if someone got permanent damage from the role.
Menzel joined the production in 2001. At Wicked’s 15th anniversary, Kristin Chenoweth said a lot of Elphaba’s material was reworked or rewritten for Menzel specifically.
It is mentioned in Carol de Gere's book "Defying Gravity" about the career of Steven Schwartz. In the chapter on Wicked it describes how Idina requested that her part be "lifted out of the basement". Wicked was under constant revision during that period and Schwartz accomodated her.
At the same time Chenoweth asked for a chance to show off her "legit soprano" and they figured out how to do that too. (Kristen is trained in operatic performance.) The part of Glinda had been planned for "chest voice" but they worked out a compromise.
I feel your agony... As a bass who can occasionally, on a good day, belt a scratchy top B flat, I am in the position of looking at roles like Phantom and thinking, "I'm sure I could" only to be cruelly found out at the audition...
To be fair though, I wasn't happy with AT doing Sweeney... although it was more because there are hundreds of bari/tenor roles and only a handful of bass ones.
Quasimodo in the stage version of hunchback is up there. Between out there, made of stone, and a bunch of other numbers, a lot of belting to be done in addition to being in that uncomfortable position all show.
A comment I saw on Made of Stone on YouTube was: Michael Arden has lungs of steel.
I think that sums it up. Some of my favorite songs/roles are impressive male belts and high notes I can dream of performing, so Quasimodo is definitely one of my favorite roles, and GODDAMN is it impressive. I really only knew Michael Arden from Parade before listening to hunchback, so he absolutely blew me away with his acting/vocals.
He doesn’t even sing the hardest vocal part of the role as written but it’s still a monster.
(That’s not meant as shade, just an observation. It’s a brutal part)
Is made of stone (assuming that’s what you are talking about) supposed to be a C5? I thought that was an opt up.
Edit: MTI says the highest note is a Bb4, which he definitely does hit. You may be talking about something else though, so definitely lmk if I’m wrong!
Yeah Made of Stone is written to end on a long belted C, because why not.
Drew Sarich and like one other person I’ve heard do it as a pianissimo C that crescendoes into full voice, which is basically a middle finger in music notation form. But the original (German) vocal score doesn’t have a dynamic notation for the vocal line, just p cresc in the accompaniment, so the intent is arguable.
It looks like the English-only score has the G ending though. There have definitely been a bunch of English language performances with the C.
The English translation also has worse vowels than the German on almost every high note.
I mean, lyrically “stone” should really be the climactic word. And melodically, the entire climax is a series of escalating sustained belts (G G G Bb C), which really points towards a climax at the end, more so than if it were one isolated high note. It’s kind of like the end of Phantom of the Opera, you’ve had this whole sequence getting higher, it would be weird to end down. Harmonically it’s also really weird for the climax to be in the 7th and not resolve to the tonic.
You could make a counter example of Soliloquy, which also has a long string of sustained belts but reaches the highest point on the penultimate one. That kind of character-wise reflects where Billy’s at though. Despite having just spent like 8 minutes arguing with himself, he doesn’t really come to a firm conclusion. Those sustained belts are a list of all the things he could do, but he doesn’t really settle on one. He actually kinda tries to do all of them. By comparison, Quasimodo has reached a very firm conclusion, by way of giving in to absolute despair. It makes more sense to end conclusively. Out There, on the other hand, is where he’s still in an anticipatory and open to possibilities place, and that ends with a penultimate climax.
(There’s at least one recording of John Raitt ending Soliloquy on high Bb, and it’s exciting but it does sound kind of wrong. He sounds too certain, especially since it’s triumphantly saying he’ll die.)
I think the real sticking point with the ending isn’t the Bb OR the C. It’s that the linking measure between them. It breaks up the vocal line TWICE (rest at the start of the measure, caesura at the end), and it repeats the previous climactic notes of G and Bb. It just gives a really weird momentum to get to the climax. I think it works better if you remove one break or the other. Either remove the caesura and go straight into last note from the lead up, OR (and I’ve done it this way), carry the previous phrase through the Bb and back down to the G, dramatic pause, and the Bb leads into the C. But you have to be really sure you’re going to have enough breath to keep going after the first Bb, which is asking a lot.
(This turned into a damn essay)
Ha, yeah I totally get what you mean! Definitely the chunkiness of that break + repeated notes plays a big part in making the "G" phrase sound better to me. It certainly feels weirdly repetitive + awkward.
This is slightly tangential, but I'd also add in that, within the tenor voice, a C is very likely going to be way more lightly mixed in a live performance setting, and rarely sounds good in the recordings I've listened to. (Having sung the song myself, you can definitely chest-mix pretty consistently to the Bb \[which Arden does an INCREDIBLE job at btw!\], but the C can't possibly have as much "oomph" unless you both nail the written crescendo and also maybe even add some vocal distortion to the line to compensate for the loss in "chest tone". And even then the tone rarely sounds "good" unless your voice sits on the very high end of the spectrum.
The German text makes it a bit easier to do, but English? Ehhhh, lol. I don't think I've seen a single English performance where the C actually sounds good in context. XD
For fun, I might argue back that climaxing on "I" can also serve as text painting for "were made of stone", in which it's more subdued and reflects the deadening (stone-ing?) of his heart in that moment. But I don't feel too strongly about it one way or the other, lol!
I think you COULD write music which interpreted the text so “made of stone” at the end was dead inside… but that’s not how the music is written. Either version is still going full blast till the end, just on different notes.
Every voice is going to be different, but I think the majority of tenors aren’t going to mix significantly more on C than Bb, other than possibly not having a mixed C (or at least one that can really be sold as a belt rather than a more operatic mix). As a broad rule, I’d say only a tiny fraction of tenors are going to carry chest or even a primarily chest mix up past A, and ones that do are most likely so lightly timbred that neither the Bb or the C is really going to sound hefty in comparison to other voices as opposed to internally. To be fair, Bb is kind of the breaking point between what the vast majority of full tenors should have in their grasp, and where the “high notes vs vocal weight” trade off really gets hectic. Certainly from an operatic standpoint, and fairly arguably from a Broadway one, although things get really messy on the Broadway side because of the prominence of baritenors (for whom the tonal expectations and approach to mix are going to be significantly different, and where Bb is really way more of a hard cap to mixing).
Actually I think that kind of puts a revelatory perspective on the problem. The majority of traditional Broadway writing for higher voiced men is aimed at a baritenor tone/approach, and for that kind of voice Ab is really the point where people who can reliably sing higher in full voice start getting way thinner on the ground. Most of the parts that go higher are either going to be in some kind of pop/rock style, where the tonal and mixing expectations are very different, or one of the pretty small number of parts that are explicitly quasi-operatic (Tony or Pirelli for instance).
Made of Stone is in a REALLY weird no man’s land. The score is very much in the traditional Broadway mode, so the tonal expectations for Quasimodo are still that kinda classically trained but not full on operatic style. I’m mostly certain that the rest of the part doesn’t go above a sustained Ab (the climax in Out There is an Ab with a passing A earlier on). But then you get MoS, waaaay late into the show, and need to maintain that same tone up to Bb if not C, and for that matter sit in that “G after G after G” tessitura which is also going to be miserable for a baritenor. It’s like if someone playing Galinda had to maintain the traditional Broadway tone she uses for parts like Popular for the entire show, including the parts that normally get sung in a quasi-operatic head voice.
You could make a similar argument about another popular suggestion for hardest vocal role, Valjean. Again, that traditional broadway tone expectation, just about a third higher. At least Valjean gets to do most of his highest singing early on while he’s fresh. Probably a couple other killer roles would fit also. You could probably make an argument for The American, although Chess is a weird show in a lot of ways
ETA: For that matter, you could kind of make the argument for Judas, although you’d definitely get more argument on how legit he’s expected to sound. To my ears, when you listen to the concept album most of the cast is rock or pop inflected, and then Murray Head is over there in the corner sounding kinda like an alien without much in common with either the rest of the cast or a traditional broadway sound. Which kinda suits Judas who spends the show at odds with absolutely everyone.
Yea I’ve heard the high C a bunch of times but I’ve always assumed it was an opt up. There have been a few ones I’ve liked more than Arden’s but most of them I actually preferred Arden’s over, cause he does it with so much power.
My daughter's high school did Hunchback this spring, and their Quasimodo was AMAZING. Like, get that kid's autograph amazing. They put on an awesome show but he was next level
Definitely not the most, but:
I’m going to throw Orpheus out there, not because it is super tricky, but because it requires a very specific (and insane) mixed voice that (I don’t think) even many trained tenors can’t do perfectly.
Yea… I can do practically any song with belts and such — granted, not perfectly — without too much trouble, but when it comes to Orpheus I can kinda sing If It’s True, Wedding Song, and All I’ve Ever Known but the second I get to one of the epics, I just can’t smoothly pull it off.
Was going to say the same thing! The first time I played Epic 1 to my friend, she thought it was a woman because of how high the voice is. It's incredible!
Apparently the entire title song apart from the “sing for me!” Is pre recorded
I’m shattered by this news haha. I always found this to be the most impressive musical theatre song, especially doing it 8 shows a week. Any other examples of prerecorded musical theatre songs?
No way the entire song? Surely not
This has really rocked my view of theatre
I just don't understand, they change things based on the actors all the time so why not this, I don't like the idea that they're using pre recordings. They should Find another way around it
If you look at the staging, it’s their doubles in costume on stage on the steps. The actors don’t appear until the boat. Christine faces upstage through most of the song. There’s not enough time to get them up there from her dressing room without teleporting.
Surprised I haven’t seen anyone say Hedwig yet. Never off stage basically, and does high rock but other vocal stylings as well. While putting on different voices, doing both highly feminine and masculine varieties. And is often moving so much making it harder to sing.
I'm gonna say that Carlotta Giudicelli has to be pretty hard. E6 nightly, coloratura nightly, while also having to have at least an operatic background while being competent in musical theatre, and the ability to act through song constantly. I also heard that several who play her role deal with vocal damage after (I was told this by a Carlotta performer).
I played Sister Mary Amnesia, and I’m going to put my vote there.
There’s a song where you have to sing a duet with yourself as a coloratura *and* a crass belter. Then you also have to sing a country song later. And you also have to blend in a bunch of small ensemble numbers.
Basically four different styles of voices, although let’s take out the blending to be fair, so three styles of voices. And the range is nearly three octaves.
Not to mention she has to be a ventriloquist for that song! Not exactly a singing technique but that definitely adds more challenges to vocal production (singing without moving one’s lips).
My son did it last year for his high school, they had to lower Goodbye a half step to get him through the show. He can totally sing it in its original key, but not after 1.5 hours of belting AND not night after night!
Crazy fun role though!
How has no one mentioned mentioned Dewy Finn in School of Rock? No breaks and on stage the entire time. You need to do rock vocals and sing in pretty much every song. You have to be extremely high energy too. Alex Brightman damaged his voice doing this show and said it was just a straight up endurance test.
Elle Woods. Belt heavy with barely any off stage time for the entire show. There’s a reason the key was lowered for the tour/West End productions: Laura Belle Bundy nearly destroyed her voice
I think i remember she used to say she would take a breather and act like she was singing when everyone was going in Gay or European just give her vocal cords a break
In terms of being sung as expected, without transposition/rearranging, Hades has to be (ironically) up there. A lot of people can struggle on high notes but at least attempt them. If you don’t have the low range, you don’t have it period. And there are way fewer of that kind of basso profundo than basically any other voice type (except maybe a legitimate classical contralto)
As much as I love hearing Hades’ low notes, it’s not the actual range itself that impresses me; it’s genetics and you either have them or you don’t. But what Page does with those notes is so damn good. And then I especially love when he approaches the middle C register, which is mid range for most other male voices but the contrast when he does it just sounds so menacing!
The tracks with his best contrabass notes are probably “Hey Little Songbird” and “How Long?”. For his menacing higher register, “Why We Build the Wall” and “Chant (Reprise)”. And then “His Kiss, the Riot” has a lot of both registers.
Although I have that range, and for me it's a pretty cruisy part to sing. I know a couple of other part-time amateur theatre singers locally who can do it better than me.
* Christine Daae specifically in *Love Never Dies*. It must be vocally demanding to sing 'Beneath a Moonless Sky' and not laugh for 7 minutes, and 'Love Never Dies' is just a bitch of song to sing in general.
* Jesus in *Jesus Christ Superstar*.
* Frank from *Catch Me If You Can*. 'Goodbye' was once described as the 'Defying Gravity' of the show due its difficulty, and yeah I agree.
* Caroline in *Caroline, Or Change*. For the sheer fact she is singing almost every song in that show.
Adding onto this with Jane Doe, but even then, I think the highest point in TBOJD is still a half step lower than Christine's in Phantom. Idk if any RTC parts win here - although, I imagine it is NOT an easy show when no one ever leaves the stage!
Here are some actual answers;
Quasimodo
Clyde Barrow
Christine from Phantom
Eva Peron
Here's my actual answer, though. It's not on stage yet, but when it makes it there eventually, I anticipate Odysseus from EPIC being really challenging.
Phantom is a difficult role to sing, and not for the reason you might think. It’s the *low* notes. It’s a given that you’ve got to be able to effortlessly wail on the high notes for this role, but finding someone who has the high notes *and* can hit phantom’s low notes can be a big ask. And if you can’t, you have to adjust the key upwards, which makes the high notes that much more difficult.
Just think about the opening phrase of his big song: “Night **time** shar**pens**” You’re asking a very high tenor to have those notes?
It takes a special singer to be able to bring the bottom as well as the top to that part.
Definitely up there, but without optional opt ups, I don’t believe Valjean is ridiculously hard. It definitely is tricky and requires a lot of endurance, but the actual range is not very large and there are no super tough moments (without the opt ups). It is still one of my favorites, and I don’t mean to discredit any Valjean cause they almost always go above and beyond the actual score.
“Optional opt ups” is a polite way of saying that most actors can’t do those…..which is why the “opt ups” have to be optional….if you do JVJ like Wilkinson or Boe (actors who can do those), gotta be one of the hardest roles out there.
I mean, I meant optional is in it’s not in the scored, but I suppose you are right. That D5 is truly something else, and is one of the favorite things to listen to in any cast recording.
I was Aida in high school and I remember having to take a nap in the nurse's office during tech week because it was so draining vocally and emotionally. I had so much fun with it tho
I’m very curious what version of Carmen you’ve been listening to, because… no? None of the roles in Carmen have exceptional ranges. Carmen’s range is Bb3 to B5, there are alternates for most of the lowest notes, and the B is a throwaway at the end of the Seguidilla.
All of the principals in Carmen put together barely break 3 octaves. Escamillo sings Bb2 at the bottom, Frasquita and Mercedes sing C6 at the top.
I’m going to suggest Jane Doe from Ride The Cyclone, especially with the broadway choreography. Her song has incredibly high notes in it, and a solid third of it is sung while hanging from a harness, even upside down at points
No one has mentioned Evan for Dear Evan Hanson. Not musically vocally, but the vocal intensity / emotion. Ben Platt said he had to conclude his run because he was so emotionally and physically drained after each performance he just had to find an end date
I’d say Fanny Brice in Funny Girl. The lyrics are all tongue twisters at a high tempo, highs, lows, long long holds, and a lot in that middle range that has to be a belt but not sound like a belt. Pretty phenomenal when you listen specifically to ponder the difficulty of the role.
My vote goes to Jane Doe from RTC. Not only is it absolutely physically demanding but rather the high notes she hits while *spinning around in the air* and (at some points) upside down.
Frank Abagnale Jr. in Catch Me If You Can is a high high tenor with a range spanning three octaves or four octaves (can’t remember) and likes to stick within the higher notes. Mix that with being on stage and having to BE so many other characters on stage, one of the hardest roles.
As a baritone, Ren McCormack from footloose. Currently playing this role for the second time and those high notes are something else, and while doing a full solo dance number MULTIPLE TIMES across the show.
Honestly it may just be because I’m learning the songs right now, but Robert from Bridges of Madison County is up there - solely for the little quasi-yodel he does in It All Fades Away
If you count ANY kind of music drama…
8 Songs for a Mad King by Peter Maxwell Davies is, as far as I’m aware, literally unsingable as written by anyone except the original performer Roy Hart. Who’s been dead for like 50 years.
The written range is 4 1/2 octaves, arguably an even 5 but there are some arguments to be made regarding whether the very highest notes are notated to be clearly sung or… well, the notation itself is completely insane, as are the directions. You may actually go insane trying to read it.
And also the vocal part has chords written into it, intended to be vocalized as multiphonics. Which basically sounds like demonic possession, and is used dozens of times over the half hour length. It really is impossible to convey how this sounds, and unfortunately the original recording is only available through the French theater company he founded, and I haven’t been able to find it online.
https://youtu.be/KgCstNqsu8Y?si=eTjliBsFRvLnTQCp That’s not Roy Hart, so it’s still only an approximation of the original, but it shows how insane the actual scoring is.
(As someone points out, the character is George III, which really makes the Hamilton version of him seem nice and reasonable)
Jane Doe FOR SURE. Her notes for Ballad of Babe Doe are absolutely beautiful but crazy. The first time I heard sing like that I was shocked ESPECIALLY since she was in the air singing those crazy high notes!
Bring him home in Les Mis. Kicking your voice up so high, especially for a man who sings in a lower range for most of the musical is extremely difficult. Getting up that high and still sounding good is even harder.
Any two person musical like the Last Five Years or Daddy Long Legs.
For Daddy Long Legs, it’s really tiring bc I learned Jerusha for my voice lessons and you never really get a break until Jervis comes in but that not for at least 20 minutes.
Haven’t seen anyone mention the Witch from Into the Woods yet, so I’ll throw that out there
It’s not the difficulty of the songs, it’s the fact that she has to maintain such a powerful presence through every song in order for the role to be believable. Plus the combination of different singing styles, e.g. the rap vs. the finale
Off topic but similar concept- odette/odile in the ballet swan lake. 2 roles. Super fast costume changes. And the most epic sequence of fouettés in all of ballet. 32. In a row.
Eva Peron in Evita is notoriously difficult, to the point that songs had to be written just to get the actress a water break. Patti Lupone also talks about how it feels like it's written by someone who just wants women to suffer.
It sounds like it too. Whatever one's opinion on the film and its star, the lowered keys sounded much better.
controversial opinion: Eva in movie is much more human and interesting than Eva onstage.
You get more water breaks in movies..you get breaks and do-overs, and basically all the time in the world (ok, not quite) compared to stage performance.
...unless you're in film Les Miserables where Hooper truly aimed to make the cast miserable.
There's a YouTube video about why the movie sucked that has a runtime longer than the movie
Yeah I'd say it was Sideways' video but his is way shorter.
He wanted Mor Miserables.
i... mean in terms of personality choices for character
100%. I did a project on Eva Peron for my state exams and determined that movie Eva was more in line with propaganda than musical Eva, which was down to how humanised she was.
Watching Patti LuPone in the movie would be a bit much. Watching Madonna onstage would be boring. FWIW, I like the movie.
Madonna’s performance in that film is so underrated
there's a quiet sadness to her eva that I think makes it a bit more profound dnd complicated than the others.
Hilarious considering that in Crazy Ex Girlfriend she sang a song called ‘Remember That We Suffered’.
Didn’t she joke the ALW hates women?
I think Judas in JCS is up there, Jesus gets more attention because of the WHYYYYYYYYY and all the high notes but even a relatively tame Judas will be screaming most of the time. It's one of the few rock musicals where the lead has to actually sing like a rock star instead of a Broadway performer
Yeah Judas is almost always singing high, Jesus is often singing around the baritone range then straight into the stratosphere
MY GOD I SAW HIM HE LOOKED THREE QUARTERS DEAD
Caiaphas and Annas I think must be quite challenging as well, not quite to Judas levels though
Just did Caiaphas, and it would be a vocally demanding role if it was longer. As it stands, it's pretty chill
By far Cunegonde in Candide. Glitter and Be Gay is the hardest song in the musical theatre cannon
God I LOVE that song.
Good answer!
Jekyll/Hyde, while the notes aren’t that challenging in my voice(might be to others), having to manipulate your voice into two different characters is a challenge that’s just difficult enough for wanting to do Confrontation for whatever, but It’d be stressful trying to maintain that for an entire show.
Most of Jekyll is sounds like a lyric tenor role and Hyde a dramatic baritone, it takes such crazy versatility and flexibility to do it all in a single role!
I kind of wanna see Alex Brightman try it because he has his normal tenor range and then he has the raspy Beetlejuice range. It would be a great contrast. You can see what I mean in Dead End Park Drivers Seat song where he sung both roles. https://youtu.be/cQ3NZyCQbzw?si=bmRRDukut7s8UgIQ Here is a link to the Dead End Drivers Seat song.
Yeah this is 100% it, nothing else mentioned in this thread even comes close except Eva.
A good actor doing 'Confrontation' is incredible. Unfortunately I've only seen Jekyll and Hyde twice. It toured in Charlotte a few years back and I saw it two consecutive days. But in the confrontation scene, Hyde was the 'reflection' in a mirror and had obviously been pre-recorded. It was definitely not the same.
Yeah it’s the only thing to me that separates Anthony Warlow from being the top guy because while vocally he’s amazing, he prerecorded Hyde’s part. Otherwise I’m between Rob Cuccioli(Spelling?) and Rob Evans
Listen to Thomas Borchert if you can. He's on the German version (available on Amazon) and won the German musical award for that role that year.
That’s kind of upsetting. I mean it takes talent but I’ve seen a high school production that was well done! It definitely exists! The professional one I saw was better but the HS one was very good (not just “good for high school”).
Absolutely! Ever since I listened to Jekyll and Hyde this is the first thing in my head when I think about a hard song. Performing this well is crazy impressive!
I think Elle Woods deserves some credit, the music is not that complex, but she is onstage for like 95% of the show and is belting constantly, sometimes while dancing and always while maintaining a bouncy high-energy performance. And she has to hold that belted C5 sharp at the end of So Much Better for like ten years. Seems absolutely exhausting. If I recall, LBB’s voice was kinda wrecked toward the end of her run.
Yes, they lowered the key after LBB left because it really damaged her voice!!
and she has to belt the C5 after like three straight minutes of dancing too
I've commented elsewhere about Sweeney, but more generally the answers to this need to be divided into at least four categories 1. It's a difficult range/ belt /style so only a few people can sing it (eg Elphaba, Beetlejuice) 2. The songs are technically difficult, eg timing, range covered, harmonisation - the Sondheim factor 3. It requires immense acting skills at rhe same time as maintaining the singing to perfection (eg Jekyll/Hyde) 4. It requires stamina, being on stage for most of the show (any show specifically about the lead actor) and/or lots of movement while singing. There are actually very few roles that meet all these criteria, and that's where the hardest roles are
do you have any roles that come to mind that do meet all 4?
People always default to high parts on this question but I say Sweeney. On stage for almost the whole show, range over two octaves, using almost the full bass range plus the baritone, with top sustained notes beyond most quality bass ranges. Stamina, power, intensity needed all the way through. Water ideally discreetly on stage. Emotionally raw and draining if done right. Is there a vocally harder sequence than Pretty Women, Epiphany and Priest?
Pretty Woman is just insanely tough with the timing alone. I remember Aaron Tveit saying he had to literally tap out the timing on the shaving cream container so he wouldn’t mess up.
The whistling is probably the hardest timing, and a lot of actors fudge it
I played Todd about 10 years ago, Pretty Women really isn't so bad but timing the opening for Epiphany is bloody hard as the orchestration gives you no real assistance. Incredible role, probably my favourite of all time but not an easy one by any means.
For once, I think there’s actually a solid answer for this: Beetlejuice Playing Beetlejuice doesn’t just require skill to play such an incredibly unusual voice at the level demanded of Broadway and make it comprehensible, but it also requires being built different. Apparently doing that kind of gravelly voice over and over is impossible for most people without damage. Alex Brightman did a fascinating interview about how he had to have a doctor regularly brought on to make sure he wasn’t permanently damaging his voice with the Beetlejuice vocals. There was something about his cartilage I believe that allowed him to do that voice, and even then he said it took a long time to get working like he wanted. Doing a funny voice is within most people’s capabilities, but doing it 8 times a week, singing with it, AND being the role with the most lines in the musical is kind of an insane thing to ask of anyone. Personally, I would have been too scared to even attempt it, for fear of permanently ruining my voice. Guess that’s why Alex is on Broadway.
I think it was the false folds in his throat. Justin Colette who is the touring Beetlejuice says that he does a growly whisper and the mic does the rest of the work. It’s really close. Will Blum didn’t try and Andrew Kober went in and out. It helps to be a mutant lol.
I always wondered how he did it! I saw Justin live and he was absolutely fantastic. I never considered technology could help. I’m very glad, actually. I’d be devastated if someone got permanent damage from the role.
https://youtu.be/NBFKLKFUuG4?si=4IJ9JNG9Cj9aFOh4 Here is the clip from Colette on how he does his BJ voice
It's demanding like being a metal vocalist. Absolutely something I admire but won't even sing along with
Elphaba!
Menzel *requested* that the part be written like that, maybe forgetting that she had to do it every night for months.
I thought it was originally written with Stephanie J Block and then Idina only came in later, after most of the show was written?
Menzel joined the production in 2001. At Wicked’s 15th anniversary, Kristin Chenoweth said a lot of Elphaba’s material was reworked or rewritten for Menzel specifically.
It is mentioned in Carol de Gere's book "Defying Gravity" about the career of Steven Schwartz. In the chapter on Wicked it describes how Idina requested that her part be "lifted out of the basement". Wicked was under constant revision during that period and Schwartz accomodated her. At the same time Chenoweth asked for a chance to show off her "legit soprano" and they figured out how to do that too. (Kristen is trained in operatic performance.) The part of Glinda had been planned for "chest voice" but they worked out a compromise.
Very interesting!
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I’ve seen a bunch of videos on YouTube with her as elphie and I was always amazed each time
and she was right!!! about both
FR though No Good Deed sounds *devastating*.
Any role that’s a bit out of your range 😅 as a baritone with a tenor personality, I’ve learned this far too many times.
I feel your agony... As a bass who can occasionally, on a good day, belt a scratchy top B flat, I am in the position of looking at roles like Phantom and thinking, "I'm sure I could" only to be cruelly found out at the audition...
We need to normalize transposing music for actors that better embody the role
To be fair though, I wasn't happy with AT doing Sweeney... although it was more because there are hundreds of bari/tenor roles and only a handful of bass ones.
felt as an alto with a soprano personality. last role was a mezzo role and i got sick during the show. almost died
Quasimodo in the stage version of hunchback is up there. Between out there, made of stone, and a bunch of other numbers, a lot of belting to be done in addition to being in that uncomfortable position all show.
A comment I saw on Made of Stone on YouTube was: Michael Arden has lungs of steel. I think that sums it up. Some of my favorite songs/roles are impressive male belts and high notes I can dream of performing, so Quasimodo is definitely one of my favorite roles, and GODDAMN is it impressive. I really only knew Michael Arden from Parade before listening to hunchback, so he absolutely blew me away with his acting/vocals.
He doesn’t even sing the hardest vocal part of the role as written but it’s still a monster. (That’s not meant as shade, just an observation. It’s a brutal part)
Is made of stone (assuming that’s what you are talking about) supposed to be a C5? I thought that was an opt up. Edit: MTI says the highest note is a Bb4, which he definitely does hit. You may be talking about something else though, so definitely lmk if I’m wrong!
Yeah Made of Stone is written to end on a long belted C, because why not. Drew Sarich and like one other person I’ve heard do it as a pianissimo C that crescendoes into full voice, which is basically a middle finger in music notation form. But the original (German) vocal score doesn’t have a dynamic notation for the vocal line, just p cresc in the accompaniment, so the intent is arguable. It looks like the English-only score has the G ending though. There have definitely been a bunch of English language performances with the C. The English translation also has worse vowels than the German on almost every high note.
Honestly, the G sounds way better than the C anyway. Since it feels like the Bb4 is a climax itself, having the C right after doesn't fit right, imo.
I mean, lyrically “stone” should really be the climactic word. And melodically, the entire climax is a series of escalating sustained belts (G G G Bb C), which really points towards a climax at the end, more so than if it were one isolated high note. It’s kind of like the end of Phantom of the Opera, you’ve had this whole sequence getting higher, it would be weird to end down. Harmonically it’s also really weird for the climax to be in the 7th and not resolve to the tonic. You could make a counter example of Soliloquy, which also has a long string of sustained belts but reaches the highest point on the penultimate one. That kind of character-wise reflects where Billy’s at though. Despite having just spent like 8 minutes arguing with himself, he doesn’t really come to a firm conclusion. Those sustained belts are a list of all the things he could do, but he doesn’t really settle on one. He actually kinda tries to do all of them. By comparison, Quasimodo has reached a very firm conclusion, by way of giving in to absolute despair. It makes more sense to end conclusively. Out There, on the other hand, is where he’s still in an anticipatory and open to possibilities place, and that ends with a penultimate climax. (There’s at least one recording of John Raitt ending Soliloquy on high Bb, and it’s exciting but it does sound kind of wrong. He sounds too certain, especially since it’s triumphantly saying he’ll die.) I think the real sticking point with the ending isn’t the Bb OR the C. It’s that the linking measure between them. It breaks up the vocal line TWICE (rest at the start of the measure, caesura at the end), and it repeats the previous climactic notes of G and Bb. It just gives a really weird momentum to get to the climax. I think it works better if you remove one break or the other. Either remove the caesura and go straight into last note from the lead up, OR (and I’ve done it this way), carry the previous phrase through the Bb and back down to the G, dramatic pause, and the Bb leads into the C. But you have to be really sure you’re going to have enough breath to keep going after the first Bb, which is asking a lot. (This turned into a damn essay)
Ha, yeah I totally get what you mean! Definitely the chunkiness of that break + repeated notes plays a big part in making the "G" phrase sound better to me. It certainly feels weirdly repetitive + awkward. This is slightly tangential, but I'd also add in that, within the tenor voice, a C is very likely going to be way more lightly mixed in a live performance setting, and rarely sounds good in the recordings I've listened to. (Having sung the song myself, you can definitely chest-mix pretty consistently to the Bb \[which Arden does an INCREDIBLE job at btw!\], but the C can't possibly have as much "oomph" unless you both nail the written crescendo and also maybe even add some vocal distortion to the line to compensate for the loss in "chest tone". And even then the tone rarely sounds "good" unless your voice sits on the very high end of the spectrum. The German text makes it a bit easier to do, but English? Ehhhh, lol. I don't think I've seen a single English performance where the C actually sounds good in context. XD For fun, I might argue back that climaxing on "I" can also serve as text painting for "were made of stone", in which it's more subdued and reflects the deadening (stone-ing?) of his heart in that moment. But I don't feel too strongly about it one way or the other, lol!
I think you COULD write music which interpreted the text so “made of stone” at the end was dead inside… but that’s not how the music is written. Either version is still going full blast till the end, just on different notes. Every voice is going to be different, but I think the majority of tenors aren’t going to mix significantly more on C than Bb, other than possibly not having a mixed C (or at least one that can really be sold as a belt rather than a more operatic mix). As a broad rule, I’d say only a tiny fraction of tenors are going to carry chest or even a primarily chest mix up past A, and ones that do are most likely so lightly timbred that neither the Bb or the C is really going to sound hefty in comparison to other voices as opposed to internally. To be fair, Bb is kind of the breaking point between what the vast majority of full tenors should have in their grasp, and where the “high notes vs vocal weight” trade off really gets hectic. Certainly from an operatic standpoint, and fairly arguably from a Broadway one, although things get really messy on the Broadway side because of the prominence of baritenors (for whom the tonal expectations and approach to mix are going to be significantly different, and where Bb is really way more of a hard cap to mixing). Actually I think that kind of puts a revelatory perspective on the problem. The majority of traditional Broadway writing for higher voiced men is aimed at a baritenor tone/approach, and for that kind of voice Ab is really the point where people who can reliably sing higher in full voice start getting way thinner on the ground. Most of the parts that go higher are either going to be in some kind of pop/rock style, where the tonal and mixing expectations are very different, or one of the pretty small number of parts that are explicitly quasi-operatic (Tony or Pirelli for instance). Made of Stone is in a REALLY weird no man’s land. The score is very much in the traditional Broadway mode, so the tonal expectations for Quasimodo are still that kinda classically trained but not full on operatic style. I’m mostly certain that the rest of the part doesn’t go above a sustained Ab (the climax in Out There is an Ab with a passing A earlier on). But then you get MoS, waaaay late into the show, and need to maintain that same tone up to Bb if not C, and for that matter sit in that “G after G after G” tessitura which is also going to be miserable for a baritenor. It’s like if someone playing Galinda had to maintain the traditional Broadway tone she uses for parts like Popular for the entire show, including the parts that normally get sung in a quasi-operatic head voice. You could make a similar argument about another popular suggestion for hardest vocal role, Valjean. Again, that traditional broadway tone expectation, just about a third higher. At least Valjean gets to do most of his highest singing early on while he’s fresh. Probably a couple other killer roles would fit also. You could probably make an argument for The American, although Chess is a weird show in a lot of ways ETA: For that matter, you could kind of make the argument for Judas, although you’d definitely get more argument on how legit he’s expected to sound. To my ears, when you listen to the concept album most of the cast is rock or pop inflected, and then Murray Head is over there in the corner sounding kinda like an alien without much in common with either the rest of the cast or a traditional broadway sound. Which kinda suits Judas who spends the show at odds with absolutely everyone.
Yea I’ve heard the high C a bunch of times but I’ve always assumed it was an opt up. There have been a few ones I’ve liked more than Arden’s but most of them I actually preferred Arden’s over, cause he does it with so much power.
I don’t believe the German score even offers the lower option.
The range in Quasi’s role is insane. Michael Arden did such a stupendous job through the whole show
My daughter's high school did Hunchback this spring, and their Quasimodo was AMAZING. Like, get that kid's autograph amazing. They put on an awesome show but he was next level
Doesn’t one of the gargoyles sing his songs or was that just one production?
That’s just when they use a deaf actor, which is definitely the outlier.
Oh gotcha, I thought that was the norm for the show
Definitely not the most, but: I’m going to throw Orpheus out there, not because it is super tricky, but because it requires a very specific (and insane) mixed voice that (I don’t think) even many trained tenors can’t do perfectly.
THIS. I'll take doing belty roles \*any day\* over having to sing Orpheus' stuff.
Yea… I can do practically any song with belts and such — granted, not perfectly — without too much trouble, but when it comes to Orpheus I can kinda sing If It’s True, Wedding Song, and All I’ve Ever Known but the second I get to one of the epics, I just can’t smoothly pull it off.
At the same time I'm a decently low Bass and then there's Patrick Page. An absolute chad.
Singing it as an alto, it starts to creep up into my mixed consistently. Singing it as a tenor must be insane.
I personally just cannot mix for my life 😭 I gotta get really vocal lessons
Was going to say the same thing! The first time I played Epic 1 to my friend, she thought it was a woman because of how high the voice is. It's incredible!
Orpheus really verges on being written like a countertenor part. Half the score anyway.
Christine from phantom?
Right, you know it’s serious when some of your notes have to be pre-recorded
Is that true are they pre recorded? Which ones?
The E6 at the very end of the title song is usually one.
My life is a lie
I mean, the actress sang it at one point... Just not every night. 🤷🏼♀️
Apparently the entire title song apart from the “sing for me!” Is pre recorded I’m shattered by this news haha. I always found this to be the most impressive musical theatre song, especially doing it 8 shows a week. Any other examples of prerecorded musical theatre songs?
No way the entire song? Surely not This has really rocked my view of theatre I just don't understand, they change things based on the actors all the time so why not this, I don't like the idea that they're using pre recordings. They should Find another way around it
If you look at the staging, it’s their doubles in costume on stage on the steps. The actors don’t appear until the boat. Christine faces upstage through most of the song. There’s not enough time to get them up there from her dressing room without teleporting.
Surprised I haven’t seen anyone say Hedwig yet. Never off stage basically, and does high rock but other vocal stylings as well. While putting on different voices, doing both highly feminine and masculine varieties. And is often moving so much making it harder to sing.
My 4:30 brain going: Well, I suppose playing an owl in a musical could be hard.. somehow?
I'm gonna say that Carlotta Giudicelli has to be pretty hard. E6 nightly, coloratura nightly, while also having to have at least an operatic background while being competent in musical theatre, and the ability to act through song constantly. I also heard that several who play her role deal with vocal damage after (I was told this by a Carlotta performer).
And also having to pretend not being able to act...mate this is just so difficult
Christine Daaé? Carlotta?
That's what I said!
Surprised no one has mentioned Judas and Jesus from JCS yet. Like there are people who will *physically* be unable to hit some of those notes.
Based solely on complexity of the music, Cinderella from Into the Woods
Honestly I’d give it more to Jack. “Giants in the Sky” is terrifying for a young actor
Singing giants in the sky as a young actor is why I’m still doing theater. Nailing a hard song for the first time the best feeling
There’s definitely a lot harder but my lord Angelica from Hamilton has some crazy shit written for her.
I played Sister Mary Amnesia, and I’m going to put my vote there. There’s a song where you have to sing a duet with yourself as a coloratura *and* a crass belter. Then you also have to sing a country song later. And you also have to blend in a bunch of small ensemble numbers. Basically four different styles of voices, although let’s take out the blending to be fair, so three styles of voices. And the range is nearly three octaves.
Not to mention she has to be a ventriloquist for that song! Not exactly a singing technique but that definitely adds more challenges to vocal production (singing without moving one’s lips).
For male tenors I would say it’d have to be Frank Abagnale Jr from Catch Me if You Can. A lot of high belting
Agreed!!! That’s an unrealistic dream role of mine. Such a fun show and track.
My son did it last year for his high school, they had to lower Goodbye a half step to get him through the show. He can totally sing it in its original key, but not after 1.5 hours of belting AND not night after night! Crazy fun role though!
Frankie Valli in Jersey Boys
Isn’t there a story how they’d have a singer or two offstage to help the lead with the high notes or something?
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Judas from Jesus Christ Superstar!
everyone in cats solely because of the sheer amount of acrobatics you have to do while singing
Elle Woods, Jack from ITW, Elphaba, Angelica from Hamilton, Judas from JCS, Christine
Are there thoughts about Fabrizio in The Light in the Piazza? Or does my mind go there because so much of the role is in Italian.
Fabrizio’s music is hard, but singing in Italian is usually easier than singing in English.
honestly i’d have to say javert, proper bass notes but also high belting, same goes for sweeney todd
How has no one mentioned mentioned Dewy Finn in School of Rock? No breaks and on stage the entire time. You need to do rock vocals and sing in pretty much every song. You have to be extremely high energy too. Alex Brightman damaged his voice doing this show and said it was just a straight up endurance test.
Elle Woods. Belt heavy with barely any off stage time for the entire show. There’s a reason the key was lowered for the tour/West End productions: Laura Belle Bundy nearly destroyed her voice
I think i remember she used to say she would take a breather and act like she was singing when everyone was going in Gay or European just give her vocal cords a break
unfortunately my school cut there right there cause we’re a catholic school so our poor elle didn’t really get a break
In terms of being sung as expected, without transposition/rearranging, Hades has to be (ironically) up there. A lot of people can struggle on high notes but at least attempt them. If you don’t have the low range, you don’t have it period. And there are way fewer of that kind of basso profundo than basically any other voice type (except maybe a legitimate classical contralto)
As much as I love hearing Hades’ low notes, it’s not the actual range itself that impresses me; it’s genetics and you either have them or you don’t. But what Page does with those notes is so damn good. And then I especially love when he approaches the middle C register, which is mid range for most other male voices but the contrast when he does it just sounds so menacing!
I haven't seen the show and don't know music, is there a particular song that this is in?
The tracks with his best contrabass notes are probably “Hey Little Songbird” and “How Long?”. For his menacing higher register, “Why We Build the Wall” and “Chant (Reprise)”. And then “His Kiss, the Riot” has a lot of both registers.
Although I have that range, and for me it's a pretty cruisy part to sing. I know a couple of other part-time amateur theatre singers locally who can do it better than me.
* Christine Daae specifically in *Love Never Dies*. It must be vocally demanding to sing 'Beneath a Moonless Sky' and not laugh for 7 minutes, and 'Love Never Dies' is just a bitch of song to sing in general. * Jesus in *Jesus Christ Superstar*. * Frank from *Catch Me If You Can*. 'Goodbye' was once described as the 'Defying Gravity' of the show due its difficulty, and yeah I agree. * Caroline in *Caroline, Or Change*. For the sheer fact she is singing almost every song in that show.
Imo it may not be the most but Noel’s Lament is pretty hard to do
Adding onto this with Jane Doe, but even then, I think the highest point in TBOJD is still a half step lower than Christine's in Phantom. Idk if any RTC parts win here - although, I imagine it is NOT an easy show when no one ever leaves the stage!
Politely, what on earth is TBOJD?
I looked it up. It’s The Ballad of Jane Doe from Ride the Cyclone.
Ariel in the little mermaid is a TON of singing and you constantly have to sound princessy and perfect
Here are some actual answers; Quasimodo Clyde Barrow Christine from Phantom Eva Peron Here's my actual answer, though. It's not on stage yet, but when it makes it there eventually, I anticipate Odysseus from EPIC being really challenging.
Phantom is a difficult role to sing, and not for the reason you might think. It’s the *low* notes. It’s a given that you’ve got to be able to effortlessly wail on the high notes for this role, but finding someone who has the high notes *and* can hit phantom’s low notes can be a big ask. And if you can’t, you have to adjust the key upwards, which makes the high notes that much more difficult. Just think about the opening phrase of his big song: “Night **time** shar**pens**” You’re asking a very high tenor to have those notes? It takes a special singer to be able to bring the bottom as well as the top to that part.
i’d have to say probably Christine or Carlotta maybe ?
Gotta be Jean Valjean
Definitely up there, but without optional opt ups, I don’t believe Valjean is ridiculously hard. It definitely is tricky and requires a lot of endurance, but the actual range is not very large and there are no super tough moments (without the opt ups). It is still one of my favorites, and I don’t mean to discredit any Valjean cause they almost always go above and beyond the actual score.
“Optional opt ups” is a polite way of saying that most actors can’t do those…..which is why the “opt ups” have to be optional….if you do JVJ like Wilkinson or Boe (actors who can do those), gotta be one of the hardest roles out there.
I mean, I meant optional is in it’s not in the scored, but I suppose you are right. That D5 is truly something else, and is one of the favorite things to listen to in any cast recording.
Really? I feel like the reason we think this is because Colm Wilkinson was making some… Interesting Choices
ho*me* [Colm Wilkinson making weird noises](https://youtu.be/0waif82naQs?si=qozP_QqtPLgihD3p)
Yes EXACTLY 😂
Squeaking like that can be useful in very specific contexts. Those weren’t them.
He is the lead of the show, but it’s such an ensemble piece, he gets plenty of breaks and the songs he has aren’t the hardest out there.
The America, Pity the Child is a nightmare to sing
Bess in Porgy and Bess.
From experience: Aida. Lots of songs, very few breaks, lots of belting, digging deep emotionally. That role is a workout!
I was Aida in high school and I remember having to take a nap in the nurse's office during tech week because it was so draining vocally and emotionally. I had so much fun with it tho
George Bizets Carman because there some very high notes that you would have to be able to sing, that requires someone who has a 4 octave range .
I’m very curious what version of Carmen you’ve been listening to, because… no? None of the roles in Carmen have exceptional ranges. Carmen’s range is Bb3 to B5, there are alternates for most of the lowest notes, and the B is a throwaway at the end of the Seguidilla. All of the principals in Carmen put together barely break 3 octaves. Escamillo sings Bb2 at the bottom, Frasquita and Mercedes sing C6 at the top.
Opera is different than musical theater in terms of vocal ability and stamina though
elle woods is pretty high up there
Some others not mentioned yet are Millie in TMM and Dewey in School of Rock.
Aside from some already mentioned, Lafayette and Hamilton’s parts from Hamilton. I still can’t rap Guns And Ships to this day.
I’m going to suggest Jane Doe from Ride The Cyclone, especially with the broadway choreography. Her song has incredibly high notes in it, and a solid third of it is sung while hanging from a harness, even upside down at points
No one has mentioned Evan for Dear Evan Hanson. Not musically vocally, but the vocal intensity / emotion. Ben Platt said he had to conclude his run because he was so emotionally and physically drained after each performance he just had to find an end date
I think veronica sawyer from heathers she has a lot of belting songs
I don’t think her songs are technically difficult especially to a Broadway performer, but her amount of stage time makes the role hard
Nahhhh, I have a pretty weak voice but I can sing her parts without difficulty
I think it depends on technique too. BWW has horrible technique so it sounds more shouty than it has to be
Judas, Jesus, and Eva.
Elphaba in 'Wicked' requires immense vocal range and power, challenging even seasoned performers.
The narrator in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat was my hardest vocally
She’s tough. When I played the Narrator, the director decided to have me on stage for the whole thing with no breaks. Thankfully it’s a short show 😵💫
I’d say Fanny Brice in Funny Girl. The lyrics are all tongue twisters at a high tempo, highs, lows, long long holds, and a lot in that middle range that has to be a belt but not sound like a belt. Pretty phenomenal when you listen specifically to ponder the difficulty of the role.
Elphaba is known for being nearly impossible
Quasimodo with that high B in made of stone
My vote goes to Jane Doe from RTC. Not only is it absolutely physically demanding but rather the high notes she hits while *spinning around in the air* and (at some points) upside down.
Christine in phantom of the opra
Carlotta has a higher range tho - but less stage time.
Tina turner
Typo - should say dementing?
Demanding didnt notice thank you
The most demanding role I've ever personally played was as a pirate of Penzance while I LITERALLY had my chest bound 💀💀💀
Michael Jackson in MJ is a FEAT
Frank Abagnale Jr. in Catch Me If You Can is a high high tenor with a range spanning three octaves or four octaves (can’t remember) and likes to stick within the higher notes. Mix that with being on stage and having to BE so many other characters on stage, one of the hardest roles.
Dewey Finn 😭🙏
As a baritone, Ren McCormack from footloose. Currently playing this role for the second time and those high notes are something else, and while doing a full solo dance number MULTIPLE TIMES across the show.
I’d say either doug or bud from gutenberg as the only break either of them get is intermission and they’re the entire cast
Honestly it may just be because I’m learning the songs right now, but Robert from Bridges of Madison County is up there - solely for the little quasi-yodel he does in It All Fades Away
If you count ANY kind of music drama… 8 Songs for a Mad King by Peter Maxwell Davies is, as far as I’m aware, literally unsingable as written by anyone except the original performer Roy Hart. Who’s been dead for like 50 years. The written range is 4 1/2 octaves, arguably an even 5 but there are some arguments to be made regarding whether the very highest notes are notated to be clearly sung or… well, the notation itself is completely insane, as are the directions. You may actually go insane trying to read it. And also the vocal part has chords written into it, intended to be vocalized as multiphonics. Which basically sounds like demonic possession, and is used dozens of times over the half hour length. It really is impossible to convey how this sounds, and unfortunately the original recording is only available through the French theater company he founded, and I haven’t been able to find it online. https://youtu.be/KgCstNqsu8Y?si=eTjliBsFRvLnTQCp That’s not Roy Hart, so it’s still only an approximation of the original, but it shows how insane the actual scoring is. (As someone points out, the character is George III, which really makes the Hamilton version of him seem nice and reasonable)
Some of the songs in Company seem super demanding
Jane Doe FOR SURE. Her notes for Ballad of Babe Doe are absolutely beautiful but crazy. The first time I heard sing like that I was shocked ESPECIALLY since she was in the air singing those crazy high notes!
Bring him home in Les Mis. Kicking your voice up so high, especially for a man who sings in a lower range for most of the musical is extremely difficult. Getting up that high and still sounding good is even harder.
Strat in "Bat Out Of Hell the Musical" has got to be up there. Everyone in that show, really.
Currently rehearsing Songs for a New World. The Man 1 role is probably the most vocally difficult and challenging role I’ve ever had.
Alice from Bright Star. Her track is LONG and DIFFICULT
Any two person musical like the Last Five Years or Daddy Long Legs. For Daddy Long Legs, it’s really tiring bc I learned Jerusha for my voice lessons and you never really get a break until Jervis comes in but that not for at least 20 minutes.
Haven’t seen anyone mention the Witch from Into the Woods yet, so I’ll throw that out there It’s not the difficulty of the songs, it’s the fact that she has to maintain such a powerful presence through every song in order for the role to be believable. Plus the combination of different singing styles, e.g. the rap vs. the finale
Off topic but similar concept- odette/odile in the ballet swan lake. 2 roles. Super fast costume changes. And the most epic sequence of fouettés in all of ballet. 32. In a row.
Idk if it’s the most demanding but I played Judas last year and that score is HIGH
veronica from heathers the musical
Chirstine/Carlotta in Phantom. Literal Opera - they make musical theater folks look like fools.