Literary notes about baritone (AI summary)
The term baritone is often employed in literature both as a technical indicator of vocal range and as a literary device to convey character and mood. In musical contexts, it is described with precision as falling between tenor and bass—used in didactic passages to denote specific voice classifications [1, 2, 3]—while in narrative prose it frequently characterizes speakers with a robust, resonant quality that lends authority or emotional depth to their dialogue [4, 5, 6]. Authors also use baritone to contrast characters or to highlight unique individual traits, whether through a rich, inviting tone [7, 8] or a more humorously understated quality [9, 10].
- Besides the principal terms mentioned above, the names mezzo-soprano (between sop. and alto), and baritone (between tenor and bass) are also employed.
— from The Declaration of Independence of the United States of America by Thomas Jefferson - Baritone is a division of bass; and tenor is either dramatic or lyric.
— from The Voice: Its Production, Care and Preservation by Frank E. (Frank Ebenezer) Miller - "The method consists of twenty lessons for each of the five kinds of voices: Soprano, Mezzo-Soprano, Tenor, Baritone and Bass.
— from Vocal Mastery Talks with Master Singers and Teachers, Comprising Interviews with Caruso, Farrar, Maurel, Lehmann, and Others by Harriette Brower - " "Yes, Rosamond, I shall," said Lydgate, in his strong baritone.
— from Middlemarch by George Eliot - he exclaimed in his dashing, old, hussar’s baritone.
— from War and Peace by graf Leo Tolstoy - “That’s it, Alexey,” said the captain, in his loud baritone.
— from Anna Karenina by graf Leo Tolstoy - Just when the stars were scattering their gold on the bosom of the sea-river, a voice rang out, a rich, full baritone.
— from In and out of Three Normandy Inns by Anna Bowman Dodd - He had a good baritone voice and always led the singing when we went to church services at the sod schoolhouse.
— from My Ántonia by Willa Cather - My love, she's but a lassie yet ," Smith sang in a cracked baritone. "
— from The Girl in His Mind by Robert F. Young - His voice was a baritone of rapid inflections, and when he was very much in earnest it changed to a deep bass.
— from Sketches from Concord and Appledore Concord thirty years ago; Nathaniel Hawthorne; Louisa M. Alcott; Ralph Waldo Emerson; Matthew Arnold; David A. Wasson; Wendell Phillips; Appledore and its visitors; John Greenleaf Whittier by Frank Preston Stearns
