Do You Call That Singing?

From Mark E Smith to Patti Smith, from Bob Dylan to Dry Cleaning - why are many of the most captivating performers, in what we might loosely call 'rock' music, singers who don't actually sing?

We wouldn't tolerate drummers who can't keep time or guitarists who can't strum a chord. Yet when it comes to vocalists, many of the most successful don't 'sing' a note. Why? And where did this technique come from?

It's linked to - but different from - the recitative (i.e. spoken word) of an opera, and the Germans have two words for it - sprechgesang or sprechstimme. Arnold Schoenberg is said to have defined sprechgesang in his 1912 opera, Pierrot Lunaire, but we can also look further back to the talking blues and folk music.

Recently, bands like Yard Act, Sleaford Mods, Self Esteem, Dry Cleaning, Black Country New Road, Kae Tempest, Big Special and Idles have used this technique to rage about social ills - as well as punk pop artists like Olivia Rodrigo, Billie Eilish and Wet Leg. But what separates good sprechgesang from bad? Why do some non traditional vocalists resonate with audiences while others fail? Is it rap?

Former music journalist Adrian Goldberg learns from his hero Robert Lloyd of The Nightingales and Florence Shaw of Dry Cleaning how to sprechgesang, he channels the avant-garde spirit of Schoenberg with soprano Claire Booth, asks rapper and saxophonist Soweto Kinch about the power of freestyle, and dares to ask the music historian Elijah Wald if Bob Dylan was just a bad singer. Finally, Adrian meets fellow Brummie Joe Hicklin from Big Special, who uses the direct and authentic nature of speech despite the fact he can sing very well.

Can Adrian take what he's learnt and fulfil his dream of becoming a rock star? He might not be a singer but he can shout!

Produced by Helen Lennard and John Cranmer
A True Thought production for BBC Radio 4