Ageing of professional opera singer’s voice- preliminary findings

Abstract

Objectives. The main goals of this study were to assess the most significant morphological changes and acoustic measures for the ageing process of a professional opera singer’s voice. Design. This investigation included 58 healthy professional opera singers, who were compared with 42 young opera singers from a control group. Methods. All participants underwent a voice assessment protocol: an ENT specialist examination and a speech therapist evaluation. Acoustic parameters and subjective observations were obtained, and then analysed. Results. The fundamental frequency (F0) level was distinctly decreased in the case of older female singers, but F0 in older male singers had stable levels in comparison to that in younger singers. Older singers were found not to have substantially different values of jitter than younger ones. Maximal phonation time (MPT) was longer in the older women group when compared to younger singers, but not relatively different in the men group. Shimmer value presented no age related change. Morphological changes seem to correlate with the age of subjects. Conclusions. The main characteristic of voice change over age was a decreased F0 level among older female professional singers and rather stable F0 levels in male singers. This study gives preliminary results on ageing voice in the population of professional opera singers.