“Coloratura” opens with the sound of an orchestra tuning up - notably, to A440 concert pitch. Despite all the buzz around the quasi-prog instrumental sections, the composition of the vocal sections is what’s most compelling and what I’d like to examine here. At the core is a more familiar verse-chorus type of structure we all know. The song isn’t really through-composed though, because there are recurring musical motifs threaded throughout. The Coldplay recording contains heavily sound-designed instrumental sections, including an evolving, nearly two-minute intro and a two-and-a-half-minute interlude (which comprises distinctive movements within itself). In short, there’s no actual coloratura in Coldplay’s song. This conceit may be farfetched, but it’s the best I can come up with. Perhaps I’m straining credulity here, but Chris Martin et al are probably using the coloratura concept metaphorically: Since their song is partly an ode to celestial bodies and the cosmos, maybe they’re simply invoking the idea of reaching to the heavens the way a coloratura soprano reaches for the high F, two octaves and a fourth above middle C.
So how does Coldplay deploy this musical construct in their song? Well, they don’t.
Among musicians, the word coloratura often conjures an opera singer using agile runs to hit high notes. (The word means “coloring” in Italian and comes from the Latin infinitive colorare.) It’s similar to gamakas in South Indian Carnatic music, and to melismatic singing in pop tunes (think Whitney Houston’s vocal decorations in the song “I Will Always Love You”). In the tradition of 17th-Century European opera, coloratura is a florid vocal ornamentation of a melody using trills, mordents, and leaps.
It’s truly stunning, so let’s check it out. I’ve always been rather indifferent to the music of Coldplay… until I heard this tune. In advance of the release of Coldplay’s new album, Music Of The Spheres, the band has put out two new songs: the rather unimpressive “Higher Power,” and the remarkably stirring “Coloratura.” The latter is an epic 10-minute pop oddity with a lot going on compositionally. After reading his takes on the music theory behind several historic hits, we invited him to turn his focus on more current singles. Vivek Maddala is an Emmy-winning composer and a regular participant in The Number Ones Comment Section.
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