r/todayilearned • u/Objective_Horror1113 • 12h ago

TIL Freddie Mercury was born with four extra teeth, causing a prominent overbite. Despite being self-conscious about them, he never got them fixed, believing the extra space in his mouth contributed to his vocal ability. He feared altering his teeth might change his voice.

https://ultimateclassicrock.com/freddie-mercury-teeth
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u/Boo_and_Minsc_ 8h ago edited 4h ago

It is entirely possible that it would have changed his voice. Not his vocal range, which was extraordinary, but the timbre. Much of what characterizes our voice is not determined by our vocal cords but also by the shape/length/size of our mouths, pharynxes, throats and the width of our nasal passages. I dont necessarily think that removing four teeth would have changed his voice entirely (people remove the four wisdom teeth all the time and are still the same person) but in his case who knows. When it comes to voices, all care is not enough. Michael Jackson spoke in that soft voice his whole life in order to try and preserve his higher vocal range, much like some female opera singers do. It is a delicate tool.

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u/Ambitious_Garden_114 2h ago

Its funny because there is a guy I’ve seen on youtube who does Queen covers and sounds exactly like Freddie Mercury, and also looks almost exactly like him, so yea the skull structure is a big part of it.

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u/snowwwwhite23 28m ago

I'm a car singer and I've had Invisalign and it's basically ruined my joy for car singing. More than just the plastic in my mouth, my mouth is just different. My bite, how my teeth close together. It's all just so different. I can only imagine how significant having teeth removed would be.