{"id":2102974,"date":"2026-08-20T17:03:18","date_gmt":"2026-08-20T14:03:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2102974"},"modified":"2026-08-20T17:03:18","modified_gmt":"2026-08-20T14:03:18","slug":"showstopping-vocals-have-fallen-out-of-favor-in-rb-can-a-new-generation-of-stars-bring-them-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2102974","title":{"rendered":"Showstopping Vocals Have Fallen Out of Favor in R&B \u2014 Can a New Generation of Stars Bring Them Back?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\tThere are singers, and then there are sangers<\/em> \u2014 and the difference is always palpable.<\/p>\n
\n\tFor decades, vocalists harnessing virtuosic technique and the conviction and training of the Black church defined R&B just as much as the genre\u2019s generational love songs and everlasting blues ballads (think the dizzying melisma or extended belts of the \u201990s). But at the turn of the 2010s, a murkier, more ethereal take on the genre emerged that bridged the traditional songwriting machine with access-widening internet hubs like Tumblr and SoundCloud. Led by the likes of Frank Ocean, Jhen\u00e9 Aiko, The Weeknd and Miguel, this new generation of artists began to push R&B into a space that, at least temporarily, seemed to deprioritize more flamboyant displays of vocal prowess in favor of vocal tone and lyrical relatability.<\/p>\n
\n\tAs offshoots like alternative R&B, trap soul and vibe&B have relegated traditional R&B vocal stylings to the back burner, fans have noticed. A week doesn\u2019t go by without some kind of online debate over the general state of vocal ability; quasi viral moments like Chaka Khan\u2019s July\u00a020 COLORS appearance \u2014 where the R&B legend bellowed a triumphant rendition of her classic \u201cThrough the Fire\u201d \u2014 attract social media comments declaring that Artists today aren\u2019t hooting and hollering anymore<\/em>. As we settle squarely into the latter half of the 2020s and bask in the afterglow of a major year for mainstream R&B \u2014 led by 2025 Billboard Hot\u00a0100 top\u00a010 hits like Leon Thomas\u2019 \u201cMutt\u201d and Kehlani\u2019s \u201cFolded\u201d (which both peaked at No.\u00a06) \u2014 is \u00adbigger still better when it comes to R&B vocals?<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cWe\u2019ve been having this conversation for a while now,\u201d says Grammy-winning songwriter-producer Bryan-Michael Cox, who\u2019s helped craft big-voiced genre staples like Mary\u00a0J. Blige\u2019s 2005 smash \u201cBe Without You.\u201d \u201cThere was a period where it was just vibes; we\u2019re almost at that 20-year cycle mark and artists [just] now are bringing vocal styling back to the forefront.\u201d<\/p>\n
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\t\t\t\t\tKehlani Gets Candid With Longtime Pal Leon Thomas About R&B, \u2018Changing the World\u2019 & Her \u2018Sinus Surgery From\u00a0Hell\u2019\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\t\t\t\t\tR&B\/Hip-Hop Power Players: Billboard\u2019s 2026 List\u00a0Revealed\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\t\t\t\t\tMeet the Manager Prioritizing \u2018Investing In People\u2019 \u2014 Like Star Client\u00a0Kehlani\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n\tSo when exactly did intentional vocal styling and general \u00admusicality start fading into the background of mainstream R&B? \u201cDrake messed it up for everybody,\u201d cracks Grammy- and Academy Award-winning producer D\u2019Mile (Bruno Mars, Victoria Mon\u00e9t). Adds Cox: \u201cHe inspired a generation of artists who probably felt like they weren\u2019t powerhouse singers, but the difference is he\u2019s lyrically sound.\u201d Drake \u2014 building on the mid- to late-2000s innovations of Ye, Phonte and T-Pain \u2014 helped establish the melodic rap subgenre as a mainstream force throughout the 2010s, particularly with his breakthrough hit, \u201cBest I Ever Had,\u201d on which he sang his own hook instead of recruiting an R&B singer. But those artists and their contemporaries were operating from the playbook of late-\u201990s and early-aughts hip-hop acts like 50\u00a0Cent, Ja\u00a0Rule and Bone Thugs-N-Harmony. They all infused hip-hop, and bolstered its commercial appeal, with melodies and subject matter that veered into the \u00adterritory of R&B\u2019s leading men. Throw in the popularization of Auto-Tune in hip-hop \u2014 which Ye\u2019s 2008 808s\u00a0& Heartbreak<\/em> album accelerated \u2014 and the way social media effectively broke down the music industry\u2019s traditional gatekeeping structure, and consumers began to prioritize vastly different qualities in R&B than they did in other eras.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cThe tough part about being a \u00adsinger is the emergence of rappers using Auto-Tune and melody,\u201d says five-time Grammy-nominated R&B stalwart Tank. \u201cPeople would rather hear bad or not-so-great singers sing OK than hear good singers sing really good.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tHowever, it\u2019s the general consensus among listeners that the apparent deprioritization of \u201creally good\u201d singing stems from declining attendance at Black churches, once key \u00adcommunity centers where children could hone their vocal talent, musical education and stage presence in front of discerning audiences that understood the value of tough love. \u201cIn the \u201990s, there was still a great church foundation with references to John\u00a0P. Kee, Commissioned, The Winans and the Clark Sisters,\u201d Cox explains. \u201cWe lost a little bit of that church during the [SoundCloud] era.\u201d The queerphobia upheld by Black Christianity has certainly played a part \u2014 shame and judgment have driven a number of talented queer vocalists away from the church over the past few decades \u2014 but D\u2019Mile also contends that \u201cthere are the same amount of people in church, they just don\u2019t get the same shot anymore because they aren\u2019t the type of singers that labels, or the world, are looking for.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI know so many great singers considered \u2018too churchy\u2019 to do mainstream stuff,\u201d he continues. \u201cThey just seem too good \u2014 that\u2019s a problem now. People just want to feel, they don\u2019t want to think or worry about the technical aspects.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
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\n\tIn other words, for consumers today, it\u2019s less about being in awe of Mariah Carey\u2019s riffs, Whitney Houston\u2019s belts or the technical aspects of a record, and more about connecting with artists and looking to their social media presence to strengthen that bond. In a way, superhuman vocals don\u2019t read as \u201cauthentic\u201d to many contemporary listeners because they\u2019re not easily replicable. As the expectations of R&B audiences have shifted, vocal performances have become secondary to lyrical realism. \u201cThe concept of being able to sing was so much more appreciated [in past eras],\u201d Tank says. And, over the last decade, The Weeknd\u2019s stadium-conquering success, Aiko\u2019s critical acclaim and Bryson Tiller\u2019s cross-genre ubiquity proved that less showy vocalists could still become commercial powerhouses.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cThe singers are there; I just feel like they\u2019re not as appreciated as they once were,\u201d D\u2019Mile says. (Perhaps tellingly, several current powerhouse women declined to participate in this story.) \u201cI always go back to Christina Aguilera; everybody knows she can sing her ass off\u2026 but nobody [seems to] want to hit those runs anymore. We\u2019re in a world where people want to be able to easily listen and sing along without focusing on the acrobatics.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tAt the start of the 2020s, \u00adseveral notable R&B crossover hits seemed to signal the emergence of a new era for the genre\u2019s mainstream. Between Grammy-\u00adwinning Hot\u00a0100 hits like Silk Sonic\u2019s \u201cLeave the Door Open\u201d (No.\u00a01), Jazmine Sullivan\u2019s \u201cPick Up Your Feelings\u201d (No.\u00a075), Coco Jones\u2019 \u201cICU\u201d (No.\u00a062), Muni Long\u2019s \u201cHrs\u00a0& Hrs\u201d (No.\u00a016), Beyonc\u00e9\u2019s \u201cCuff It\u201d (No.\u00a06) and Steve Lacy\u2019s \u201cBad \u00adHabit\u201d (No.\u00a01), R&B mainstream hits were defined by more traditional, well-\u00adcrafted vocals. By the time Ryan Coogler\u2019s Oscar-winning Sinners<\/em> rolled around in early 2025, with its Grammy-\u00adwinning compilation soundtrack peaking atop Billboard<\/em>\u2019s Blues Albums chart and thrusting jazz, soul and Delta blues back into the center of pop culture, it felt like a turning point for what works commercially for R&B.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cThe [R&B singles] that are working are very midtempo,\u201d says Tunji Balogun, CEO of Def Jam Recordings, which is currently home to Coco Jones and Teyana Taylor. \u201cIn the \u201990s and 2000s, coming out of that new jack swing era, many of the songs that crossed over had tempo. I\u2019ve noticed some fans bristle when a vocalist wants to make songs with tempo \u2014 and I want to crack the code on [fixing] that.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tWhile Cox, Tank and D\u2019Mile have heard this debate on their side of the industry as artists, Balogun says he comes across this discourse primarily \u201cwithin the online fan conversation.\u201d There\u2019s \u201ca skepticism that the industry doesn\u2019t want R&B to flourish,\u201d he says. \u201c[British Sudanese singer] Elmiene checks all the boxes for R&B purists\u00a0\u2026 he\u2019s living proof that the labels push great R&B, but it takes time and luck for these songs to connect. Most of these songs need a digital moment to coincide with its quality, and that\u2019s not as easy to engineer as people think.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
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\n\tMainstream R&B has always featured vocalists of all stripes, but rising stars like Elmiene, Jai\u2019Len Josey and Durand Bernarr \u2014 whose respective 2026 albums all earned acclaim for their impressive vocals \u2014 are part of what feels like a current recalibration of consumer taste and listening habits. D\u2019Mile also credits stars like Leon Thomas and RAYE with \u201cleaning toward actually singing again\u201d and helping reprogram R&B\u2019s vocal standards.<\/p>\n
\n\tThat level of audience reprograming also extends to pop, where, for the past decade or so, belters have taken a back seat to distinct, often quieter and less robust tones. While top\u00a040 radio certainly loved recent full-throated hits like Benson Boone\u2019s \u201cBeautiful Things\u201d and Teddy Swims\u2019 \u201cLose Control,\u201d those are still outliers as soft, bedroom pop voices dominate, further highlighting the difference from when American Idol<\/em> ruled the zeitgeist and minted new stars throughout the 2000s. And with several R&B hitmakers also writing for the pop world, it\u2019s no surprise that both genres are lacking mainstream vocal powerhouses.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cAs a songwriter for 15 years, I watched people play Black songs, copy them, water it down, sing with Auto-\u00adTune and leave out the runs \u2014 and it goes No.\u00a01. And then, in those same rooms, they claim there\u2019s no budget to send Black artists to top\u00a040 radio,\u201d reflects Grammy-winning singer-\u00adsongwriter Muni Long, who wrote for the likes of Ariana Grande, Kelly Clarkson and Rihanna before stepping out as an artist in her own right. \u201cThank God [label executives] listen to me when I say, \u2018I need y\u2019all to be my partners.\u2019 You can\u2019t do a TikTok dance to \u2018I Will Always Love You.\u2019 If we have a smash record we believe in, I need them to throw the kitchen sink behind it \u2014 and they did with \u2018Made for Me,\u2019\u00a0\u201d Muni\u2019s 2024 single that reached the Hot\u00a0100\u2019s top\u00a020 and spent 22 weeks on the chart. \u201cWe need to tell the world what time it is and stop allowing them to dictate what we do.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tAnd while artists still largely relegate their most ambitious vocals to deep cuts, leaving more straightforward takes for their radio singles, records like \u201cFolded\u201d show it\u2019s possible to strike what Tank describes as \u201cthe balance of a [melody] where you hang with me and [subtle] bits to let you know that I\u2019m still a little different from you [vocally].<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cPeople are diving back into Aretha Franklin, Whitney Houston, Luther Vandross and Chaka Khan, and that\u2019s why they\u2019re in love with Kehlani, Ariana [Grande], Jazmine [Sullivan] and Fantasia,\u201d he continues. According to Luminate, official on-demand U.S. catalog streams for Houston, Vandross and Khan more than doubled in the first half of the 2020s compared with the latter half of the 2010s, while those for Franklin leapt 89%. \u201cWe have our versions of those vocalists; we just have to rally around them and give them the freedom to truly be creative.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tAs younger artists rediscover the vocal magicians of past decades \u2014 and as the rise of AI inspires greater respect for traditional craft and the unique capabilities of actual human voices \u2014 mainstream R&B will likely continue to boast a range of vocalists. But now, the scales are \u00adslightly tipped in favor of singers working in the storied tradition of good old-fashioned flat-footed belters.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cEverybody\u2019s definition of a \u2018great voice\u2019 is very different,\u201d Balogun says. \u201cR&B is the source material for damn near every genre, vocally. We need to do a better job of elevating people whose artistry honors and evokes the origins of the genre; it\u2019s important to celebrate the people who have that natural God-given instrument. But there\u2019s also room for people who have a different approach.\u201d<\/p>\n
This story appears in the Aug. 22, 2026, issue of <\/em>Billboard.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.billboard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/vocalists-cr-melissa-santamaria-2026-bb9-espanol-billboard-1800.jpg?w=1024″] Trending on Billboard There are singers, and then there are sangers \u2014 and the difference is always palpable. For decades, vocalists harnessing virtuosic technique and the conviction and training of the Black church defined R&B just as much as the genre\u2019s generational love songs and everlasting blues ballads (think the dizzying melisma […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[48,226],"class_list":["post-2102974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-billboard-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2102974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2102974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2102974\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2102974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2102974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2102974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Kehlani](\"https:\/\/www.billboard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/cover-kehlani-billboard-2026-bb9-micaiah-carter-1-1800.jpg?crop=0px%2C65px%2C1800px%2C1116px&resize=237%2C147\")
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n![\"R&B\/Hip-Hop](\"https:\/\/www.billboard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/rbhh-power-players-2026-bb9-billboard-1200.jpg?w=237&h=147&crop=1\")
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n![\"David](\"https:\/\/www.billboard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/feature-david-ali-billboard-2026-bb9-micaiah-carter-1-1800.jpg?w=237&h=147&crop=1\")
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