Where have all the tenors gone?

The CBC Radio program Ideas continues to be one of the jewels of Canadian broadcasting. I'll admit that some CBC programing might well be discarded without loss, but this one program is worth the candle.



Tonight's program focused on the unlikely issue 'where have all the tenors' gone? It seems that in times past tenors were common but today tenors are very rare.



The reasons why are not clear -- most likely people have become larger (4 inches in the last 100 years) and have begun puberty much younger (in 1900 puberty was 16 or 17 for boys -- today it is 11 or 12) and these changes have lowered the pitch of male voices. (By the way, the average size of the adult men who stormed the Bastille was the size of average modern Canadian 13 year old girls).



Regardless, the program is a fascinating look at a topic which reflects the changes in the world. As an ambassador to the world, Canada could do much worse that the CBC.