I agree completely with the sentiment of this thread. I think that of all the songs and bands I listen to, about half are sung/led by females and half by males. But as there are way more males who sing I can infer (and already know) that I much prefer the female voice. There's at least 20 women I would consider writing a piece on for this thread. I'll start with one and maybe come back for others at a later point.
<u>Sandy Denny</u>
Sandy had the best voice I have ever heard. To be honest I think her voice is the most aesthetically pleasing thing I have ever heard. She was around in the sixties singing other people's material in London folk clubs. Very quickly she got snapped up by Fairport Convention who then recorded the album Liege and Lief, which is now regarded as the most influential folk album of all time. She then split up from the band because she was scared of flying abroad to play gigs. She married Trevor Lucas (who you can see with thick red hair playing guitar in one of the following clips and on her right in the above photo) and they formed the band Fotheringay for one album. Then she went solo and died tragically in 1978. She had always been self-conscious about her appearance (although was by no means ugly), and was heavily addicted to alcohol. She began drinking heavily because she thought it would give her the confidence to sing like Janis Joplin, but it just made her voice worse towards the end of her life. She was also an irresponsible mother and used to leave her young daughter in the back of her car while she went to drink all day at the local pub. Eventually her husband took their daughter home to Australia without telling her they were leaving. A few weeks later she fell down the stairs and died of a brain haemorrhage.
She doesn't have much material on YouTube. The first is her playing with Fotheringay.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JlJMI8T57g
This next one is just an audio recording of some of her early demos, when her voice was at its strongest. This is a really good example of the most heavenly singing she was capable of. The second song on there (of two) is regarded by many as her strongest song.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8ZH3lV49aU
Here is a video of some of her solo stuff from later in her career when the drink got to her voice. The songs are still good, but it's not representative of what she was once capable of. I'm only including it because it's the best video of her available.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Rd_gMrmf6g
Many now regard her as Britain's best female singer-songwriter, although she still doesn't have much recognition in popular music. She only performed on Top of the Pops once, because her music was quite underground then and still is (moreso even).
EDIT Also: I have an mp3 uploaded of a brilliantly simple song of hers, called Winter Winds. This is one of my favourite songs of all time and quite hard to find too.
http://indigogogogo.googlepages.com/04WinterWinds.mp3
