THE SOPRANOS who raise the roof in gilded opera houses across the world may be swooning this morning when they realise the vocal techniques they have spent years perfecting can be produced with minimal effort by lovelorn gibbons.

Until now, scientists have thought the complexity of the human voice was unique and had developed as a result of specific modifications to our vocal anatomy. However, a study to be published in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology today suggests that it bears an uncanny similarity to the sound of a singing gibbon.

The gibbon’s melody can be heard at distances of more than two miles and is used to sound out potential mates and chat with neighbours in jungles where visibility is often poor. Research into the workings of its vocal cords was carried out by Dr Takeshi Nishimura from the Primate Research Institute at Kyoto University in Japan, and its findings look set to challenge some long-held assumptions.

“Our speech was thought to have evolved through specific modifications in our vocal anatomy,” Dr Nishimura said. “However, we’ve shown how the gibbons’ distinctive song uses the same vocal mechanics as soprano singers, revealing a fundamental similarity with humans.”

His team conducted acoustic investigation on gibbons with helium, a gas useful for studying animal vocal mechanisms because it increases sound speed and resonance frequencies. It showed gibbons consciously manipulating their vocal cords and tract to make distinctive sounds and employing the same process for producing speech as humans.

It also found that with minimal effort gibbons could adopt the complex vocal techniques which are mastered by professional soprano singers and suggests that the development of such complex abilities in humans was not due to unique evolutionary modifications but an acquisition of one of its most sophisticated forms. “This is the first evidence that gibbons always sing using soprano techniques, a difficult vocalisation ability for humans,” Mr Nishimura said. “This gives us a new appreciation of the evolution of speech in gibbons while revealing that the physiological foundation in human speech is not so unique.”