Mr. Garner's soul-based vocals reached back to country and forward to metal.
In late 1974, the Miami Showband's song Clap Your Hands and Stomp Your Feet (featuring O'Toole on lead vocals) reached number eight in the Irish charts.
Music historian Ben Urish recalls hearing the Beatles' Ed Sullivan Show performance of "This Boy" played on the radio a few days after Lennon's murder: "As Lennon's vocals reached their peak ... it hurt too much to hear him scream with such anguish and emotion.
His first recordings in the early 1950s, produced in the soothing jump-blues style of Roy Brown, showed none of the soaring vocal reach that would mark his later singing.
For its vocal reach alone - the murmurs, stammers and repetitions that tease out or accentuate meaning - Astral Weeks is unique in modern popular music.
But on Who Am I and Listen to the Clock on the Wall, the vocal group reached new deep-soul heights.
Just when it seemed as if Barbara Cook had achieved a plateau of vocal perfection reached by only a handful of cabaret performers, this great American singer, who turned 73 on Wednesday, has made another artistic leap forward.
But what a hit – a magical synthesis of Motown's deft pop orchestrations and Ron's earthy, unvarnished vocal that reached No 12 on Billboard's pop charts and remains an unimpeachable joy today.
Her debut single, Sugar Me, released under the name Lynsey de Paul, featured her piano playing as well as high-pitched vocals, and reached No 5.
The group's fragmented grooves and otherworldly, processed vocals, which reached an apotheosis on their brilliant last record, "WIXIW," are an incongruous yet intriguing fit for this ancient ruin.
Read more 9 Full of simmering beats and swaggering vocals, Konnichiwa reached No 2 in the charts and won the Mercury prize, but these achievements seem small fry compared to how the album managed to sell grime to a new generation of fans.
