Consider the following translation:
Estabas cantando en voz alta en la ducha.
You were singing loudly in the shower.
Is it correct? I mean is this how a native speaker would translate the sentence in a regular/colloquial conversation? Please provide your country in the answer to help me/others understand if there's any dialectical variation.
(I'm from Northern Spain)
loud in English usually means high volume. That is alto in Spanish, (or sometimes fuerte, particularly if it can be confused with high tone or pitch, which is also alto).
But the expression en voz alta has a subtler meaning: it is not loudly, but just using normal speak volume, I think it would be aloud, or out loud:
Lee el periódico en voz alta. - Read the newspaper aloud.
So:
Estabas cantando en voz alta en la ducha.
would be:
You were singing aloud in the shower.
While:
You were singing loudly in the shower.
would be:
Estabas cantando (muy) alto en la ducha.
Depending on the situation and how to addressed the Audience. I would personally use ...
You were singing loudly in the shower.
-Tu estabas cantando en voz alta en la Regadera
friendly approach slang Tu estabas cantando escandalosamente en la regadera
Here's the part where you used Escandaloso/escandalosamente,Only when you are going to refer to an individual as lazy(I know people in the field that refer to them as loud as a niece way and supposedly professional)
Example...
John is very loudly when it comes work
John es bien escandaloso cuando se requiere trabajar
In this above example you wouldn't use High Voice but rather Escandaloso. I grew at a community where people had little education so individuals refer to others as loud when they really meant lazy . I grew at the outskirt of Michoacan Mexico.
I have also heard people use recioto mean loudly. Estabas cantando muy recio..., for example.
