If your song only goes an octave, it’s OK
10 Feb 2012 1 Comment
When I first began writing songs, I was barely out of elementary school. I think I was in fourth or fifth grade. My mom was the first to show me how to set a melody to lyrics. She came into my room one night and on my tiny piano keyboard, Mom plunked out a melody to go with some lyrics I’d placed in front of her. It was exciting for me as a little girl to see my own lyrics coming to life in music. They were no longer words on a page. They now had another life.
Don’t ask me what the name of that very first song was. I can’t even remember. Whatever it was, it’s probably buried somewhere in one of my many memory boxes to be dredged up for another time. Maybe for one of my future children when they too come to me and ask, just like I did my mother, how to write a song, and I can show them my first song.
Who knew that would be the beginning of a lifelong love of writing songs! Oh how I whiled away many an afternoon up in my room playing melodies on my little piano keyboard to lyrics I’d just written. My love of songwriting ebbed and flowed a lot over the years, but it was always there. I always had a melody in my head, whether it was a song I’d heard on the radio earlier that day, or a melody that I thought up myself. I’d find myself singing around the house while doing my chores, singing in the shower, singing in the car, wherever. I loved melodies.
I had a very high opinion of my songs. I truly believed that I’d become a major world superstar with the songs I was writing. I remember one song I wrote called “Cognizant,” a word I’d learned from a dictionary. Yes, I liked perusing the dictionaries at home for interesting words to use in my everyday vocabulary. I was one of those kids who liked learning new words in English class. What can I say? :) Anyway, that song had so many random images thrown together, one in particular standing out to me about someone standing in their underwear in the dead of winter, and my asking in the chorus, “Why can’t you be more cognizant,” with a melody that, in retrospect, went ALL over the place. I think the song was about two octaves with a LOT of high notes. Up and down the scales without much of a hook at all. I haven’t heard the song in years, but I remember bits and pieces of it.
Yeah, I’ll take over the world of song with something like that, suuuuuuuuuuuure.
And that gem of a song? I recorded it on my Fisher-Price tape recorder, which looked exactly like this (looking at this picture brings back SO many memories):
Oh boy, this dates me......
I even gave it some album artwork, which I still have tucked away somewhere. It’s only too bad that the tape is forever lost. Either I recorded over it (most likely) or it’s just been lost to the sands of time. Really too bad because I’m very curious to hear, as an adult, how I sounded singing back then. I did find another tape where I sang and played some Christmas carols and HOLY TOLEDO. And not in a good way. So I’m pretty sure it was absolutely horrible, but you know, what I lacked in vocal ability back then I certainly made up for in enthusiasm!
The point is that in remembering all these old songs I wrote, including the aforementioned “Cognizant,” I remember how I went ALL over the place with my melodies. It was made even more so when I started taking voice lessons in high school. I learned how to sing in a classical way, singing Italian arias and German art songs. So I tried to incorporate those kinds of classical melodies into my songwriting, to very mixed results. I’d try to do melodies with huge leaps in the vocal line so I could show off my voice, but I wondered why, when I played back my song, my songs didn’t sound as good as the songs I’d hear on the radio. And I couldn’t put my finger on it.
You might remember when I spoke in a previous post about singing classically over alternative/indie music. Well, that doesn’t work.
It’s taken me a good number of years of writing and writing and writing so many songs to really become a decent melody writer. But isn’t that like anything creative? You have to create lots and lots of utter crap in order to get better. And it’s SO TRUE. My husband tells me I’m getting better. My friends tell me I’m getting better. And some of my loyal YouTube subscribers, over the course of my filming videoblogs of songs in progress, tell me I’m getting better, especially with confidence. But that’s another post. And I know I’m getting better as well.
The songs I’ve written lately that have simple but well-written melodies are the ones that my husband and YouTube subscribers like the most. I’m realizing that a good song doesn’t have to go ALL over the scales to have a well-written and memorable melody. I don’t want to write something monotonous, but I’m realizing more and more that I want to write songs with melodies that people can easily sing along with in the car or rocking out on their iPod. And also: there’s no need to show off my vocal prowess (especially my newfound range an octave above middle C) in absolutely every single song I write. Especially if the kind of song you’re writing doesn’t call for being sung all over the place.
Keeping that in mind has made songwriting even easier for me! Every week, a song comes pouring out of me in a burst of creativity. The buzz I get from working on a new song that’s going well is something I can’t even fully describe. I feel like I’m constantly getting new songs, at least a song a week. And that’s why I started filming weekly video blogs. I wanted to show off my new songs to the world, warts and all.
And on that note, I’m off to write more of some new lyrics in French that I started last night. :D Here’s my YouTube channel with all my video blogs, by the way:
Talk to everyone later! :)
A song out of thin air
12 Jan 2012 1 Comment
in blog, music Tags: blog, music
Driving home last night, I was caught in a torrential downpour that led me to drive no more than 55 mph on the highway. Even going a mile over that felt unsafe. Unfortunately, rain usually equals heavy traffic, especially with all the tunnels in my area. Hampton Roads is connected by bridges and tunnels, and you’d think that people would finally learn how to drive carefully tunnels, as in not immediately slowing down while going through tunnels causing everyone else behind them to slow down too. But I digress.
So I got caught in bumper-to-bumper traffic about a half a mile from the tunnel. I had to go from a comfortable 55 mph down to a snail’s pace for about thirty minutes. Just to go half a mile. UGH.
At least I had music to keep me company. Just in the last thirty minutes I sat crawling along the highway with all the other cars, I had two songs that randomly came up on my iPod that had to do with water and rain. “Flood” by Jars of Clay, and the obscure 80s song “Wildwood” by Trees, a song that begins with the sound of rain falling. My iPod must’ve known what the weather was like at that moment.
One song in particular really caught me amidst the random music mix. It was the song “All This Time” by Sting, a song that I enjoy very much but haven’t played as much as I’d like. Just haven’t been in much of a Sting mood lately.
Since I had nothing else to do except let off the brake every few minutes to crawl another fifty feet to the next car in front of me, I sat and listened intensely to the song. This was the first time I really listened to the lyrics and music other than just singing along to the chorus as usual. For all its peppiness, the song is actually quite thoughtful. There are different layers to the lyrics that really intrigued me. For one thing, I’d heard that the song was written about his father’s death like most of the album it was from (The Soul Cages). So there’s the element of the narrator dealing with his father’s death and wishing he could give him a simple burial at sea instead (“if I had my way, take a boat from the river and I’d bury the old man/I’d bury him at sea.”) Then there’s the obvious element of the cycle of life going on and on like the river he mentions in the song. (“And all this time, the river flowed endlessly to the sea”).
And now for the song itself:
So during the song, I began to get an idea for a song of my own.
It started with a line. In times like these, I grab my phone and type out the line before it floats away. Later that evening, I began fleshing out the idea for these new lyrics. Earlier today, I perused through Logic for any random snippets of songs that I began but never finished, and I found a song I started with a simple drum beat and piano riff, but put on the shelf for some other time.
As I played the song fragment through my tinny computer speakers, it hit me. I have to use this song background for these new lyrics. It’s pensive and thoughtful. Perfect! Even if I do have fifty thousand of these different song fragments sitting here on my hard drive, it’s a good thing I keep them all for times like this! Then came the vocal melody that I practiced while puttering around the house for about an hour, then recorded in my studio. A minute and fifty-one seconds of musical bliss, with an intro, two verses and a chorus, all recorded.
So by dinnertime tonight, I had half a new song done, when only twenty four hours before, I had nothing. Talk about creating a song out of thin air! I’d had days before when I’d record most of a song. However this was different. Not many of my other songs have ever come out this fully formed in such a short period of time. When I let my husband, who is essentially my producer, in on what I’d recorded, he told me that other than the chorus (which admittedly does need work with the melody), he absolutely loved it and I should keep going with it! He even suggested that I keep the demo vocals since they fit with the sad subject matter.
So we’ll see what happens with this one. :)
Pitch Perfect or Not?
02 Jan 2012 1 Comment
in blog, music Tags: blog, music
Last night I reviewed a song for which I’d recorded a full vocal and piano part about two weeks ago. It’s a song whose melody came to me a few months ago in a burst of inspiration as I sat at my keyboard one day. The lyrics had been sitting on my computer drive since sometime before Thanksgiving 2010 but I hadn’t done anything with them yet.
It’s a song that I played on one of my previous videoblogs, which you can view here called “That’s Why I’m Here,” which you can view here:
I was revisiting this song and when I listened to what I’d recorded, I was unsure of my vocal. I was flat on some notes in the chorus and first verses and another part sounded like I was trying to sing too many syllables in too little space. My husband was sitting next to me on his computer as I played the song and partway through the first chorus, he sat up and watched my computer screen as the Logic project played my song through my tinny laptop speakers.
He then told me that I should consider this song done and keep this song the way it is. Listening to some of my flat notes, I wasn’t so sure. I asked if he was sure and he nodded with his eyebrows raised.
“I’ll be honest. You’re not hitting every note on this song. But that’s fine because this is an emotionally raw song. You’re singing something that comes from a deep emotion, and if you hit every note, it wouldn’t sound as sincere.”
OK, perhaps not exactly those words, but that was the basics of what he told me.
Within five minutes of tweaking some EQ on my vocal (lower some of the very high frequencies and balancing the lower end) and a few other mastering tools, I had a completely new song that I was very proud of! One of my best songs too, if I do say so myself!
Hearing my husband tell me to keep my slightly imperfect performance in the song got me thinking about things. Is it better to have an emotional song sound absolutely perfect, with every note hit dead on and every bit of legato and rhythm not even a touch out of place? Or is it better to have a vocal that cracks and falls sharp or flat because of underlying emotions, so that it goes better with the subject matter?
When I think about this, I’m reminded of a very popular song that I heard a LOT on the radio as a child (and I know this dates me!). It was hard to escape Celine Dion’s version of “The Power of Love,” between my parents playing her album with that song at home and in the car (on a cassette player) and hearing it on the radio wherever I went. You know the song and if you don’t, you’d recognize it if you heard it.
“Cause I’m your laaaaadyyyyyyy, and you are my maaaaaannnnn…..”
Celine Dion was not the first person to sing that song.
The song was originally written in the early 80s and first recorded by Jennifer Rush, someone who’s not too well-known on my side of the world (strange, since she’s American; seems she had bigger success elsewhere). Then Air Supply did a version for one of their albums and was released around the same time as Jennifer’s version. Then Laura Branigan sang it.
Some years after hearing Celine Dion’s rendition, I became a fan of Laura Branigan, who sang a version of that song some five years before Celine Dion took the song to the top of the charts all over the world. Her version is not as well-known but ultimately, I think her version is the best for the sheer emotion that she shows in her voice. It was only a minor hit, I’m told, without even a music video to promote it.
I’m not denying Celine Dion’s vocal abilities (I wish I could sing like her, but then again, don’t we all?) but her version feels too polished. While she hits the notes well and belts out the higher notes with gusto, I don’t feel much emotion behind the words as they come out of her mouth. There’s no quivering of the notes to sound like she’s scared but willing to give in. I feel like it’s sung as words on a page.
“The Power of Love” is a vulnerable song. A perfect vocal performance on something like this just doesn’t feel sincere to me. Laura’s voice cracks and she’s definitely off on a few notes. Her voice quivers in fear and it sounds like she’s on the verge of tears through the latter half of the song. Her version absolutely grips me in a way that Celine’s song doesn’t.
As a side note, some years after becoming a fan of Laura, I saw her sing live at HersheyPark and I couldn’t believe how raw her voice still was. Never mind that I was one of the youngest people in attendance who was there to hear her! After the show, I had the opportunity to meet her (there’s a picture of the two of us standing together, but I unfortunately can’t find it) and even told her that I wish I could’ve heard her sing that song because it was so emotional and I loved it. She signed my CD and said, “Maybe next time.”
Of course there was no next time, since Laura Branigan died a few years later of a brain aneurysm in her sleep.
For comparison purposes, here’s Laura’s version:
And the world-famous version sung by Celine:
Back to the subject at hand.
I believe the answer to my question is that it depends on the song. Light and happy songs should be as perfect as they can be because the sour notes would ruin the song and mood. But for songs with emotional and pleading lyrics, like The Power of Love, an imperfect main vocal is more sincere and fits the song better. Singing is more than just stringing together notes. Singing is about telling the story of the song, like playing the part of a character in a movie or play. You want the audience to feel what you are singing about and to get into your song.
Take another one of my own songs called “Harbor.” That song came to me from a deep place through constant soul-searching and looking for God. For years I’d been on the edge of becoming a Christian but never went fully over the edge into it. I wasn’t ready to completely give myself up to God and Jesus. Then I came to a dark time in my life a few years ago where I realized that I needed something else in my life, something to show that I wasn’t the only one alone in this universe and that someone was looking out for me besides my family and friends.
I had tears coming down my cheeks as I sang that song in my home studio. And I know because of that, I went flat on some of the notes. When I played it back, I almost deleted those takes with my voice cracking and falling off the notes in places. But I didn’t delete them. Instead, I left them in. And I think it sounds all the better for it. My imperfect vocal take fit the subject matter, where the narrator is at first scared but finally gives in. Giving yourself up and placing your trust in God, or anyone for that matter, is a difficult thing to do, after all.
Well, this post ended up being longer than I anticipated. Almost 1300 words!
More Happy New Year wishes to everyone, by the way! :)
The Importance of Being Loud
01 Jan 2012 1 Comment
To say that Kate Bush is one of my favorite music artists is an understatement. She is a major musical influence for my musical endeavors and I have devoured every piece of music she’s ever written and released. And do I ever wish that she had released even more music! I love the worlds that she creates within her songs and the textures that she uses to bring her point across to the listener. Sometimes this worlds are a little strange and dissonant, like all the songs on her Dreaming album from 1983. Her music isn’t mainstream pop music by any means. But that’s part of why I like her. She demands your attention. You’re not just a passive listener when it comes to her music.
About a year ago for fun, I recorded and mixed my own cover of one of her b-sides, a self-penned song in French called Ne t’enfuis pas, meaning Don’t Fly Away in French. Despite the dated production, I enjoy the melody and the mysterious lyrics of the song. Yesterday afternoon I went hunting for more Kate Bush song that I hadn’t heard before when I found a fan-made video for the “original mix” of Ne t’enfuis pas.”
For once, something of Kate’s that I HADN’T heard before!
This original mix made its way onto her single There Goes a Tenner back in the early 80s and apparently was remixed with new vocals a few years later. That new vocal version is the one I’m most familiar with.
All I can say is that it’s no wonder this original mix was later redone. You can barely hear her main vocal!! Were the producers and engineers on this song deaf? Did Kate, the notorious perfectionist, let that flaw slip through so that she could meet the record company’s deadline for releasing a single and she couldn’t spend more time on it?
Take a listen here. This video has embedding disabled so you have to click the link to watch it on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2qN9HmPo-E
And for comparison purposes, here’s the remixed version with supposed new vocals:
She still sounds a little forced vocally like she’s trying too hard (the vibrato is a bit much in places) but at least you can hear her in this one! I’m surprised that Kate would’ve let that first version through.
Just hearing that Kate Bush song reminded me of how important volume is to a song. Being able to hear the star of the show over the background music. Having everything balanced so that one instrument doesn’t overwhelm the main vocals and everything else.
Earlier yesterday I played around with a new song I’m recording. I finally turned the vocal tracks down to a nice volume so that it would blend with the music, only to have my husband, who listen to everything I do to give me feedback, tell me the vocals were still too loud and my voice was overwhelming the music.
This wasn’t the first time this has happened. Truth is that I’m not the best judge of hearing. I never have been.
That’s because I only hear 40% in my left ear.
I was diagnosed as hard of hearing while I was in elementary school and as soon as the audiologists discovered my deficiency, it came as a relief to my teachers and my parents. It explained why I didn’t pay attention in class (because I couldn’t hear the teacher) and perhaps why I was a bit socially maladjusted (because I couldn’t hear social cues). Though I was probably socially awkward more because of my attitude that I would act however I wanted to like wearing biker shorts, which got me a lot of flack from the other kids because I wasn’t wearing what was “cool,” and listening to classical music instead, than by poor hearing. But I digress.
I never let my poor hearing stop me though. If anything, it made me work harder. I took French all through high school and aced every listening activity that was required of me, much to my counselor’s dismay. She repeatedly told me I shouldn’t take French because it requires listening activities and therefore I wouldn’t do well with it.
Guess which was my favorite subject in school though. French all around. Listening activities never bothered me and I always did well. I was determined to do well because of what my counselor has said. I wanted to show her that I COULD do it.
I suppose then that it’s strange for someone like me to thus enjoy recording and writing music. After all, my lack of hearing no doubt distorts the way I hear sound. I have mixed some songs that I thought sounded balanced and great, only to have my husband tell me that my vocal was too loud or everything is out of balance. That’s why I consider my husband my second set of ears when it comes to mixing my music. In fact, as I type this, my husband is equalizing the mix for a new song.
So why do I record songs if I have such bad hearing?
Because sitting up there in my little home studio creating a song from scratch and fragments of ideas makes me feel happy and accomplished.
Because I constantly get new ideas for my writing, from conversations, from listening to favorite artists, from movies, and I can’t just keep it all inside. I was the kind of kid who was perfectly happy sitting at her computer for hours typing stories into Ami Pro (Ami Pro, boy does that date me!). If I got bored in class, I’d write a poem. If I heard an interesting turn of phrase in a conversation, I’d scramble for a piece of paper to write it down to use for later (nowadays, I reach for my phone instead). And I’d write a poem after something major happened to me so I could get out my feelings.
Because I am a creative soul.
Everyone has their strengths. Mine is in creating.
And most of all, because I don’t let my hearing get me down and stop me from doing what I love. Everything else about me works. I’m perfectly healthy in so many ways. So what if one thing doesn’t really work the way it should?
So I’ve just learned to accept that’s how I am and have compensated for it. I can’t do anything to change it (though it would be nice!), so I have learned to live with my poor hearing. I make sure friends and family tap me on the shoulder when we’re in a crowded room and they need my attention. I always walk on people’s left sides so I can hear them through my good (right) ear. I hold the phone to my right ear instead. I’ve learned to sing well through years of practice and hours of voice lessons and feedback from teachers. As for making songs, I have my husband to help me with mixing and equalizing and he doesn’t mind at all helping me achieve my creative goals. And I do the same for him.
This year promises to be a great one for creating. I have half an album completed with new songs constantly being written every day. I’m a creator, it’s what I do.
Speaking of new years, Happy New Year 2012!
And I’m off now to go work on part of a song that I started last night. Always creating!
A happy holidays with plenty of thoughts
23 Dec 2011 Comments Off
First of all, I wish everyone happy holidays, wherever you may be!! I’ve been getting better about buying all my presents earlier each year, so I’m glad I won’t have to make any mad dashes over to the mall to get any last-minute gifts! I like to avoid the major holiday rush when I can. :D
So some thoughts came to me as I’ve been writing more and more songs for my next album.
So far this is turning into a very piano-driven project, more so than I ever thought. And I’m loving it! I’ve really taken to the piano this last year and a half. And all of it has been self-taught. I already knew how to read and write music. It was just putting both my melodies and piano playing at the same time that I needed to work on. And I’m still working on it. I’m no Tori, though I’m not set out to become the next Tori by any stretch of the imagination.
Overall, I’m finding that songwriting and singing while playing is far easier with my keyboard than it ever was with my guitar. All the keys are laid out there for me to play with. For chords on the guitar, you have to have a certain fingering for them or you don’t have the correct chord. All of the notes are not easily laid out for you in the same way as piano, if that makes any sense.
It’s interesting to see this new direction. When I began taking songwriting seriously, I started off on guitar. I liked the ease of carrying it around with me. That’s not really something you can easily do with a keyboard. I also loved the sound as I strummed the strings and fingerpicked an accompaniment. I also liked that I was setting myself apart from other female singer/songwriters. I wanted to be different. I didn’t see many women out there rockin’ on the guitar. I wanted to be KT Tunstall more than A Fine Frenzy.
So buying my keyboard was a complete impulse buy. Before I went to BJ’s for groceries with my husband one weekend, I had no intention of coming out with a $200 Yamaha keyboard. But one stroll through the electronics section made me decide to just go for it. I’d always wanted to take up the piano for real and learn to play things beyond just Chopsticks or the bassline and melody for Heart and Soul. Since then, I’ve written countless songs on that keyboard and can even play the first movement of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata. Pretty good for a year and a half of teaching myself!
I’ll never get rid of my guitars, but I don’t intend to play them very often. I’ll still take them out every so often to tune and strum them, but I just haven’t taken to it like I have with piano. My fingers don’t hurt after playing piano for hours like they did with guitar. At least pressing down on the keys doesn’t cause calluses to form after a while on my fingers.
So I’ve found a new favorite instrument. And that’s fine. My husband has been talking about wanting to learn guitar for ages, so I’ll keep my guitar around. And for future children too. With a musical mommy, they certainly will learn all about music!
Being that most of my songs these days are becoming more piano-driven, this also means my music is becoming a little more simple. Beforehand I was content with creating complex soundscapes that couldn’t be easily replicated on a piano live. That’s why some of my earlier Ustream shows were just me singing to a backing track.
But I’m starting to like simplicity. Why go for huge sound atmospheres when the song’s emotion doesn’t really require it? When I over think things, I tend to lose sight of the song’s emotion. I don’t let the song just breathe. Instead I try to suffocate it under layers of synthesizers and wonder why it sounds cold and soulless in the end.
Artists usually start off simple before going weird and experimental. I seem to be doing the opposite!
Speaking of simplicity, here’s a demo of a song I’m working on. I’ve recorded a very good demo of this already and it sounds not too different from what you hear here:
So now I’m off to hit the hay and do some more piano playing tomorrow. Woot! :D
Gaining more confidence
14 Dec 2011 Comments Off
in blog
Pretty simple title for this post that encapsulates what has been on my mind for the last few weeks.
Confidence.
I’ve always been a strange one when it comes to confidence. Then again, I suppose everyone is. For instance, as a teen and young adult, I had no problems going up to a guy I liked and asking him out. After all, that’s how I ended up getting my husband! I was bold and unafraid. And on a different side of the coin, I certainly didn’t mind making a fool of myself in front of my students when I was a teacher for a few years. You have to be with the young (we’re talking 1st through 5th graders) students I had. And as a child, I had no problems getting up in front of people and singing my heart out. I have a vague memory of trying to imitate opera singers I heard on TV and singing so loudly that my parents came upstairs to see what I was doing.
I discovered early on that I loved singing and I’d do it every chance I could: singing along with the radio, writing my own little songs and recording them on my Fisher-Price recorder. In 6th grade I wanted to sing “I Love You Always Forever” at a talent recital. And was told by the teachers that it was too mature for a little 12 year old to be singing. Looking back on it, yeah, it probably was. Though by today’s standards, the lyrics of that song are pretty tame! Eventually I joined the choir in high school. Not middle school because that was reserved for band. Probably a good thing I didn’t join my middle school choir because I used to hear that the teacher was a real bitch. So I stuck with the band.
I was in the clarinet section, for the record.
Then something happened along the way.
I became more self-conscious.
I’d go to open my mouth in front of people to sing and I wouldn’t sound nearly as sure of myself as I did when I was completely alone.
As I reflect on it, I think it was a combination of hearing that I shouldn’t try to be like Celine Dion or Whitney Houston because I didn’t have the voice for it as well as listening to all the adult contemporary music my parents would play at home and wishing I sounded as good as what I’d hear on the radio. So I became quieter and didn’t sing out nearly as much. In choir, I’d sing just loud enough to blend in with the rest of the members, and I never tried out for solos. You could also forget about going out with friends to sing karaoke. I would’ve never done that because I was way too self-conscious of how I sounded. Why even try if I can’t sound nearly as good as the pros?
Voice lessons helped a little bit, but I still had problems. I was classically trained, so my classical voice over pop and rock music sounded awful. Honestly, the only time that classical singing sounds good over anything but classical music is in metal, with groups like Nightwish, Within Temptation, Epica and (some) Lacuna Coil (husband helped me out with some of those names since I’m not a metal listener). So when I’d go to sing my own music, I’d sing it with my classical style and playing it back, it would sound bad but I couldn’t pinpoint why. After all, I’d been taught the proper way to sing, so if I was singing properly, why didn’t it sound very good? Gee, I must not be very good at all then, I’d think to myself.
And further down the hole I’d go.
Only after my husband gently told me that it was in the way I was singing, did I start to change my style of singing and then like what I was hearing. I realized there is a time and place for classical singing and that it doesn’t work all the time. Don’t believe me? Try singing something like Katy Perry’s “Hot and Cold” with veeerrry well-raaaaahhhooounded vowels and you’ll see what I mean.
“Yoooou’re haaaaht thayn yooou’re cooohld, yooooou’re yaysss thayn yoooou’re nooooh……”
Or how about “Born This Way”?
“Ahm ohn the raaht traahck, bay-beee ah waaahs booohrn thees waaaaay….”
You try doing it without laughing. If you can, I’ll give you a copy of my upcoming album for free when it’s released. Shoot me an e-mail.
But you see what I mean? It just doesn’t sound good. It sounds too proper. And pop music is all about…. well, not being proper. It’s about letting go and just singing the blasted words. Why does it work over loud metal guitars? It’s the contrast of hard music and beautiful singing. It’s one of those things that just works.
As for me…..
I’m just now beginning to see the sky as I climb out of that hole.
It’s taken years of undoing but I’m able to sing in a more pop style than I could’ve done as a teen taking classical voice lessons. So I’m now enjoying what I hear when I play back my songs on my computer. I will give that there are some valuable lessons I got from those classical lessons such as breath support and warm-ups. You’ll never see me launch right into singing for one of my online concerts without doing some scales on “loooo” or “laaah” first. Runners always warm up their muscles before launching themselves onto the track for a race. So it is with singers.
I also began taking voice lessons again about a year and a half ago so I could improve my range and confidence. And that has been helping a lot! I realized that I was singing lower than I should’ve been. I can almost hit a C two octaves above middle C on the piano and can go as low as F# below middle C. So that’s almost a two and a half octave range. Not bad! Though sometimes I can even hit a D almost one octave below middle C after I’ve eaten a lot of chocolate; can you tell I’ve tried that? :P :) I know I still have a ways to go with improving my voice and music, but I have the raw talent to make it work.
It also helps to have encouragement from friends and family. My husband is my biggest fan and critic. When I’m working on a song, I let him take a listen and he tells me in brutal honesty what I should work on and what I should omit. He’s not Simon Cowell but he’s honest without being rude. At first I was terrible about taking criticism, but I’m getting a HELL of a lot better about it.
It’s about letting go and enjoying singing. I finally did karaoke one night a few months ago and realized that I really enjoyed it! I’d forgotten how much I truly enjoyed singing. Which led me to joining SingSnap and becoming a member so I can do karaoke all the time! Though I still prefer to focus on my own original songs. :)
All of this to say that it’s been a long journey… And I’ve realized the more you practice, the better you become. You write and write so you can become a better writer because not every piece you write is going to be the greatest. And you sing and sing so you can become a better singer. I highly doubt that Florence of Florence + the Machine records her first take of singing a song for the very first time (after never hearing the song before going into that big, expensive studio) and says, “All right I’m done.”
No. It doesn’t work like that. It takes practice. Hours and hours of singing the same part over and over again until you almost want to shoot yourself if you have to hear that song again. At which point, you take a break from it and come back to it with fresh ears and eyes. I can’t tell you how many times I have had to do that with a song.
And I’ll end it here for the night and go get some ice cream. Or play some more piano. Whichever I feel like doing. :D
Till next time….
VidBlog
13 Dec 2011 Comments Off
So at least one of my future Ann Feld ideas has come to fruition.
I put up my first video blog just before Thanksgiving on my YouTube channel!
My idea with this video blog is to post a video every week of either a cover or an original song that I’m working on. The covers are easy to do of course, and just in the last three weeks that I’ve been doing them, I’ve gotten some more subscribers and people paying attention to my music. It’s not too many but more than I was getting before.
The originals, however, are harder to do.
I’m a horrible perfectionist as I’ve stated before, so I don’t like putting out product that I don’t feel is ready yet. My video blog is going to change this. It’ll be my way of showing off my songs as they evolve from draft to finished product, warts and all.
So far I’ve posted three vidblogs.
The first two are covers of two beautiful French songs, and the third, and most recent one, is an original that may or may not make my next album. I think it has the best chorus I’ve ever written, IMHO.
I’m also going to be blogging here more often. :D In fact I have something I’ll be doing into more detail about tomorrow.
Musical thoughts
21 Oct 2011 Comments Off
in blog, music, news Tags: blog, feature, music
A good evening to everyone, wherever you may be! :)
So I’m continuing to write new songs and I’m SO EXCITED about how well they are coming along!! My goal is to record at least two dozen songs for my next album and then pick the best ones from that bunch. As it stands now, I have 9 songs that are more or less completed. Some still need some tweaks and some are in the can and don’t need any more tweaks.
It’s going to be an interesting array of songs to choose from, let me just say that. I listen to a lot of different music from electronic (my husband plays a lot of Moby, BT, and Portishead around the house) to pure pop (gotta love Kylie Minogue for the sheer fun of her music!) to indie rock to singer songwriters like Tori Amos and even French pop. Inevitably, some of those musical styles end up in my songs after being surrounded by them all the time. Not a bad thing at all! For example, two of my songs have a Portishead groove to them, while another is completely piano and voice like A Fine Frenzy, and another has an Ingrid Michaelson quirky vibe to it.
It’s truly exciting to see and hear such great things going on! I’m becoming so much more confident in my voice and songwriting and it shows. Which leads me into my next thing:
I’m thinking of doing a video blog detailing some of my songwriting and recording sessions, showing the world how I record and letting people listen to clips of what I’m working on! Right now in my life, I have a lot of personal things going on so I probably won’t get to filming anything for a few weeks, but I intend to very soon! :)
Stay tuned to this space and I’ll put up something very soon! :)
New Directions
14 Aug 2011 Comments Off
So I realize it’s been a while since I’ve updated my site. What can I say: it’s summer and therefore, I’ve had more time to catch up on things I’ve neglected to do throughout the year when I was at work, like reading, spending time with friends and family, not to mention vacationing!! :) Hence why my site hasn’t been updated as often in the last few months.
All the while, I’ve been slowly working on new songs. In a few weeks, I want to release a few instrumentals and a vocal track or two that I’ve been working on. I’ve just been slow to work because not only am I enjoying my summer, but also I admit I’m a perfectionist when it comes to my music. I figure that if I’m going to be putting it out on the internet for consumption, I want it to be well-done!
As I’ve been recording some of these new songs, I’m also having a lot of fun toying around with some ideas for my next musical direction. I’ve been getting better at using the effects of Logic to make my songs sound even more professional, and I have also been using my piano for composing more often.
Then a few days ago, I found out about The Smiths Project, an ambitious project done by a woman named Janice Whaley who decided to record every single song ever recorded by the Smiths as a cappella pieces, using no other instruments except her voice, not even the drums. We’re talking about over 70 songs she recorded through 2010. WOW!
What especially drew me to the project was not just her a cappella treatment, but also that I myself was a big fan of the Smiths in way back high school (gosh was it really that long ago??) and I wanted to hear how some of my personal favorites were reinterpreted. I honestly have no other words to say except WOW! She sings the main vocal lines well, but she also used layer upon layer to imitate Johnny Marr’s jangly guitar lines and some of the other riffs in the songs. It’s obvious that a lot of time and effort went into this project and I’m enthralled listening to the results. For the last few days, I’ve been enjoying listening to Janice’s takes on songs that were important to me during my adolescence, like “How Soon Is Now,” “Well I Wonder,” “What Difference Does It Make”…..
And it got me thinking about my own music. The idea of using the human voice in music for something more than just singing fascinates me. I’m talking about recording layers of voices to sound like a choir, or making sounds into the microphone to imitate instruments. The human voice is capable of producing so many different sounds so why not use that ability in music?
And I’ve already done it to some extent. For example, on Welcome Back to the Aquarium in the song “Purple,” I used some vocal layers that were nothing more than me making percussive sounds in the microphone, but which were then tweaked to sound spacey and airy. On one of my latest songs “Harbor,” in wanting to make my voice sound like a storm to fit the song’s metaphor, I wailed into the microphone and made those sounds part of my background vocals. It’s just that I never felt comfortable doing something completely a cappella because it’s so new to me and I wasn’t very comfortable using my voice for anything other than singing.
Listening to Janice’s covers has inspired me however to take a leap and give a cappella a try. After all, she even said herself on her website that she had wanted to be a singer but gave up on it and The Smiths Project was her way of fulfilling that dream, taking a leap into doing something she’d always wanted to do. My goal is this: I would like to try recording my own songs as a cappella as possible (my voice imitating drums and percussion) with only piano behind me. I’ve already begun recording an a cappella cover of “Running Up That Hill,” so we’ll see how this idea goes! :)
If nothing comes of this idea for me, oh well, it was a good experiment. I however think this will be very successful! ;-) :)
A Return to Old Music
19 May 2011 Comments Off
So I decided to revisit some old music.
I released my first album “Welcome to the Aquarium” in late 2009/early 2010 after recording and fiddling around with my songs for about six months. At the time, I was just getting into seriously recording my music on the computer and was into GarageBand. During the recording sessions, I purchased Logic Express, and to be honest, I really didn’t know what I was doing exactly with making a good recording. I didn’t know what all the features and buttons really did, so when I went back to listen to my first album a few months later, I began feeling like my old songs could’ve been a lot better! The mixing was horrible (certain tracks were too loud or stifled) and the vocals were stifled by effects that I didn’t quite understand how to use in the program.
In short, it was definitely one of those “if I’d only known then what I know now” moments!
Thinking back on my old music, even though I recorded those songs barely 2 years ago, a lot has changed since then. For one thing, I am now a much better mixer and am more familiar with all the buttons and wonderful features in Logic Express; thus my songs sound much more professional, an amazing feat given that I record exclusively at home, not at an expensive recording studio!
I also started taking voice lessons last year, so my singing tone has improved significantly. In addition to weekly lessons, I performed several times at open mic night at Aromas in Newport News, so I became more confident in singing and performing for other people besides just my husband, friends, and my cats!
Sometime late last year, for fun one Saturday, I decided to rerecord some vocals for one of my songs, “When I’m Gone.” I liked how things started sounding, but I got caught up in my new music so I abandoned my re-recordings, wanting to move on to newer music.
But last month, I decided to come back to my idea of rerecording my vocals on my old music and tweaking the mixing levels to make my songs sound better. And thus “Welcome Back to the Aquarium” was born!
To say that I’m happy with how my old music sounds now is an understatement! For the first time, I really love my old music, and I’m proud of how far I’ve come. And I’m so happy to share it with everyone!
The album is called “Welcome Back to the Aquarium,” and contains 9 tracks: 5 are redone songs from my first album Welcome to the Aquarium (“Fade Into Me” already had a rerecorded version available on “Coming Up For Air,” so that one is not included on this collection) and includes 4 instrumentals of my songs! Pretty cool, huh?? I just submitted it to be put on iTunes in the next few days, so be on the lookout for it!
I will also have the album available for purchase on my Bandcamp page as well complete with a digital booklet that includes lyrics and album credits! Again, pretty cool, huh?? :D
I look forward to this new release coming up on iTunes and I can’t wait for you all to hear it (the few people who read this site haha :D). Enjoy! :)
