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HELP WITH SINGING
james.powells@sky.com |
SINGING:
We will cover all aspects of singing. I can supply printed sheets
covering:
Singing is like playing golf, snooker
or any other skilled pastime: to do it well you have to respect that
it needs work and regular practise.As far as the voice is concerned
it’s very much a case of “use it or lose it”. Even a week without
exercising your vocal chords will mean that you don’t have the
quality you had a week ago.
I used to sing in social clubs and the pattern went like this: At
that time I sang Saturdays and Sundays and not in between so on a
Saturday I quickly found out I had no power in my voice as I hadn’t
“worked” it for 6 days. This was actually embarrassing and it
doesn’t matter what kind of microphone you use it’s only going to
amplify what comes out of your mouth and if it’s sub-performance
then that’s what will come out. Having said that, I bought a really
good Beyer microphone in 1989 for £200 and it has been a great
investment.
I’d sometimes travel an hour or so to a club so I used to sing in
the car and do scales as I knew that if I didn’t there would be no
power. I found that as I had “sung my voice in” on the Saturday I
always sang much better on the Sunday. The idea of resting your
voice for a performance only applies if you have a cold or some
illness or if you really have been singing a great deal and you know
that your vocal chords are “tired”.
The more you sing the more you stretch your vocal chords and you’ll
find that you can get those low or high notes just a bit easier.
When the Beatles first went to Hamburg they’d start off singing
songs in one key and after a long spell there, they’d end up singing
them much higher due to the stretching of their vocal chords.
It’s essential of course that you sing from your Diaphragm and not
your throat (you’d find you go hoarse after half an hour if you just
try to sing load by just shouting from your throat).
STARTING:
The best best starting point is to find out your own vocal range.
i.e. Tenor, Baritone, Alto or whatever.
The normal range for most untrained singers is about two octaves.
This means that if you start from your lowest note which can be
heard with a reasonable volume and sing Doh, Ray, Me, Fah, Soh, Lah,
Tee, Doh and keep going up again Ray, Me, Fah, Soh, La, Tee, Doh you
will have sung two octaves and very importantly have found your top
note which is a good thing to register in your mind as you will use
this time and time again. You will need a musical instrument of some
sort to find out what your notes are. Mine is G to G two octaves
above.
If you have managed the two octaves (or just about) then that is
good start as many songs can be sung without going out of this range
and you would just need to find out which key is best for you. It
may not be the same as the singer you heard singing it. More about
keys later.
Don’t be fooled about songs though. If you take what sounds like a
fairly straightforward country song like glen Campbell’s Rhinestone
Cowboy, it covers exactly two octaves. i.e. when sung in the key of
C the lowest note is G and the highest is G two octaves above. It is
quite demanding to sing this REALLY WELL if you haven’t had voice
coaching or are lucky enough to have a natural very good range. On
the other hand Diana Ross’s “When you tell me that you love me” ihas
a HUGE range as it has a middle eight which goes way up into a
higher key. I couldn’t sing this song the way it was written because
of the range and I don’t know anyone who could. To do this needs a
great amount of voice coaching and even then it would be a real
challenge for any singer.
The lesson is to pick songs within your capabilities.
KEYS:
There is a misconception about keys that people sing in. You should
always know which key any song is in. Some beginners think they just
sing in one key which is not the case at all. I sing lots of songs
in G but also sing songs in ALL OTHER KEYS. e.g. C,D,E,F,A, etc. It
just depends on what notes are in the song. You may find you start
singing a song and it goes too high or too low. Doesn’t mean you
can’t sing it. You need to find out what key is best for you and
you’ll need help with this.
SINGING IN PUBLIC:
There is a great joy in singing generally but I think that we all
have to admit that singing in public is an EGO thing. We love it
when the audience gives genuine positive feedback and it creates a
high which we enjoy. If we are not prepared and it goes badly, it
can shatter our confidence so best to be fully prepared before
performing anything in public.
When you sing at home with no noise around, you can hear every low
note and lots of singers who haven’t sung in public don’t realise
that when they sing in public with background noise etc the low
notes may not be heard and quite simply the whole performance can be
ruined. You need to be fully aware of this. Best to practice at home
in the key that you will sing it in public. If you have neighbours
who will hear you at the top of your voice, just find a time when
this won’t be a problem.
NERVES:
Nerves are caused by lack of confidence which comes from lack of
preparation or perhaps trying something which we sort of know is
more than we are capable of even with preparation. It’s like a job
interview. You are nervous if you haven’t prepared or really don’t
have sufficient knowledge or experience for the job you are applying
for.
You need to be relaxed. The voice box works best when you are
relaxed.
The lack of confidence makes you edgy. With music you need to be
sure of the tune, lyrics and arrangement and also sure that the song
is right for the performance. In other words “will they like it ?”.
As said before, you sing at home for yourself, you sing in public
for the audience. If you don’t like that, then I’d say, don’t do it.
PERFORMANCE
Performance is everything. Unless you have a truly fabulous voice
and people love your voice so much that they are happy to listen to
it while you just stand there and sing, you’ll have to put some
thought into the delivery/performance of the song(s). No use just
standing there “like a tin of milk” as they say. Performing in
public is all about engaging the audience and setting a mood,
whether it be happy up-tempo, romantic, humorous, serious, sad or
whatever. If your singing is not note perfect, it can be overlooked
if your performance/delivery has charisma. I don’t naturally have a
great deal of charisma (thankfully my wife Carol has) so over the
years I have mostly sang songs which people know or have a chorus
and it has got me by. Carol and I have a repertoire of about 80
songs and about 75 of them have a chorus. We are not what you’d call
great singers so if we didn’t engage the audience in the songs then
to be honest there would be little point singing in public as the
audience wouldn’t be getting anything out of it at all.
So, if you want to sing and need some help, please call me and I may
be able to use my experience to help you and as with my other
lessons, can supply backing tracks of certain songs, in suitable
keys and we can work together to achieve your ambitions.
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