Will-Sing-For-Supper

You have solid potential. You did this song fairly well, I think. You definitely should not let anything stop you. Keep up the good work! :cool:

I don't know why, but when I click that link, it shows me the name of the song, but there is no track. :o

I recommend that you ask these questions in the Vocal Technique section. Here is the link to that: http://themodernvocalist.punbb-hosting.com/viewforum.php?id=3 I think that section will attract some of the experts to answer your vocal technique questions. I will attempt to answer some of your questions, but I still would like to see this moved to Vocal Technique... 1. As you sing higher, your vocal cords change the shape and size of the hole where the air is passing through. With proper breath support, this increases the air pressure. It's this high air pressure, not volume, that allows you to sing high notes easily. One of the problems beginners have is taking large breaths just before they are about to sing a high phrase. this makes it more difficult to control with even the best breath support. With experience and focus, you will learn this. To simplify, proper breath support allows you to do a whole lot with the air you inhale because of the dramatic increase in air pressure. Yes, you will need to move more air for high volume singing, but not nearly as much as the average singer thinks you do. For me, this took years to figure out on my own because I didn't have a vocal teacher. 2. You will feel and hear the difference. Do the cheesy superhero pose by placing hand on hips, then slide hands up until your thumb and forefinger are on your lower ribs. When you inhale to start a phrase, you should feel everything you have your hands on expand at roughly the same time. I don't think it really matters where you feel it first, as long as everything feels as if it is expanding. 3. IMO, you should not intentionally tighten your abdominal muscles when singing. For me, my abdominal muscles begin to tighten when singing at a high volume, but I have heard some coaches say that you should not tighten their abs. Maybe someone can help me clarify that. 4. See # 2

I do this too! I sing along to "What About Love?"... Sometimes I creep myself out! :lol:

Cool! :cool: Yes, I believe that a lot of people are at least familiar with Jeff Buckley's version of "Hallelujah". I love that song! I see that you posted it, so I will check that out when I get time. You named some great singers, and would love to hear you sing "Somebody To Love" by Queen if you can. :D

That's cool, Ron. People should sing whatever they want. I am just saying that it is easier for the beginner to work on a song that is sung by their own gender. I know it was easier for me back in the day. Nowadays, I might practice a song like Judy Garland's "Over The Rainbow", doing my best to match her tone to see how closely I can get to it. That is a hell of a lot of fun. For beginners, and anyone else that wants a critique, (IMO) they should sing a familiar song that best fits their natural voice. This allows almost anyone with a good ear to compare them to the original. The easiest way to determine your level of ability is to see if you can match the original singer. I am probably not explaining myself very well. I hope someone that agrees will add a comment.

I agree 100%, just keep practicing, and you will improve.

Well, OK, since you said "please"! Seriously, I like it, and I don't even like Bon Jovi. I won't say that you are a better singer than Bon Jovi, but I like the sound of your voice much better than his. I listened to it twice, and I didn't hear any weak spots. Thumbs up! :)

I agree 100%. :cool:

My new friend plague said, " I could sing better when I was five than I can now. But ever since puberty hit, my voice is cracky and pitchy." If you had told us this in the beginning, it would have explained at least part of your problem. I went through puberty at an earlier age, and I had problems just like the average young singer when their voice changes so drastically. I have no idea if there are ways to deal with this. Maybe someone else can help with that. It is totally normal for your voice to crack and to have sudden changes in pitch during this period in your life. No need to worry, because it will go away when the changes are complete, and that whole process doesn't take a long time. Hope this helps... :cool:

My comment about my own abilities at age 6 was simply to establish my credentials. I also want him to understand that I know the level at which he could potentially be today. I hope no one thought that I was saying that so that plague would consider quitting, or that I am boasting. I was doing my best to walk on egg shells. I am merely seeking to motivate him. However, having said that, the thread is called "...Critique My Singing". This is where people come to find out what others think of their singing. I do apologize if I sounded negative. This reminds me that I should really limit comments about my own abilities. Many people take it the wrong way.

First, put up a clip with you doing exactly what you are describing. So, you won't need your guitar for this one... Also, I think this question might be better asked in the Vocal Technique thread. I'm new here, but I assume that is the best place for you to post it. I actually know exactly what you are talking about, but we still need to hear it. You are a talented musician, so I'm sure you understand. Don't worry about how bad it might sound. I make bad sounds every day, and no one (so far) has died from it! :o

From 2:08- 2:11, you are ending the phrase, "won't stop 'til it's o-ver". The "ver" part becomes breathy in the middle. You begin "ver" with a light vibrato, which is lost when you go breathy in the middle, and then your tone changes as you finish the note. Thankfully, I don't feel the need to explain how to fix it since you have been reading and doing the exercises. Work on breath support and projection. You already have a little vibrato, and this will come on it's own as you work on the basics. Hope this helps... :cool:

You are singing in two completely unblended registers. The predominant register is your "Axel Rose" falsetto. Since it isn't blended or connected to your chest register, it lacks the fullness and overtones it requires to sound decent. Roger Daltrey did not use falsetto in this song. I just now listened to it, although I have heard it hundreds of times in my life. I am 49, and was a Who fan in the 1970s. I have sung this song many times in my life. Falsetto is completely unnecessary, and sounds really awful for this Arena Rock song. Your chest voice is practically non-existent in this song. When you drop from the falsetto to chest, you sound like you dumped all of your air in the transition. The chest voice notes are completely unsupported, and they just kinda tumble out and down to the floor, hardly reaching the mike. Hope this helps :cool:

Here is the link to the original song. The singer is Adele, the song title is "Skyfall", from the crappy James Bond movie. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaJEmq209LA 1. Your topic heading says"critique my voice". We already know what you want, otherwise you are posting in the wrong place. Help us help you. Always put the name of the song and the name of the original singer in the title. If you have room left, give more information. 2. Pick another song by a MALE singer that feels comfortable to sing, and one that is sung as "straight and pure" as possible without trying to sound like someone else. A simple and easy song that everyone knows is the best way to get people to comment. 3. Ask people in the forum how to record a song. The iPhone ain't gonna cut it. You might want to beg, borrow, steal, or possibly even buy a mike and recording software. 4. Find some warm-up exercises online. Relax the neck and shoulders. Warm-up for at least 15 minutes, then run through the song until it sounds good. Now you are ready to record. 5. Sing in full voice. That means a relaxed open throat, neutral larynx position, proper use of the diaphragm and core muscles. For most beginners, this requires standing. Stand with your feet about 6 inches apart. Now, slide one foot forward about 3 inches. Find your balance. Now sing. In other words, you gotta do it again with a different song by a male singer that is in your comfortable range, and then I will be happy to give feedback. As nearly as I can tell, you have a lot of work to do. I look forward to your next recording.

Practically anyone can develop a "decent" singing voice. The only exception would be someone that has some sort of physical defect in their "instrument". The voice is a "wind instrument". If a guitar is made with a cardboard neck, it won't sound good. If a person is born with a physical defect in the areas of the body that are used to sing, then you will not sound good. As far as I know this is extremely rare. Sometimes, people will develop small bumps on the folds called nodes from improper speaking or singing. This even happens to professionals, and sometimes requires an operation to return to normal. The two that I know of are Elton John and Tom Petty. The odds are in your favor that you have a normal healthy instrument. You can keep it that way by avoiding things that are unhealthy for your voice, such as lack of sleep, dehydration, anxiety, screaming, eating and drinking things that make you cough, colds and sinus allergies, smoking, alcohol, and many other things. Before I answer your last question, I want to tell you a little about my background and experience. I am 49 years old, and I have been singing since I was 6 years old. My sister and I sang in front of a full church audience on many occasions, and I also sang in the church choir. I joined marching band to play drums at about 11 or 12, and played through high school. I joined swing choir in high school. Since then, I have done a bit of self-study by reading a book and daily practicing exercises and scales for 45 minutes, followed by 45 minutes of singing songs that challenged me. I am a goofy person, and I like to make people laugh, so I have also developed some really goofy voices. I might have already mentioned that developing the goofy voices, as well as mimicking South Park and Family Guy characters. At one point, I developed an Ethel Merman singing voice. I can sing Robert Plant, Frank Sinatra, Bono, Steve Perry, Stevie Wonder, The Beatles, The Beach Boys, Elton John, and Nat King Cole, just to name a few. I have a very good ear, and I am a huge music fan. I have listened to thousands of hours of probably every voice type and style of music. So, the previous paragraph was about establishing credibility. I also have respect for you because you have the guts to ask, "From 1 to 10 , with 10 being the worst, how bad am I?" The answer is: You are a solid 10. I was a much better singer than you when I started singing at age 5. I am sure that you won't be upset by this, because I can see that you want the truth. Your family and friends might not tell you the truth because they don't want to hurt your feelings. We are strangers who will never talk or meet, so you have chosen the perfect place to hear the truth. I have absolutely no reason at all to give you a 10 (worst). So, now that you know that you have absolutely no clue as to how to sing, you can focus on learning to sing. You can learn to sing. You can probably learn to sing well. You won't know until you try. Don't worry about failure. Don't worry about embarrassing yourself in front of others. Don't compare your progress to others. Start now, and by the time you are out of high school, you should have improved dramatically. Good luck!

More suggestions: Are you still in school? Sign up for drama, public speaking, debate club, etc. This will strengthen your voice. Talk to your pastor, minister, preacher, or whatever you call him. Ask him for advice on public speaking. If you have ever been in a southern baptist church, you know the power that preachers have in their voice. They can raise the roof. A powerful speaking voice is easily trained into a powerful singing voice. People that talk a lot will generally strengthen their voice, I strengthened my voice one summer when I took a temporary job in telemarketing. My job was to talk on the phone for 8 hours a day, 40 hours a week. I don't recommend that you do that, but if you are the shy and quiet type that doesn't talk much, then it's time to find fun social activities that encourage you out of your shell and get you to speak with volume and confidence. This will safely strengthen the vocal folds as well as help you to "find" your voice. You will find resonance and proper placement of the vowel sounds if you work at it. Seize every opportunity to speak in front of a group of people. Read aloud to yourself alone in your room if that works. Read poetry and song lyrics. Buy a metronome, and read song lyrics in time to the metronome.

Thanks, Ron. Yeah, just sing in your comfortable range. It will expand on it's own while you are training. Daily vocal exercises will strengthen your entire range if you are doing the appropriate exercises. You have to strengthen your chest register if you want a full sounding head register. They are not two separate instruments. When properly combined, you get what some call a mixed register because it seamlessly bridges the passage (passagio between chest voice and head voice. I will stop there. First, I am brand new to the forum. If I am wrong about anything at all, please correct me. I also might be going too far into these concepts for beginners. I ramble. Please forgive me. I should also say that I do not consider myself to be knowledgeable compared to probably most of the people reading this! :lol:

Please don't take this the wrong way, but nasality is not your problem. The problem is that you don't know how to sing. Teaching you to sing is beyond the scope of this thread. You need a vocal instructor. If you are still in school, sign up for Chorus, Choir, or whatever they are calling it these days. Check out your local churches. See if the choir director will work with you. If you can afford it, use the forum's vocal instructor directory to find a teacher in your area. Good luck!:)

You asked what Tose Proeski is doing at 1:26. I think that you are going to become a good singer because you were able to pick up on what is one of the hallmarks of a great vocalist, and that is vibrato. "Vibrato" is the Italian word for vibration, and is one of the advanced techniques that every singer should learn, even if they never use it for their particular style of singing. It is required for operatic singing. Listen to opera if you want to really hear some strong vibrato. If you want to sing in the style of Tose Proeski, then it is required. Check out him singing Lionel Richie's "Hello" to hear a more prominent vibrato. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnPn58Mf0TQ. When used lightly, you will hear it mostly in sustained notes. When used heavily, as in opera, it is practically constant. Now that you noticed the vibrato in his voice, go back and listen to his songs. I am not familiar with his work (I actually never heard of him), but I'll bet he uses it in every song. His style is similar to jazz vocals, which uses vibrato. However, now is not the time for you to learn vibrato. You don't have the basic skills yet, and you need those in order to train for vibrato. Your natural vibrato will begin to appear as you train. Meanwhile, you can still practice and record the "Fragile" song, just don't try to mimic the vibrato. My quote: "You must be able to hold this position while you vocalize a phrase, release it to exhale during your rests in the song, and inhale and hold again for the next phrase." You asked: "Does this mean that my diaphragm should not move upwards while I sing the phrase? I don't want to get this the wrong way." If you are doing everything else correctly, you will have the sensation that it is very slowly moving upwards. This is because you are allowing (in a very controlled way) air to pass over the vocal cords and up through the nose and out of your mouth. Properly engaged core muscles help you control this slow climb of the diaphragm. I will get back to you on your range question. I have to pull out my keyboard to do that. Maybe someone else will read this and answer the question. I also will put the vowel modification on the back burner. You are not ready for that yet. By the way, this reminds me of a young man I met in downtown Portland. He was playing his guitar and singing songs by his favorite band, Radiohead. I stopped to listen, and tossed a dollar into his hat. We started talking and he asked me to sing a song. I sang "Unchained Melody" by The Righteous Brothers. I used vibrato. He said he had never heard anyone sing like that before, so I told him that it's called vibrato. I thought it was funny, but didn't say anything. I didn't want to embarrass him. He didn't realize that Radiohead's vocalist uses vibrato! ;)

I have never heard this song before, but you have a professional level voice, no doubt about that. I enjoyed it. Thanks for sharing. I think I know why you asked about vowel modification. There was one high note that was (and hardly even noticeable) that sounded a teensy bit like a yell at the close of the note. A slight darkening of that note would completely fix it, but you probably already know that, and that's why you asked; to see if some goober like me actually noticed. An engineer could fix that in the studio, or you could do another take, and, in my opinion, it is practically ready to roll out the door to finer music stores everywhere! Edit: OK, I just listened to Josh Groban sing this, and you compare nicely. However, the little run you do that starts at the 4 minute 21 second mark is out-of-control which seems due to the fact that you keep changing the vowel instead of a barely perceptible modification (in this case a slight darkening is appropriate). You start the phrase with "my confessiouhhhh". That part is fine, but then you switch to "ehhh" at about 4:22 for a second, then switch back to "uuuh", then back to "ehhh" to connect to the final consonant, "n". Why? The word that you are singing is pronounced con-fe-shun. The run must must maintain the "uuuh" vowel from "sh" to "n". There is no "e" or any other vowel in there. If you were attempting a vowel modification here, then I must first say that it is unnecessary. However, if you think you sound like you need it, then use the correct vowel. The correct modifying vowel "uhh" is "aaah" and should be mostly visualized in your mind, and lightly allowed to slightly color the vowel. In the lower notes, you can apply this technique to give some body to the note. If done lightly, it will help. Do it too much, and you sound like Creed. Hope this helps.

I told him bowel movement, but coughing and laughing aren't nearly as gross! Seriously, though, we are talking about the same thing.

This will sound gross, but learning how to slightly "bear down" as if you are about to take a dump will approximate what the deep core muscles should be doing. This is done very lightly. Do NOT create extra tension in your body. Stand tall. Pretend you are sitting on the toilet. Relax as much of your hip, stomach, and lower back muscles for a few seconds, and then bear down until your sphincter moves. Yes, I have done this many times, and when you are done roflmao, etc., then get back into position. That last paragraph is probably worth it's weight in gold for unintended comic relief, but since it is totally at my expense, we'll let it roll. At the beginning of your sphincter exercise, you are engaging a large group of voluntary muscles, but the way they are engaged is nearly effortless. You can learn to engage them while breathing in and out (otherwise people would pass out on the toilet). You will feel as if something is pressing against your pelvis from deep inside your bowels. Stop and hold.Relax and release, take a slow breath. As you inhale, move your bowels downward. That isn't what is actually happening, but it's best to think of it that way. It's easier to visualize, and easier to find that way. Anyway, those must be engaged, and they must stay engaged while singing the phrase. The nasality issue is separate from breath support. Professional singers that use nasal tones have plenty of breath support. If they didn't, it would sound horrible. As someone else said in this thread, you have already chosen a style, you just didn't know it. It's somewhere between indie folk and wimpy pop. Sorry, I can't remember the proper name for that style. Nasality can usually be cleared up within a few minutes of working with someone who will help you first on lowering your soft palate a little, as well as showing you the difference in the "coloration" of your vowels. In other words, the correct "a,e,i,o,u, and sometimes y" sounds. If you actually talk like you sing, then you have lots of work to do. Don't give up if this is what you want, but I would advise a different style. Your best bet is to either seek out a vocal coach and get re-trained, or ask people in this forum who you should choose to record. It doesn't take much to impress me. If you can sing Mary Had a Little Lamb perfectly, with full tone, vibrato, power and projection, then I will definitely be impressed. Baby steps, buddy, baby steps... I would love to hear you record a simple song that everyone knows. That will get lots of people helping, I imagine. We need to understand how your normal, natural voice sounds, when singing with no strain something simple, doing your best to sing with an open throat without going so wide that you sound nasal. Let me explain nasality. At the extreme, you have some actors and actresses that make a living doing funny nasal voices for comedy films and television. It's used a lot in country music, and of course by boy bands. By partially blocking the air from entering the sinus cavities (called the mask in singing) as you sing, you can totally change the tone of your voice. I think that some people instinctively do this to cover up something that they see as a problem with their voice. the other reason, of course, is that beginners sometimes think that's cool, and they try (unsuccessfully) to emulate that sound. In other words, they are attempting to do something that was someone else's voice gimmick, and that is always a bad idea. You will try to move your mouth and throat all kinda artificial and different ways, and it will never sound good if you don't have the problem that the famous singer does. In other words, you can't fix what isn't broken, or, "if it ain't broke, don't try to fix it." In your case, we can't even tell if you have a problem, because we haven't heard your natural voice. Just talk through a few songs if you have to, it can help. Make the notes in a casual, conversational way. Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, and others were masters at this. Listen to those guys, maybe pick an easy one to try.

I have Sony Music Unlimited, so I synched up your clip with it to hear you and Bruce sing in unison. What I heard was Bruce in my left ear and you in my right ear on headphone. I made a slight delay to differentiate your voice from his. The first pitch problem that caught my attention was when you ended the phrase at about the 2 minute 11 second mark. The bottom note at the end of the phrase was off-pitch and weak. I suggest some practice with breath support exercises. The main issue in my mind is that you might not yet have the power and projection to do this particular song justice. I was a Maiden fan in the early 80s. I saw them in concert more than once during that period. I had their first few albums. Bruce Dickinson sings basically operatic tenor with full power, projection, and ringing vibrato. In fact, he's got all that in spades, although he claims that he never had formal training. My friend, you don't appear to be quite at that level. Bruce either was born with a perfect set of pipes, or he trained for a few hours every day, or someone taught him hyper glottal compression at an early age. Either way, he has a huge advantage on us mere mortals. All of your "demon" phrases are extra light, meaning no power/projection/resonance, etc. I know that there is a term for that kind of voice, but if it doesn't come naturally, then you have to learn it. You won't have a clue as to how you sound unless you record and listen over and over. Study Bruce and Ronnie James Dio. Analyze that specific part of their voices when they do it. Really listen to all of that fullness, that power that is in perfect control, using all of the best techniques. Now, mimic it. Singing is simply controlled shouting, even when the phrase is whispered. If you can control the way you speak, you can control the way you shout, and if you do that then you are singing. You will need to develop your power along with your control, use a lot of glottal compression to hit those notes with operatic power, projection, and vibrato. Having said that, my hat is off to you. That is a tough song. If you pursue this specific style, then you should reach your goals in time. Do this style for an hour and a half a day. Try some Dio or Judas Priest. Practice makes perfect! :cool: