aravindmadis

Very interesting take on the song Felipe.. Wonderful as always. This is one of my favorite songs of Iron Maiden. The Bruce Dickenson version has a lot more raw power and brute emotion(if that is indeed a thing), which gives the signature kick to the song. Your version sounds so easy(like you are lazing, just having got up), which has a completely different feel. While this is a wonderful interpretation which you have made your own, it sounds like not the best song for your voice. Then again what do I know, perhaps I am biased since I like the original version so much. All in all an amazing lesson for singers like me on how to render a song differently and yet do justice to the original. I think I have a much heavier set voice in the high range than you. Bruce's version is a bit too much for me to render. Your song offers a great lesson for me. Kudos and keep posting..

I can do relaxed head voice. Personally I don't mind a bit of "forced" tonality, especially in Western music, somehow, I feel that a little bit of imperfection conveys the human side. Also, with my relaxed head voice, it may have a larger tonality gap, from the rest of the song. This is a balance that I can never seem to successfully get. In a world where the feedback would be instantaneous, I could do what the composer wanted... But these things I guess are very individual centric, in terms of what listeners prefer... Thank you for your feedback..

Hi Folks,, Been a while since I posted. Have been working on my technique for the last several months. This is a cleaned up version of a song that I have done earlier. Deceptively tough song to sing. Let me know what you think..

One of my favorite songs.. Great singing.. Keep up the good work..

Hi Rob, Thanks for you note. I have left you a PM.

Sounds great. I am always envious of dark sounding voices especially high ones. From the video, it looks like you have a pretty decent technique.. All I can say is keep up the good work and keep posting more..

Hi MDEW, this is one of my favorite songs. This is very difficult to cover in a single voice and guitar combo since the falsetto has layers of multiple tracking to give the perceived weight. Also, to maintain a tonal consistency across a wide range is quite difficult. I liked that you have used a light tone to keep the variation minimal. There are a couple of spots where I feel you can improve 1. When you slide into falsetto at 0:40 for e.g. you sound like you slightly unsure where exactly you ARE sliding into falsetto. The outcome is this uncertainty lags on a bit too long and messes up with the tone at that point. What works for me is to visualize the series of notes that make up this portion and clearly identify when I am going to slide into a falsetto mode. Also, what prep work I need to do before doing that and how many notes back do I need to go for that. When you do this, you may find this this portion may be smoother. 2. There are places where you are a bit flat and slightly off pitch. It is not a range issue as much as an attention issue. If you have a keyboard, you can play the actual notes of the song on the keyboard to tell you where exactly they lie. That way you can do this as a legato whilst not moving away from the center of the pitch... Keep up your good work..

Hi Folks, A few in the forum have indicated that I have a bright sounding voice, so I was tempted to cover some James La Brie! This is a work in progress version. Please indicate errors that you spot so that I can clean them up. Especially areas where you see a dipthong or onset issue! I find that to sing this song, I need to hear myself extremely well(Talking about the high parts in the latter half of the song). In a sense I have to visualize the note as it forms in my vocal chords. Even if my hearing is slightly off(through loud background) I have a big difficulty in getting the weight right. It leads to strain and off pitched notes. Therefore this is a very low margin song for me to cover live. Do you have any recommendations on how I can overcome this problem? Also any tips to improve the mix will be really useful!! Also suggestions for songs that you think will suit my voice!!

Thanks folks.. Gneetapp, still and always will be a vocal student.. Long long way to go!! Mivke, I am aware of the slight pitchy issue. I could not get the exact pitch without the timbre like you have pointed out. But in this genre, I felt a little bit of flat sound can help, if it can maintain the integrity of the tonal quality!!

Felipe.. You are too humble:) . I am trying to learn this song. I will try to learn to sing it the way you have sung, with a similar vocal weight. I personally feel that Bruce has a truly unique voice. There are many good youtube singers who can pull of the Bruce range, but it is nearly impossible to find an exact mimic of his tone and weight..

.. As always,, epic my friend!! I was not familiar with this song and I listened to the original after hearing your version and you sound like you can sing for the original band!! Bruce sounds a little darker and heavier set in the chorus. Is it a physiology function? I mean can someone with a lower center of voice exactly mimic the Bruce sound? But all in all, amazing work. Please keep posting more work!!

Beautiful voice and great singing Keep up the good work..

Hi Folks, It has been a while since my last post. This time I wanted to do something that is quite different from my last song(s). I have always wanted to do distortion at lower ranges. I just could not find the right support mechanism and way to do this without hurting myself. I have understood how to do this safely without injuring myself. Sometimes when I am not yet sufficiently warmed up I get a itchy feeling when I try to distort. If I am careful, it goes away after a while. I am assuming that I am not doing anything wrong because I can sing like this for more than an hour and I don't feel any effects later in the day or the next day. All in all, quite a fun song to sing with an epic sounding F#5 to finish it. I wish I could get some grit on this note, but for the time being happy with where I am!

Gneetapp.. I like your voice in the higher octave. It sounds more natural for your voice. I must say that I like Rob's version in the lower octave coz he has got that effortless low notes that create the more signature Rob sound! Quite a big task to want to sing same song in two different octaves, but great effort!

This is a great song for your voice. You have the right tone and range for this song. You may want to experiment with the following 1. More support and compression in the way you render the mid upper range. 2. Get some distortion on the high notes like 3.03. You will need to do support and compression for the same and it will have the rocker sound! You do these same sounds in 4:48 for e.g. It will be great if you can get this kind of sound in the high parts of the voice.. All in all great effort and kudos to take on such a tough song..

Thanks. that makes a lot of sense. It sounds to me like I get a darker sound in Curbing in comparison to overdrive or even neutral. I will keep that in mind. I usually sing lower parts in neutral coz they sound good to me! I have never experimented with curbing with my middle voice! Plus I tend to really really buckle down and focus on the tough parts of the song and do not focus as hard singing lower parts from a tonality standpoint. Guess this is a mental adjustment I need to make..

Compression is something I just cannot seem to get a good understanding off. I do something very similar to what you describe here. If I feel that certain parts of the song are low volume, I just normalize that portion and increase the volume. I am surely doing something really wrong with my mixing, cause my wife keeps saying that the highest parts and the most powerful parts of the song seem a bit muffled in the recordings and that I sound way better in person. Maybe I should stop reading free stuff on internet and sign up for a formal sound engineering course LOL!!

Thanks man.. I actually never realized the change of the melody on the "when I see your face" line. I am trying to experiment with new songs and genres. I don't want to do an exact replica of the original, since I want to see how my voice will suit the melody line and range. I make it a point only to listen to the core direction of the melody and try to sing it my way. I am training myself to sing original stuff and felt that this was one way for me to do this! So at some points I do inadvertently, end up altering the melody in a way that people may not like to or relate to! When you say mid high range, what lines in this song are you referring to? I might consider to explore that stuff further. Thank you for your comment.

Haha.. No way. I can say that it has taken me several years of hard work to get to this level, but I think I can improve a lot over the next several years also. Every song always brings to the fore, faults in my technique and tonal deficiencies which keep me motivated. I have never heard of Bruno Mars till a year ago. This particular song I heard it first time only a few days before I recorded my version and it is not music that I hear regularly. It sounded very catchy and I couldn't get the song out of my head. I was curious to see how my voice would sound singing this style and range. Normally I take a song that I think is challenging, just get an idea of the core melody and improvise from there. I don't want to or can't sound like Bruno does, but I definitely want to pick up the good things in his singing.

MDEW/Ronws. I have corrected the compression issue in "Just the way you are". I think this version sounds much better mix wise..

Hi Buddy. Your voice seems to come a long way from when you started posting(2 years ago if I am correct). There is way more structural integrity around your singing and less abrupt tonal changes. Your tone now has a professional quality which is a very good thing. So congrats and keep singing. With my limited knowledge. I see two areas of improvements based on what I have gone through 1. For a single take, you are mostly on pitch. But in my experience, pitch accuracy is less to do with physiology of singing but it is a mental adjustment that comes with pitch training. Just spend half an hour a day just listening to notes and try to memorize the aural distances by singing along with the piano(solfege helps). It is best done with a keyboard. check out the links below. See what happens is that with interval training our inner ears become more and more adept with the notes and if you do it regularly with your singing voice, then you will find it more easy to sing on pitch. Our ears visualize the notes to come and help us shape our vocal chords to sing correctly on pitch. https://www.iwasdoingallright.com/tools/ear_training/online/ 2. The second area you have to focus on is your descent. You seem to be quite comfortable in your heady mix, but when you descend, there are places where there are tonal loss and pitch issues. For e.g. at 1:15 where you sing "even heroes have". Your onset for "Even" seems to be wrong which is why your heroes have sounds off. You need to keep the compression/configuration that you use for the rest of the song here also. And when you descend, you have to sing low parts high with support, if that makes sense. We tend to focus too much on the high notes, but sometimes the descend causes all kind of issues in notes that are quite comfortable. With little practice and awareness you can easily overcome this issue.

Hi Folks.. Trying some contemporary pop this time. I had fun doing these. The John Legend song was relatively easier except for the falsetto(just cannot figure how to slide into a smooth falsetto). The Bruno Mars song was quite difficult. The final mix in "Just the way you are" is not upto mark. I just can't get my head around using compression correctly. Any tips would be appreciated.. Yes, my production sucks! I am going to make a conscious effort to make it better next time!

Goodness Benny! You sound amazing(I am sure you hear it a lot)! What a wonderful deep voice you have. I guess you are a bass right.. Such a rare voice

Wow.. Sound amazing Nice job.. Are you a native Italian speaker(just curious)