Vocal cover of Cantarella, please help >.<

[Doozywu]

I recently decided to try out singing properly, and this is my first ever song cover, I would love honest critique and advice and everything! It would help out a lot,

I also have some questions which are causing me to kind of lose confidence in my singing however, so the answers would really help:

1) When I first sang this song, I sounded awful, is it normal to sound really bad at singing a song on your first try?

2) It took me awhile to actually sing the song until it didn't sound awful, I started singing this song back in January time. However, I only sang like once or twice a month (if lucky a few times) on average for an hour/half hour, or sometimes never because I only sing when no one is in my house due to shyness. Is it normal to have to spend that long on a song?

3)What is the average amount of time it takes to sing a song decently? I kind of think that because it took me that long to actually sing the song to the level it is now, it's like cheating/doesn't count/ not my actual singing voice if that makes sense

Thankyou very much! Much appreciated!

[The Aspiring Singer]

You have a unique and interesting voice - in a good way! A unique voice will help you stand out from the crowd and get more attention.

I see that you posted these same questions in the forum, and I responded over there first. Now that I've heard your song, I want to REALLY encourage you to practice more. You did this song well for someone who I would actually classify as someone who doesn't practice. I don't mean for that to sound harsh, so I apologize if it comes across that way. Like I said in my response in the forum, when you only practice twice a month, then you're not really improving between sessions. If you did this well for someone who doesn't really practice, then I can only imagine how well you will do once you start committing to practicing more.

Your tone, overall, has a little bit of tension and I think that it sounds like the root of that tension is in your mouth/jaw and how you sing your vowels. I listened to another version of this song on YouTube and it was in a different language, so I'm not sure if you are mimicking someone else's vowels or if they are your own. In either case, I would spend some time trying to loosen up the jaw and let the vowels open up more. Your tone gets quite lovely towards the ends of a few words when it sounds like you relax on that tension that I'm referring to.

Overall, you have good flexibility and range. But I will emphasize it again. The more you practice, the more effortless the song will sound on your voice with all those big jumps and the more even your tone will be from top to bottom.

Hope that helps! :)

[Doozywu]

Thankyou very much! Do you know any techniques which I could use to try loosen my jaw and stuff? : o

[The Aspiring Singer]

Place one finger on each side of your head, directly in front of your ear, right at the top of your jaw. Now drop your jaw like you're about to yawn. You should feel the flesh cave in a little bit. That should give you a good idea about how much space you can create inside your mouth with your just your jaw. Basically, you want to keep it loose and flexible so that it doesn't get in the way of creating your best and most open sound. Usually, jaw tension just means that you're not allowing the jaw to have its full range and it's getting in the way of your sound. Sometimes it can mean that you're overworking the jaw and that you're chewing the words, so try not to go to that extreme.

I wish I could be better help, but it's tough to describe without showing you.

If you get a chance, go to my website. It's brand new. I will be offering these exact kinds of vocal training tips through videos. (There are no videos up right now, but they're coming soon.) Right now, I have a few articles up about some basic singing technique.

www.theaspiringsinger.com