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Curbing?

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Olem

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I know that curbing needs a bit of a hold or cry, that it´s a called mix voiced by some, i have also heard a couple of examples of it like for example Stevie Wonder. Now, i was posting a clip here the other day with an Iron Maiden song called "Run To The Hills" and most people say that he is singing in curbing, so i am trying to find this mode. I post some clips here where i try to sing in curbing. Am i on the right path or what, please tell me what you think? Either way, what can i do to improve?

http://www.box.net/shared/1rgu6ujxnz

http://www.box.net/shared/shr359j2km

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Hmmm, not sure what you were doing. Sort of a partial or reinforced falsetto, e.g. headvoice with fairly loose closure with just a little bit of cry in it, IMO. Only heard the first one because my satellite kbps speeds are so crappy

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Hmmm, not sure what you were doing. Sort of a partial or reinforced falsetto, e.g. headvoice with fairly loose closure with just a little bit of cry in it, IMO. Only heard the first one because my satellite kbps speeds are so crappy

hiya matt, remember the time you said lou gramm was a great singer, but never ready had any soul?

listen to this. (i never heard this song before.) plus a gorgeous little guitar solo at 3:23

(b.t.w. this is curbing as i understand it to be.)

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Ok, more volume and more cry, more volume would be metal like neutral but if i add some cry also it must be curbing. Here are some more examples. Are there any curbing present here?

http://www.box.net/shared/f13avjesnu

http://www.box.net/shared/lshcms4xqy

http://www.box.net/shared/ztpx5js7oq

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Lol, I have warmest rising sun in my cell phone actually. Had a period when I listened to it every day. I'd hate to say he doesnt have soul, I think he's got lots of passion and soul. I think I still think though that he's got soul-a-plenty when he sings rock, but not as much as when he sings soul, but then again Ive only heard a couple of non-rock tunes by him .

Btw, IIRC, thats his brother on the guitar. Doesnt Lou live upstate NY somewhere? I bet you could find him doing little club gigs. I remember driving through New Jersey and we saw a dodgy little poster outside a dive: "Edgar Winters tonite at 7, $10 admission", which was pretty cool.

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Ok, more volume and more cry, more volume would be metal like neutral but if i add some cry also it must be curbing. Here are some more examples. Are there any curbing present here?

http://www.box.net/shared/f13avjesnu

http://www.box.net/shared/lshcms4xqy

http://www.box.net/shared/ztpx5js7oq

I don't think there is curbing on those clips either, except perhaps in the last one, which is actually VERY promising :) It sounded very cool, except that the first word ("run") was a bit off pitch but the other words were (mostly) spot on. The highest note was very cool and sounded great. I don't have time to check if it was an E5, but it was rockin' :) Partly due to the rasp, of course :)

But I think you need to first practise the basics of curbing, which can of course be found in the CVT book (or in SLS, although the approach is a bit different), before you put curbing into a song. You don't seem to get the "hold" in curbing completely. But it's pretty simple. Just whine, cry or moan like you're hurt. Imitating a whiney kid can be helpful. I don't want to post clips from instructionals here so I made one myself a few weeks ago and you can check it out - maybe it will help you get that sound. Just note that I'm no master at this and I feel that I could have done a bit better job at this, but I think you can hear what I'm talking about. Also, when singing, you don't want to have quite as much "hold" as you'll hear in this clip. Just beware, it's very silly: http://www.box.net/shared/revh0z9ccb

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Here are more tips. This is taken from the CVT web site and is free info:

Curbing is the only half-metallic mode. There is a slight ‘metal' on the notes. Curbing is the mildest of the metallic modes. It sounds slightly plaintive or restrained, like when you moan because of a stomach ache. Curbing can be found by establishing a ‘hold'.

Curbing is used in popular music when the volume is around medium and when a certain amount of metal is wanted on the notes such as in soft soul or R ‘n B. Curbing is used in classical music by men when singing medium volume (mf) in their entire range and when women singing loud (f) in the middle part of the voice and sometimes in the low part of the voice. Curbing is used in everyday life when you wail, moan, or whine.

Men and women use Curbing through all the various parts of the voice. The sound colour can be altered quite a lot. All vowels can be used. However, in the high part of the voice, the vowels have to be directed towards ‘O' (as in ‘woman'), ‘UH' (as in ‘hungry'), and ‘I' (as in ‘sit') to stay in the mode. The volume in Curbing stays more or less in medium compared to the other modes, ranging from medium quiet (mp) to medium loud (mf). It is not possible to sing very quietly and very loudly in this mode.

It's taken from an overview of CVT and the whole overview could help you. Here it is: http://www.completevocaltechnique.com/?q=en/Vocal-Technique/CVT-intro

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I'm always liking Lou Gramm more and more. He can sing well both clean and gritty - just about the perfect singer, really. Bob, what would be the best Lou Gramm/Foreigner albums or songs (even on youtube) to start out listening to? Btw. have you noticed that Lou has a timbre not unlike Brian May's voice? :) Well, at least to me, just a little bit. Kind of like Brian May on steroids.

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Thanx alot guys, and especially you Jonpall, that example of yours is a very good example. But i thought you sang quite high there and not very medium, weren´t you? Does Bruce really sing an E5 in curbing? That would be a little unique for a metal singer, wouldn´t it? Sounds like most metal singers use metal like neutral up in that range, or am i wrong. And an E5 in curbing most be on the limit for what a man could do in curbing wouldn´t it? Lou Gramm is one of my favourite singers too and i love the genre AOR. Of course we all heard the famous Foreigner tunes so i would like to recommend a fantastic record he made in the early 90´s with a group called Shadow King, i think it´s just called Shadow King or the Shadow King and it´s one of my favourite AOR records. A must have.

Take care guys

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Well I sang a B4 in curbing and the higher you take curbing, the louder it gets - it just doesn't happen as rapidly as with the modes overdrive and edge and overdrive doesn't go higher than C5. So the volume there was pretty loud, yeah, because of the pitch, but if I had done it in overdrive or edge it would have been even louder. Because I did it in curbing, there was a slight "restrained" quality to it like I was holding something back. Bruce sings the E5 in mln (metal-like-neutral, which is like softly and relaxed, but with tons of twang which makes the tone loud, piericing and powerful). But the OTHER notes in the chorus are in curbing. You can hear it from the vowel choices. You COULD do it in curbing, but mln is easier and truthfully, both the modes and the vowels start to merge into each other that high, so it's of little point to make it harder for you. CVT says that curbing has no upper limit but most guys would probably start to merge from curbing to MLN at about C#5 or so. I'll listen to that Shadow King album for sure, thanks! :)

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Thanx alot guys, and especially you Jonpall, that example of yours is a very good example. But i thought you sang quite high there and not very medium, weren´t you? Does Bruce really sing an E5 in curbing? That would be a little unique for a metal singer, wouldn´t it? Sounds like most metal singers use metal like neutral up in that range, or am i wrong. And an E5 in curbing most be on the limit for what a man could do in curbing wouldn´t it? Lou Gramm is one of my favourite singers too and i love the genre AOR. Of course we all heard the famous Foreigner tunes so i would like to recommend a fantastic record he made in the early 90´s with a group called Shadow King, i think it´s just called Shadow King or the Shadow King and it´s one of my favourite AOR records. A must have.

Take care guys

I've done a F#5 in curbing http://www.box.net/shared/54q0z4gpm8 . But it's freaking hard, as you can hear I have a veeeery light sound color in that one. But I've heard an E5 of some tenor of youtube who managed to pull it off with a darker sound color and it was freaking insanely powerful. Right now I'm focusing on being able to do curbing in E4-C5 persistant instead. It takes awhile. ^^'

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Lol, I have warmest rising sun in my cell phone actually. Had a period when I listened to it every day. I'd hate to say he doesnt have soul, I think he's got lots of passion and soul. I think I still think though that he's got soul-a-plenty when he sings rock, but not as much as when he sings soul, but then again Ive only heard a couple of non-rock tunes by him .

Btw, IIRC, thats his brother on the guitar. Doesnt Lou live upstate NY somewhere? I bet you could find him doing little club gigs. I remember driving through New Jersey and we saw a dodgy little poster outside a dive: "Edgar Winters tonite at 7, $10 admission", which was pretty cool.

yes, he lives about 300 miles from me in rochester, ny.

i actually emailed him once telling him how much i admired his vocal abilities (trying not to sound like a star-stuck groupie, lol) and actually asked a bunch of questions about vocals including wheher or not he had had any vocal training.

i got an email back from his brother ben, with all the "thanks from lou", and yes he has had vocal training, but post-foreigner to be able to last and sustain day after day performances.

one of my musician friends opened for him once...i couldn't close the store to go.

i must have posted over 300 youtube comments and one was "lou, if you ever read this post and after you retire, (yes, he plans to retire soon) you decide to teach vocals, i'd like to be your first pupil.

i don't care what anyone says...as a solo vocalist, with a very distinctive timbre, few guys could touch him in his prime. and he always sang pretty "naked" (with not a hell of electronics and bells and whistles) live.

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I'm always liking Lou Gramm more and more. He can sing well both clean and gritty - just about the perfect singer, really. Bob, what would be the best Lou Gramm/Foreigner albums or songs (even on youtube) to start out listening to? Btw. have you noticed that Lou has a timbre not unlike Brian May's voice? :) Well, at least to me, just a little bit. Kind of like Brian May on steroids.

glad to hear that jonpall, i was afraid i was boring you guys with him. oh man, where do i begin?

he's one tough vocalist to emulate. and he's notorious for singing his balls off high, and then at the end he drives himself up a higher yet.

shadow king (the whole album is awesome)

i assume you've heard "juke box hero" and "hot blooded" ...if not, you should.

these are live beauties:

these are not easy vocals!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwuB2Oaekc4&feature=related

i love the intro to this song, not found on the album:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MZiSntiI08

this earlier song, the intensity of last two high notes blows me away.

3:35 to the end.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x430fv_foreigner-blinded-by-science_music

two more i love

a bitch to sing urgent and sound that way!

here he's more pop but still those awesome highs at the end

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZKi9R9C7vw&feature=related

and this one to me is a masterpiece! the end notes after 2:55 to the end are incredible!

http://www.myvideo.de/watch/2310691/Foreigner_With_heaven_on_our_side

let me know.

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