Any other singers here?

[oldfolkie]

Sorry Oldfolkie, recovering from a flood this last weekend in my Condo. ...
Wanted to Talk a little about your folk influences. I am guessing that you sing folk (duh   ) and am curious to your style and the voices that have inspired you.
To get things rolling I will start with mine. Of course, touching on it earlier Karen Carpenter is my biggest influence but not really considered folk. In the folk genre, and even though her popularity has only recently surfaced my biggest vocal inspiration is Eva Cassidy. ...
Reaching back in time though I have to say I love Sandy Denny. My love for folk generates from the simplcity in the vocal stylings and in that they vary so differently with each performer. I find it interesting that alot of repeated renditions (or covers) of various songs that you hear nowadays, first came out originally as a folk song. Any thoughts??

My turn for apologies, sngwthme. I\'m on a big project at work & entirely swamped. Soon off for a much-deserved vacation. Will have to resume our discussion when I get back (not until second week of June). Was sorry to hear you had flood problems. There\'s a lot of that going around lately, it seems. We\'ve got wet basement woes ourselves. The trials of home ownership are endless.

In the meantime, yes, I sing folk. Mostly traditional, for a long time. By which I mean Western European & North American traditions, heavy on the British Isles. Early influences would be Ian & Sylvia, Joni Mitchell, Judy Collins, Joan Baez, Mimi & Richard Farina, Simon & Garfunkel, Bob Dylan (the 60\'s version), Tommy Makem & Clancy Bros. Also my Dad\'s country & western stuff including Jimmie Rodgers & Hank Williams.

Hit the folk festival scene early & often. Discovered Martin Carthy, the Watersons, John Roberts & Tony Barrand, Friends of Fiddlers Green, Fairport Convention (which is why I agree completely with you on Sandy Denny!), Steeleye Span, June Tabor, others too numerous to mention. Not just folk, classical, blues, rock, bluegrass, reggae, metal. Came late to punk & jazz. Totally avoid most pop & lounge stuff (apart from the occasional song that hits me just right).

Have also begun to discover some other Western European bands, from Brittany, Spain, Holland, Sweden & Denmark (usually seen first at the Old Songs Folk Festival or Champlain Valley or our local one in Ottawa). Current favourites are my local trio (& good friends) "Finest Kind".  

I currently sing a lot of shape note (see fasola.org if you\'re interested) which is great fun. Also play 12-string guitar & sing an eclectic mix mostly for myself; the occasional open stage too. Once in a while I sing with a group, obscure Christmas stuff.

Eva Cassidy doesn\'t ring a bell, but will look her up. Thanks for the tip. Karen Carpenter...well, I have to confess that by the time she was active I\'d gone deep into trad. folk & didn\'t re-surface until she was gone. So I have no opinion!

I also find the diversity of folk endlessly interesting. It bleeds across all the lines into other genres of music. Everything starts with it. I don\'t always care for the covers, but I love the way they develop. The "folk process"!

[oldfolkie]

OK, I\'m shamelessly bumping my own thread with a question:

Have any of you used vocal exercise books to help improve some aspect of your singing, and were any of them any good? If they were, which ones & how did they help?

[Strawberry Vale]

There are vocal workout CDs that are really good... I\'ll try to find the website for ya...I think the company is "the Vocal Coach" or something like that.  They are awesome for keeping your voice in shape, they keep reminding you to sit up tall and little singing tips, etc..  you can get the one for your range and also there\'s some that are for expanding your range etc.

[oldfolkie]

That gave me a start, SV, thanks! I found this link  http://www.vocalcoach.com/ and it looks like it has some stuff I could use. Plus, they have a sale on right now. I think I\'ll try a couple of their CDs, and see if it helps. Breathing & warm-up are my critical points. Let\'s see... of course, that doesn\'t mean I\'m giving up my real live voice coach, but she takes the summer off!

[svale]

hey OF did you order a CD?? :)

re: the topic of \'hearing your own voice on tape and hating it" ..  keep in mind that most \'tapings\' like of a lesson etc are going to sound horrible no matter who the singer is...just because of the poor quality of the reproduction..   I bet if you had Eva or Sebastion singing into a little tape recorder it wouldn\'t sound all that hot (ok, maybe a bit better but...)   Seriously,  you really need GOOD gear to get a good reproduction of your voice.  The better quality gear, the more true the reproduction - that\'s what I believe anyways, then there\'s nothing getting in the way...  
e.g. we just got a 32 channel Soundcraft and we\'re amazed at the difference in sound from just comparing to our old Mackie 24, and also have been testing different mic-pre\'s and it\'s amazing the differences.  The solid-state ones seem to smooth the vocal out a bit (at least the ones we tried), and the tube ones give it a grittier, but maybe more \'real\' sound.  Personally I love reverb in my headphones when recording cause if I think the better I sound in my ear, the more I"ll be confident about my voice, get into the song, just relax and sing.
(all above comments are completely my opinion only..)

[svale]

hey Oldfolkie,

I uploaded a song on Travis\' server... let me know if you like :-)  It\'s a bit \'folky\' I think...   it wouldn\'t let me edit after, so it says "whatintheworld_sc" as the title, but it\'s actually called "Broken Like Mine".  

peace,
L

[oldfolkie]

Really enjoyed that, svale. Folk-rock, just a touch of blues (but not the overly whiny kind LOL). Nice tune, lyrics & arrangement. It\'d be good to dance to, as well! I found myself harmonizing right away.

Do you work with this group a lot? That\'s you singing? If that\'s typical of your material then WOW  

[svale]

hi OF
Thanks so much! glad you liked it.... re; the \'group\' there really isn\'t one...I just write tunes and me and my hubby record them. That one actually we were able to record at a semi-pro studio in town cause I entered it in a song contest and won some studio time... so we hired a standup bass player and drummer, and I played guitar, and my husband did the piano/keys and backups, etc...  

We\'re trying to get a permanent band happening though and hope to do some live stuff around town soon!  :-)

[sngwthme]

Hello Svale and welcome to the discussion. I was finally able to find the way to your song, since there was not a link, all I have to say is I REALLY liked it! I would have no objections to hearing more. Thank you for sharing it with us.
I have to admit that I am a little envious. Not just of your song and abilities as a song writer but also of those from our fellow forum friends here like Chris Moss and Chris Dicicco (hope I spelled that right Chris) and Hex to name a few. You all have hands on instrument talent that I find to be amazing.
      
Ok steering back to this "singers" thread, I just wanted to point out that in the previous discussion regarding hearing ones own voice and disliking it, there was no mention of or has anything to do with the equipment being used. I mean I do believe that it will be very difficult to find anyone on this forum who will argue the point of sound on good quality equipment, but whether the equipment is good or bad hearing your own voice can be frustrating when you are not hearing vocally on the out what you thought you were putting in.

Oldfolkie:
Shamelessly bumping your own thread, you are so funny. An answer to your question, the only instruction tape that I have, came from my old choir teacher. I was having difficulties recovering from strep throat one year so I asked him if he could help get me back on track. He recorded for me about 30 minutes of warm ups on the piano, consisting of scales and notes in different keys and arrangements, it is really great and it helped me immensely. I often use it today. I am anxious to hear how well The Vocal Coach CD's work for you, so please keep us posted.
 
Reviewing your list of influences and interests in music, sorry so late but going back to our previous discussion, I found myself looking in a mirror, so to speak, since I too enjoy much of what you have listed. You have also peaked my interest in several others that I have never even heard of so I thank you for that. I have a few other things Id like to ask but to keep this short, tried and failed, I will PM you later because we have to talk about shape note, I am extremely interested because I love it too!

[oldfolkie]

I have only just got the CDs in the mail, so haven\'t had a chance to try them yet.  I went for Breathing & Warmup, since those are the areas I feel the most need for. They don\'t have a relaxation one, which is the other biggie, but I can craft one of those from stuff I own.

This business of trying to hear your own voice is a tough nut to crack. No matter how good the reproduction, it\'s still going to be qualitatively different from what you hear in your head. I still find that my coach tells me something is better and I can\'t always hear it. Funnily enough, though, I can usually feel it. More comfort in production usually means better sound.

[gkg]

but can you reproduce it?

[oldfolkie]

but can you reproduce it?

Good question! It takes a bit of practising to get the physical memory established, but then, YES! Well...most of the time    I find nerves make things fly out the window sometimes.

[gkg]

NERVES.  they are not my friend.

getting better but still in all... i have nerves of steal when a car is speeding my way as i cross the street, will even stand still and stare the fucker down if they\'re about to jump a light and hit me - that\'s a breeze and i go on my merry way.

ask me to stand alone and sing, and i wind up with cold sweat down my back and my heart in my throat.  i never got the training i\'d love to have had... and i\'m positive that shows.

oh well... so i sing in the dark with a margarita or two propping me up.  

[CMA]

Im in to spectrally retracting famous peoples voices and like mapping it on to my own voice..so you get like, this weird mutation voice like of mine and someone well reconizable.. it sounds pretty good. also i got my computer to sing once, im quite into having a hit with a computervoice as the main charater or personality thats quite fun i reckon....

[gkg]

yes, i heard your computer sing - i like it.

i hate to raise a negative issue, but do you run into any copyright issues with using the voices of other people?  seems like a tricky thing to do, legally speaking.