Country Singing (This is the Life by Amy Mcdonald)

I feel that country is genre that I struggled with, not naturally having that country twang/accent and going against what I have trained my body to do (creating a smaller space in my mouth and throat rather than a large space) was something I found very difficult. I also feel that with struggling to embody the twang of country it made the song sound quite dull and not as happy and upbeat like it is supposed to be. Although there were some positives, one of which was my articulation, something I usually struggle with when singing as I slur my words together, but by choosing a faster song I had to pronunciate each word more precisely. I think to improve in the future I would need to record harmonies to give the song more depth as well as spending more time trying to embody the country twang, I also think singing along to more than just a guitar would also help me to sound more upbeat and less dull.

Country

This week I am looking at Country music. Originating in the south of the United States in the 1920s, the roots of Country music come from ballads and folk songs. "Singers create the song from their speaking voice — they think of singing as an extension of speaking" (Philips, 2011) this means unlike classical singing you don't need to create a wide, open space in your mouth and throat. And of course you must have to add a twang to your vocals to really create a country feel to your singing. To achieve this many country singers sing through their nasal voice, you can determine the difference from nasal and non-nasal singing by simply pinching your nose whilst singing. The proper way to sing country is to use an accent, which makes country music very unique, although you should not force the accent.

"Have you ever noticed country singers like Dolly Parton are utilizing a very heavy accent? on the other hand, some of them are using a very slight hint of an accent such as Martina McBride, but the sound they create is very natural." (Become Singers.com, 2015)

Because I do not naturally posses the southern country accent needed to perform country music, I will not be able to sing with a very heavy accent like Dolly Parton and will be more influence by Martina McBride who sings with a much more subtle twang.

Pop Singing (To Make You Feel My Love, Adele)

This is a voice recording of me singing "To Make You Feel My Love" by Adele. I feel that this song suits my voice well but on the higher notes my voice becomes slightly shouty and I would need to improve softening my voice at these points. I also struggle to change from my chest voice to my head voice so the sound is not very flowing. My voice also sounds weak and almost breaking at points, this is something that will continue to improve the more I sing and I can tell has improved already, hopefully this will be prominent in my later recordings. Overall I think I succeeded in creating a nice pop sound with my voice, its simple and easy to listen to.

References

The Guardian (2009) Pop Singing Advice [online] Available at: http://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/may/10/pop-singing-advice [Accessed18th October 2015]

The Guardian (2009) Jazz Singing Advice [online] Available at: http://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/may/10/jazz-singing-advice [Accessed 29th October 2015]

Become a Singing Master (n.d.) How Can You Master Rock Music
Singing Techniques? [online] Available at: http://www.become-a-singing-master.com/rock-music-singing-techniques.html [Accessed November 13th 2015]

Philips, P. S. (2011) Singing for Dummies. 2nd ed. [pdf] Hoboken: Wiley Publishing Inc. Available at: www.ysa.yolasite.com/resources/Singing%20%20For%20Dummies.pdf [Accessed 22nd December 2015]

Follin, A. (2015) Vocal coaching for Musical Theatre [online] Available at: http://www.vocalskills.co.uk/Musical-theatre-singing-lessons.html [Accessed 28th December 2015]

British Phonographic Industry (n.d.) Catfish and the Bottlemen [online] Available at: https://www.bpi.co.uk/catfish-and-the-bottlemen.aspx [Accessed 2nd January 2016]

Pop Music

The first style of music I will be looking at is pop. Pop is short for popular, so pop music is usually what a lot of people like to listen to and is what we hear on the radio as chart music. Pop music does not always follow exactly what is written, singers add riffs, breaks, longer and shorter notes in order to make a piece of music there own. The intention of pop music is to communicated a feeling or emotion, therefore creating a different vocal arrangement can help to communicate your idea. After practising the techniques below I will sing a pop song and then analyse my outcome.

"All singing requires support, and pop is no exception. A good way to connect your voice to your body is to place a finger in front of your lips, touch them, and blow firmly. You should feel the connection to your stomach muscles, and the contraction of the abdominal area.
To work on speech quality, a vocal technique commonly used in pop that is closer to speaking than singing, try saying "uh-oh" with an edge on it. That's called starting a sound with a glottal onset, which means that the sound starts before the breath. If you say "ho-ho" with an "h", you can feel your breath escaping. Now say "uh-oh" again without the "h" and engage your abdominal muscles up a bit. The glottal onset is an important part of speech quality, which is the communicating factor in singing - it's what people recognise when we talk. Avril Lavigne and Alanis Morrisette both have terrific speech quality. Speech quality singing becomes much harder in the higher range. To practise this, try singing "ee", going up in thirds (ie do-me-so). The sides of the tongue should touch the insides of the top back molars. Add a glottal onset to "ee", then say "hee" with a big "h", and feel the difference - the former gives a clearer speech quality." (The Guardian, 2009)

Introduction

This semester I'd really like to push my singing abilities. To do this each week I will be looking into different genres of music and working on specific techniques for that style. I will be focussing on five different genres; pop, rock, jazz, country and musical theatre. From this is hope to figure out which style suits my vocals the best and create my individual piece of music from my findings.