Song School 2008

I just returned from my third year at the Lyon’s Song School sponsored by Planet Bluegrass. Having skipped last year, I'm once again blown away with the expereince.

Over 4 days, I had a chance to study the craft of songwriting, vocals, guitar, and even native American flute from talented instructors that included Paul Reisler, Annie Wenz, Arthur Lee Land, Josh Ritter, Susan Werner, Steve Seskin, Moira Smiley, and Rebecca Folsom. The hardest part was picking which sessions not to attend.

I learned as much from the other “students” during evening impromptu song circles and general discussions. Many of these "students" are already performing musicians and teachers themselves, an amazing assembly of talent.

As I get a chance to digest the material, I will try to share some tidbits here. I may also just say the heck with it and write for the next month

"It's not what you say, it's how you say it"

This expression holds true for songwriting as well. Just think about how many times you understand the words in songs on the radio, yet you often understand the meaning of the songs. This week I worked with Ben Senterfit on creating colors with my voice and lyrics. Here are some of my take home points

- Low density (breathy) vs. high density (resonate, bassy) - Low density creates a sense of vulnerability. Deep and resonate singing shows more confidence. A great example of low density is Van Morrison's Crazy Love (he's got a whisper tone to his singing). For high density, just listen to anything by Frank Sinatra.

- Singing high vs. low - High notes tend to impart more energy and be used to be more aggressive. Low notes are more laid back and somber.

- Lots of words vs. few words in the same time - More words yield a faster pace. Less words a slower pace.

These are neat ideas, now all I have to do is apply them to my songwriting.

What to do if you suck at singing

There's a discussion on the web site, Blogging Muses about "what to do if you suck at singing." I added the comment below:

I was one of the people who was told, play the guitar, but whatever you do don't get near the mike. About 5 years ago, I decided to learn how to sing. For one main reason, to get my songs heard!

I started in group classes where I could hide my voice in a crowd. The instructor, Julie Davis, started the class with "everyone can sing, no one is tone deaf. You just need to learn how." Great advice, yet I had my doubts! After about a year, I started private lessons and am still continuing once a week with Ben Senterfit. I went through 5 or 6 teachers before I started working with Ben.

What I found out was by learning to sing, I improved my songwriting. My melodies were limited because of the limited range of my voice. With more confidence, I can play my voice like my guitar (I should say like a beginning guitar student). I also have confidence to sing in front of a crowd and my songs are getting heard.

Am I an excellent singer, no! But at least I don't sound like fingernails on the blackboard. Check out my songs, at jeffsongwriting.com.

Practice the easy stuff

On Monday, I was playing my latest song for a small group. It went over well, but I did make a few small guitar mistakes. This has happened at my last few shows, strong vocals, mistakes on the guitar. If you ask me what's the strongest part of my music, I'd easily say guitar.

Upon reflection, I realized that I put most of my practice time on the vocals. I worked on how I was breathing, what note to hit where, different phrasings, etc. I recognized challenging areas, practiced the transitions, and figured out how to recover from mistakes. Since the guitar part was relatively easy, I only practiced to support the voice. In essence, I took the guitar parts for granted. It's no wonder that I made mistakes.

My take home lesson is to practice the easy stuff (guitar) with the same intensity as the hard stuff (vocals).