Attempting to Play Guitar

So aside from improving my singing this semester I have also been learning to play the guitar. I wouldn't say I could play it exactly, but I have gone from never having picked one up, to mastering a few basic chords and melodies. I've never attempted to learn a song from scratch with just the chords written in front of me though - that was throwing myself into the deep end.

Having looked at the score for Passenger's 'Let Her Go' with Natalie, who was playing the piano part, for about an hour I was ready to smash the guitar into pieces, I couldn't get the hang of what I was doing as I didn't really know where to start. Frustrated I asked for help and realised that I was trying too hard and I needed to start out with something simple. Instead of playing the full melody with the correct strumming pattern I played only the block chord of every chord change, this allowed me more time to move my fingers and get to grips with the piece.

I'm still by no means good but I feel like I improved a lot in just that one session, I worked hard and went from barely stringing two chords together to (slowly) working up to fluent changes. It just goes to show determination and hard work do indeed pay off, I found a YouTube video of the piece I'm practicing so that I can rehearse outside of class and hopefully get to grips with it before the group assessment.

Songwriting Inspiration

My main concern with writing a song of my own was that I doubt not only my own creativity but my knowledge of music, therefore I know that I need a relatively simplistic melody as I am not as confident with my guitar playing as my singing as I only know a small selection of chords which I struggle to synchronise. Initially I thought that I would begin with the lyrics, however I know what I want my song to sound like more than I know what I want to say. Therefore I have begun my research with looking at some more simple guitar songs.

Coincidentally, one of my biggest my musical inspirations is Ed Sheeran, who I consider an amazing singer/songwriter and he also plays his own guitar. I admire Ed because he writes his own material and every song comes from him. His personal experiences and I feel this adds so much more to a song. I instantly thought of Ed because of his track 'Small Bump'. Like many of Sheeran's songs the rhythm melody is simple enough to play on a guitar, I think this is due to the fact that Ed lets his lyrics do the talking, he doesn't need complex compositions to make a hit, but again, this is only coincidentally why Sheeran sprung to mind. 'Small Bump' is about a miscarriage, again Sheeran is writing from a personal perspective about his own close friend who lost her baby. I particularly looked at the lyrics;

"Cause you were just a small bump unborn
For four months then torn from life
Maybe you were needed up there
But we’re still unaware as why"

as the key themes are loss, particularly losing someone too soon. There's also the questioning of why that person was taken and how now we have to live never knowing why that person died. This is particularly resonant to me currently and I know that I want my song to be in memory of someone close to me. Another song of Ed's which holds resonance with me is 'Photograph' and the chorus lyrics which are;

"We keep this love in a photograph

we made these memories for ourselves

where our eyes are never closing

hearts are never broken

and time's forever frozen still."

Again, these lyrics speak to me and they made me realise we can take comfort in the photographs we have of a loved one we have lost. 

Developing Untuned Percussion

Our original performance of 'Monday Blues' was solely focused on rhythms. After studying melodies in class our challenge was to add accompanying vocals to our piece and develop it further.

We looked at the dynamics of the piece and decided our message could be made clearer through varying tempos and bringing people in and out of the piece at different times. We also further experimented with what sounds we could make from hitting different parts of the drum and incorporated this into our piece as the higher and lower pitch sounded nice when it contrasted.

We then devised the lyrics;

"Monday morning and I feel sick,

the weekends gone and it went too quick,

whiskey ,vodka , gin and rum,

why did I drink? I feel so dumb,

I do my makeup and brush my hair,

The hangovers bad but I've got to care,

I force a smile and act ok,

I'm stuck at uni for the whole day." 

This worked as a chant which we sang over the percussion piece.

Going Acapella

"Music singing solely or mainly without instrumental accompaniment" - Collins Dictionary

At first glance I thought acapella was easy, it's everywhere recently! In TV shows like Glee and the recent film Pitch Perfect - which focuses solely on four competing acapella groups. The music produced by Glee's acapella show choir The Dalton Academy Warblers CD, 'Glee; The Music presents The Warblers', debuted at number 2 on the billboard 200 charts and reached number 2 on the iTunes Albums chart (iTunes. (2010). Glee: The Music presents The Warblers.) Pitch Perfect grossed $64,998,368 (USA) as of 8 February 2013 (IMDb (2012). Pitch Perfect) - acapella is cool!

This video perhaps isn't a great example as it's from a film and so has probably been edited, however it is clear to see that the main melody is created by the singers making the noises of the instruments.

Bearing in mind that the majority of CMU1a aren't trained singers and had never gave acapella a go, we were never going to achieve something of this calibre however, we gave it a good go. First we had to establish who's voice fitted where, Hayley played us simple chords on the piano and we matched pitch. Eventually we had Reece as Bass, Chloe and Donna as Tenors, Jess, Natalie and myself as Altos and Sophie and Hayley as the Sopranos.

Looking After Your Instrument

My main aims throughout this module were to improve my singing, learn to control my voice through sustaining my breathing and knowing my own range and abilities. In the past I've predominantly tackled songs from a musical theatre genre as that's my background, with my choir I was classed as a 'mezzo soprano' however I sometimes took the alto line and at a push could handle soprano pieces.

My downfall is that I've never really learnt or been trained to sing professionally, I open my mouth and pray for the best. 

In class we learnt some basic breathing exercises which would allow us to monitor our breathing whilst singing. We began by simply producing noise, as a class we lay on the floor and made a sound as we exhaled. We also experimented with some more structured exercises, such as sustaining our breath for a number of beats. Practicing these exercises outside the rehearsal room means we will increase our breath capacity, enabling us to hold notes for longer.

I consider my voice my main instrument and therefore it is important to condition it but also to look after it. I watched several tutorials on YouTube which covered warm ups and how to access your voice, "Professional Vocal WarmUp 1 - Opening Up The Voice" - Eric Arceneaux. (2013),

 

is the first in a series of videos by Mr Arceneaux which teach beginners some basic vocal techniques, which I found very helpful. I also discovered "Sing Wise", a website on which Karyn O'Connor, a vocal technique instructor, writes what she advises to maintain a healthy voice, she writes in more specific detail about warming up, staying hydrated, sleeping enough, not smoking, carbonated/caffeinated drinks and certain foods, all of which she claims can affect your voice.

Learning the Language of Music

The thought of music theory used to be an entirely alien concept to me, almost like a foreign language. I would stare at a stave (I only just learnt it was a stave) and get nothing back. I gave it a go however and realised that it's very much like the grammatical rules that govern written language. By this I mean that once you know the basic rules, you can pick it up. I'm now able to read simple treble clef notation and tap out rhythms correctly. I consider this quite a large step as I had no previous experience with sheet music and can now follow a melody and stay in time and tune! 

From being in choir from a young age I was familiar with reading vocals from sheet music, however I have developed this skill through the classes work with accapella, in which we read from a score. 

One of my aims was however to develop my guitar playing and so I have been looking at a site called 'Ultimate Guitar' which is an online database of songs and guitar parts. I can't read tab however which is what guitar melodies are written in, however this site covers that with guides as to where to play each chord, it even reminds you where to put your fingers to achieve each chord! I aim to learn a very simple song. My main struggle with the guitar is changing chords quickly, I am confident that I know certain chords but putting two together is proving problematic.

Discovering Untuned Percussion

As a vocalist my immediate interpretation of 'music' would be a stereotypical song. I also would probably limit my knowledge of possible instruments, however through musicianship I've had my eyes opened.

When confronted with a djembe and told we'd be experimenting with untuned percussion I'll admit my heart dropped a little, however having looked at the various ways and means of creating this branch of music I'm a lot more appreciative of it.

Essentially it's all about rhythm, and it doesn't matter how that rhythm is created! My favourite examples of this are embedded below;



 I love how you can literally tap out a beat on anything and then add in a counter rhythm or even a melody/vocals, even a complex basketball choreography!

 

 This led to the class getting back on the djembes and creating our own attempt at untuned percussion which we named 'The Monday Blues', we experimented with the different sounds we could achieve from hitting different sections of the drum. We then brought in different rhythms at different times to create a dynamic piece.

A Brief Introduction...

'Music' is a very small word to encompass something that takes as many forms as there are cultural or subcultural identities. And like all small words, it brings a danger with it. When we speak of 'music', we are easily led to believe that there is something that corresponds to that word. But when we speak of music we are really talking about a multiplicity of activities and experiences; it is only the fact that we call them all 'music' that makes it seem obvious that they belong together." - Cook, N (1998) Music; A Very Short Introduction.

Until two weeks ago I didn't consider myself 'musical', although I listen to music every day I had never picked up an instrument or really considered what music was or what it meant to me.

Through beginning this module it's clear that there is so much more to being musical than the ability to play an instrument. As a performer I think it's so important to have an affinity with music as it plays such a huge part in what we do every single day. Although I cannot play an instrument (yet), I posses skills with rhythm through my dancing and with vocals through musical theatre training, something I hope to be able to improve throughout the module.

My name's Ashley, I'm 18 and currently a student at Sunderland University studying Performing Arts. I love to act and dance and I'm discovering more about my musical side every day (all about becoming a triple threat). I'm currently learning to play the guitar and I hope to improve my singing voice over the course of the year as I'm a huuuuuuge musical theatre geek. My taste in music is pretty versatile as I come from a very musical family and I listen to a little bit of everything, if you shuffled my iPod you could go from Broadway's finest musical numbers to Nirvana.

In conclusion, this blog will be a composition in it's own right, of my journey through musicianship!